Ever since North Carolina passed House Bill 2, we've been treated to celebrities voicing their displeasure with the law, municipalities threatening to cease all business with the state of NC (even when none existed previously), businesses denouncing the state and other assorted noise condemning the action. As usual, there's plenty of heaping piles of hypocrisy around - there are plenty of cases like the link where a company that refuses to do business in North Carolina is happy to work in middle eastern countries.
But that's not my issue.
No, the real problem as I see it is simple. The real problem with HB2 has been completely and utterly ignored. I've seen folks on "my" side of many issues make the claim that the actions in NC are much like what the gun grabbers do: They've passed a law based on what someone *might* do, much like gun grabbers pass laws about guns.
The problem, as I see it, is that there is anything in the past sentence after "law."
The real issue, as I see it, is that the state of North Carolina has passed a law that addressed, well, nothing. Anything that might happen that HB2 would prevent are already illegal - does it matter what plumbing the person in the stall next to you has if they're peering over the top of the stall at your junk? Is someone intent on kidnapping a child for whatever sick purposes they have in mind going to give a hairy rat's patoot that they aren't allowed in that particular bathroom?
It's a completely useless law that doesn't change a damn thing and only adds to a growing pile of unnecessary litigation. Period. Full stop. No matter what your views might happen to be on trans-gendered people, homosexuals, whatever, HB2 is just plain government overreaching. It's no different than the flag-burning amendment crap that was all the rage back in the late '80s. Look, if someone wants to burn a flag, that's their right (assuming, of course, that it's *their* flag to begin with). I don't like it, but guess what? The First Amendment is never so useful as it is protecting the speech we don't like.
Here's the thing: If a person of [opposite gender] walks into your restroom, if they go into a stall to do their business (or to a urinal if so plumbed), what in blue blazes does it matter? If they're staring at your junk, that's actionable. We don't need another law taking up space to prevent them from walking in. We have laws that cover stalking, being a pervert, etc. Use the damn laws that are already on the books. Don't just start flinging new ones around.
But then again, no one ever made a name for themselves proposing that we simply prosecute the breaking of existing laws...
That is all.
Showing posts with label Random Ramblings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Random Ramblings. Show all posts
Monday, May 2, 2016
Monday, April 18, 2016
Triple "S"...
The dreaded "Special Snowflake Syndrome." I don't know if I'm just noticing it more lately or if things are changing, but the number of people I see out in public completely and utterly unaware that there are other humans in their little life's play seems to be growing.
Like this douchebag:
He's not in a parking space. That's the entry way to the local warehouse store. Because people often buy large, heavy items like furniture and appliances, the "curb" isn't - so jackass parked there. There are parking spaces galore, but none were apparently close enough for Senor Jackass, so up on the curb he goes.
Of course, this same area is frequently a site for other SSS's. I see people who pull up, leaving their running automobile directly in the travel lane while they load their purchases into it. It is not uncommon to see vehicles half-out into the main travel lane, either; it's like they just randomly decide "Oh, here's a good place to stop" because in their minds, there are no other humans on the planet.
The worst, in my opinion, are the ones that will sit in a running car right next to an empty parking space while someone else runs into the store for a quick errand. There's nothing as exciting as moving around one of these mouthbreathers only to find one of their kindred spirit blithely backing out of a parking space without even so much as a cursory glance. Ah, excitement.
And yet people think we'll have "self-driving" cars any time in our lifetimes. Um, no. Unless the government takes a very active role in getting "human driving" cars off the road, it ain't gonna happen. All it's going to take is one erratic human to screw up an entire line of self-driving cars to cause all sorts of mischief and mayhem.
I think Mencken said it best: "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public"...
That is all.
Like this douchebag:
He's not in a parking space. That's the entry way to the local warehouse store. Because people often buy large, heavy items like furniture and appliances, the "curb" isn't - so jackass parked there. There are parking spaces galore, but none were apparently close enough for Senor Jackass, so up on the curb he goes.
Of course, this same area is frequently a site for other SSS's. I see people who pull up, leaving their running automobile directly in the travel lane while they load their purchases into it. It is not uncommon to see vehicles half-out into the main travel lane, either; it's like they just randomly decide "Oh, here's a good place to stop" because in their minds, there are no other humans on the planet.
The worst, in my opinion, are the ones that will sit in a running car right next to an empty parking space while someone else runs into the store for a quick errand. There's nothing as exciting as moving around one of these mouthbreathers only to find one of their kindred spirit blithely backing out of a parking space without even so much as a cursory glance. Ah, excitement.
And yet people think we'll have "self-driving" cars any time in our lifetimes. Um, no. Unless the government takes a very active role in getting "human driving" cars off the road, it ain't gonna happen. All it's going to take is one erratic human to screw up an entire line of self-driving cars to cause all sorts of mischief and mayhem.
I think Mencken said it best: "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public"...
That is all.
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
Limitations, and the Knowing Thereof...
Leaving the house Saturday morning, I found a white van blocking my driveway. Rather than stop the vehicle ten feet sooner - or 15 feet later - the driver had thoughtfully stopped right in front of my driveway, blocking about 2/3. He was sitting in the vehicle as I came out of the garage and got into my car. The jackass proceeded to then get out of the van and walk across the street to deliver a package.
I thought, for a moment, about saying something. First off, there's the complete and utter lack of anything resembling common sense that had him stop blocking my driveway. Either side was totally clear - he could have easily parked without blocking me in. Next, he SAW me get out of the garage and into my car. Any rational human would have thought to themselves, gee, maybe I ought to move. Nope. This jerkwad just went about his business.
I paused, though. What I really wanted to do was get out of my car and call the guy out in the middle of the street. "Hey! Could you move your f**king van so I can get out of my driveway, you inconsiderate nitwit?" What would have come out would have been more along the lines of "Excuse me, you're blocking my driveway. Can you move?"
And it dawned on me. If I asked him to move, and he had been a jerk (which empirical evidence suggests would have been the case), I would most likely have gotten angry. I'm bringing my kids to the hospital to see their mom after surgery, and this jerkweed is blocking my driveway and giving me lip about it? I was uncertain about my ability to keep my cool, and figured that the best course of action was to get out of Dodge.
Basically, what it boils down to is that I cannot honestly say that if the guy had been a jerk, I wouldn't have escalated. Ask politely, get a rude response, and I might very well have reacted poorly. It's probably for the best I walked away. Knowing your limitations is applicable in so many different applications...
Driving away, though, something dawned on me. These people get away with this crap precisely because no one calls them on it. It's a vicious circle. Much like the jackasses that drive past the long line waiting to turn only to cut in at the last second, it's the people that LET them cut in that are equally at fault. If everyone forced the jerk to wait, they'd stop trying to cut in.
Ditto calling out assholes. If enough people said, "Hey, jackass, move your damn van, you parked across my driveway," maybe it might convince a few to stop. Oh, had it been a company vehicle you better believe I'd have taken a picture and broadcast it widely, but it was a rented van. Maybe the anonymity gave the driver courage? Maybe a simple "What the hell is wrong with you?" or simply WTF at a volume the whole neighborhood could hear would have been enough.
That's the thing, though. There aren't any easy answers. Confront the jerk and you run the risk of getting into a shouting match/pissing contest, no question about it. There are enough stories of road rage and other confrontations that end poorly that the calculus strongly urges against calling someone out. But that emboldens them, doesn't it? All that evil needs to triumph is for good men to do nothing, something along those lines.
Knowing your limitations is key. I knew how I was feeling at the moment I came out of the house and saw some jerk blocking my path. A confrontation at that point would have escalated dramatically and significantly, and it's simply not worth it just to teach some jackass a lesson. I'm a firm believer in karma, and I just hope that someday, he gets it back in spades.
Until then, I hope he gets bit by a rabid pit bull with mad cow disease...
That is all.
I thought, for a moment, about saying something. First off, there's the complete and utter lack of anything resembling common sense that had him stop blocking my driveway. Either side was totally clear - he could have easily parked without blocking me in. Next, he SAW me get out of the garage and into my car. Any rational human would have thought to themselves, gee, maybe I ought to move. Nope. This jerkwad just went about his business.
I paused, though. What I really wanted to do was get out of my car and call the guy out in the middle of the street. "Hey! Could you move your f**king van so I can get out of my driveway, you inconsiderate nitwit?" What would have come out would have been more along the lines of "Excuse me, you're blocking my driveway. Can you move?"
And it dawned on me. If I asked him to move, and he had been a jerk (which empirical evidence suggests would have been the case), I would most likely have gotten angry. I'm bringing my kids to the hospital to see their mom after surgery, and this jerkweed is blocking my driveway and giving me lip about it? I was uncertain about my ability to keep my cool, and figured that the best course of action was to get out of Dodge.
Basically, what it boils down to is that I cannot honestly say that if the guy had been a jerk, I wouldn't have escalated. Ask politely, get a rude response, and I might very well have reacted poorly. It's probably for the best I walked away. Knowing your limitations is applicable in so many different applications...
Driving away, though, something dawned on me. These people get away with this crap precisely because no one calls them on it. It's a vicious circle. Much like the jackasses that drive past the long line waiting to turn only to cut in at the last second, it's the people that LET them cut in that are equally at fault. If everyone forced the jerk to wait, they'd stop trying to cut in.
Ditto calling out assholes. If enough people said, "Hey, jackass, move your damn van, you parked across my driveway," maybe it might convince a few to stop. Oh, had it been a company vehicle you better believe I'd have taken a picture and broadcast it widely, but it was a rented van. Maybe the anonymity gave the driver courage? Maybe a simple "What the hell is wrong with you?" or simply WTF at a volume the whole neighborhood could hear would have been enough.
That's the thing, though. There aren't any easy answers. Confront the jerk and you run the risk of getting into a shouting match/pissing contest, no question about it. There are enough stories of road rage and other confrontations that end poorly that the calculus strongly urges against calling someone out. But that emboldens them, doesn't it? All that evil needs to triumph is for good men to do nothing, something along those lines.
Knowing your limitations is key. I knew how I was feeling at the moment I came out of the house and saw some jerk blocking my path. A confrontation at that point would have escalated dramatically and significantly, and it's simply not worth it just to teach some jackass a lesson. I'm a firm believer in karma, and I just hope that someday, he gets it back in spades.
Until then, I hope he gets bit by a rabid pit bull with mad cow disease...
That is all.
Tuesday, November 17, 2015
Boy. TheBoy.
So, I took TheBoy to see the new Bond flick Spectre this past weekend. Short synopsis? It's a Bond flick. If you like Bond flicks, you'll like Spectre. There's nothing terribly different or innovative in Spectre, almost a dearth of gadgets, and the brooding Bond as portrayed by Daniel Craig. Again, it's not a bad movie, especially; it's entertaining enough and there's just enough special effects to make seeing it in the theater worthwhile.
I did find it especially telling that, on its second weekend in theaters, that we walked in 10 minutes before it started and there were only about a dozen people there. More trickled in, but I was rather surprised to find the theater so empty. We are fortunate in that we have a Regal Cinema not even 2 miles from the house here in VA, and an IMAX theater only 5-6 miles away.
And yes, we will be seeing the new Star Wars movie in IMAX. But I digress.
Anyways, TheBoy is quite the Bond fan now. He's seen all of the Daniel Craig Bond movies, and we're going to start filling in the gaps in his Bondian knowledge with DVDs and Friday night movies. I love this plan. I was an unabashed Bond fanatic growing up, seeing a succession of campy, Adam-West-as-Batman-style Roger Moore James Bond movies in the 1970s and 1980s. Once we got a VCR in the house, I discovered just how much better Sean Connery was, and Bond will, for me, always be a mishmash of the two actors.
Dalton was wooden; he played Bond like a brooding teen and his tenure was mercifully short. Brosnan was seemingly born to play James Bond and landed somewhere in between Connery and Moore for how Bond should be played; more jocularity than Connery, more serious than Moore. Daniel Craig--his views on firearms aside--played Bond more true to Fleming's gritty version than the campy Moore Bond of the '70s and '80s.
Permit a nerdy aside - Craig is to Bond, compared to Moore, as Christian Bale's Batman compares to Adam West's.
So, I have several months of Friday night movies with my son watching James Bond flicks from the 1960s through the 1990s. Yeah, I'm pretty damn excited about this. The big question is whether we rent from RedBox, or buy through Amazon/WalMart, etc. Part of me wants to pick up the movies to have available - one enduring theme throughout the Bond universe is the Cold War that comprised my childhood, and the movies are an almost quaint reminder of when we had a singular, identifiable enemy.
And part of me realizes that one can only watch a Roger Moore Bond flick so many times...
That is all.
I did find it especially telling that, on its second weekend in theaters, that we walked in 10 minutes before it started and there were only about a dozen people there. More trickled in, but I was rather surprised to find the theater so empty. We are fortunate in that we have a Regal Cinema not even 2 miles from the house here in VA, and an IMAX theater only 5-6 miles away.
And yes, we will be seeing the new Star Wars movie in IMAX. But I digress.
Anyways, TheBoy is quite the Bond fan now. He's seen all of the Daniel Craig Bond movies, and we're going to start filling in the gaps in his Bondian knowledge with DVDs and Friday night movies. I love this plan. I was an unabashed Bond fanatic growing up, seeing a succession of campy, Adam-West-as-Batman-style Roger Moore James Bond movies in the 1970s and 1980s. Once we got a VCR in the house, I discovered just how much better Sean Connery was, and Bond will, for me, always be a mishmash of the two actors.
Dalton was wooden; he played Bond like a brooding teen and his tenure was mercifully short. Brosnan was seemingly born to play James Bond and landed somewhere in between Connery and Moore for how Bond should be played; more jocularity than Connery, more serious than Moore. Daniel Craig--his views on firearms aside--played Bond more true to Fleming's gritty version than the campy Moore Bond of the '70s and '80s.
Permit a nerdy aside - Craig is to Bond, compared to Moore, as Christian Bale's Batman compares to Adam West's.
So, I have several months of Friday night movies with my son watching James Bond flicks from the 1960s through the 1990s. Yeah, I'm pretty damn excited about this. The big question is whether we rent from RedBox, or buy through Amazon/WalMart, etc. Part of me wants to pick up the movies to have available - one enduring theme throughout the Bond universe is the Cold War that comprised my childhood, and the movies are an almost quaint reminder of when we had a singular, identifiable enemy.
And part of me realizes that one can only watch a Roger Moore Bond flick so many times...
That is all.
Thursday, September 24, 2015
This 'N' That...
Nope. I'm not dead, just unmotivated. You see, a lot of what moved me to put pen to paper finger to keyboard was stuff that torqued me off, and there's just a lot less of that these days...
In no particular order, though, are a few things I've been stewing over...
So, the pope has a Fiat.
Sure, there's six armored Suburbans getting 3 MPG assigned to guard him, but by gosh the Pope chose a Fiat 500 for transportation around the US. He sure is humble, driving around in a Fiat guarded by soldiers armed with machine guns (are they Christians, Frankie?). You know what would have spared the environment even more? If you had stayed in Rome and bashed America from there.
Very disappointed in the alleged leader of the Catholic Church. Kinda makes me glad Obama deliberated spited him. Last time I checked, the Pope was supposed to lead Catholics in matters of faith. Not beat us about the head and shoulders over junk science.
The "clock".
I won't even dignify this one with a link, but I think everyone knows about the muslim teenager in Irving, TX, who "invented" a clock, brought it school, and got arrested because it might have sort of looked like a bomb. The narrative is that the eeeeeevil right wing Texas school board had the budding young Edison arrested solely because he's a muslim, and that if he had been a white kid, this never would have happened.
Now, I happen to agree with this last part - if he had been a white student, he never would have gotten invited to the White House, he never would have had a talk with MIT, he never would have been consulted by Silicon Valley companies, nothing. He would have served his suspension in silence. Why do I know this? Because it has happened over and over for decades with no fanfare.
Look, I don't know the kid's motives, nor that of his father. It really doesn't matter. Whether they're agitating for muslim rights (and, no, the reaction of the school doesn't vindicate the idea of bias against muslims; zero tolerance policies are just that stupid) or not, the one fact that has jumped out at me throughout all of this is how blatantly this "project" looks like a ten minute rush job the morning it was due. I mean, it really looks like this kid grabbed a standard clock, unscrewed the housing, then put it back together in a different case. It'd be like cutting the rind off a honeydew melon, placing it on a cantalope, and then claiming you had genetically engineered a new fruit. And yet everyone has lost their bloody minds over this kid's engineering prowess - I'd say he's a fairly good *social* engineer, in that he has played his role perfectly.
#ShoutYourAbortion
Another one I won't dignify with a link. I'm trying really hard to wrap my mind around the concept that people are actually up-in-arms over the push to defund Planned Parenthood after the little incident about selling organs from aborted fetuses. The left is so desperate to continue the bulls**t "war on women" and hang it around the GOP that they are actively supporting monsters who sold human body parts from aborted fetuses. People, the goddamned NAZIS weren't this evil.
I'd urge you to think long and hard if the GOP is who you're angry with over this whole mess.
But yeah, go out and crow about murdering infants. That's certain to resonate with the vast majority of Americans who either haven't had abortions or at least had the common decency to realize that, while it might be the best of all possible bad outcomes, it's still a pretty damn horrible thing to do. It's certainly nothing to brag about, and if you do find yourself bragging about killing a baby to score political points, seek professional help. Look, I understand and accept that there are valid reasons for terminating a pregnancy. I don't think it should be illegal, but it should have more oversight than it currently does.
And now that I've thoroughly pissed everyone off, I'll go back to hibernation...
That is all.
In no particular order, though, are a few things I've been stewing over...
So, the pope has a Fiat.
Sure, there's six armored Suburbans getting 3 MPG assigned to guard him, but by gosh the Pope chose a Fiat 500 for transportation around the US. He sure is humble, driving around in a Fiat guarded by soldiers armed with machine guns (are they Christians, Frankie?). You know what would have spared the environment even more? If you had stayed in Rome and bashed America from there.
Very disappointed in the alleged leader of the Catholic Church. Kinda makes me glad Obama deliberated spited him. Last time I checked, the Pope was supposed to lead Catholics in matters of faith. Not beat us about the head and shoulders over junk science.
The "clock".
I won't even dignify this one with a link, but I think everyone knows about the muslim teenager in Irving, TX, who "invented" a clock, brought it school, and got arrested because it might have sort of looked like a bomb. The narrative is that the eeeeeevil right wing Texas school board had the budding young Edison arrested solely because he's a muslim, and that if he had been a white kid, this never would have happened.
Now, I happen to agree with this last part - if he had been a white student, he never would have gotten invited to the White House, he never would have had a talk with MIT, he never would have been consulted by Silicon Valley companies, nothing. He would have served his suspension in silence. Why do I know this? Because it has happened over and over for decades with no fanfare.
Look, I don't know the kid's motives, nor that of his father. It really doesn't matter. Whether they're agitating for muslim rights (and, no, the reaction of the school doesn't vindicate the idea of bias against muslims; zero tolerance policies are just that stupid) or not, the one fact that has jumped out at me throughout all of this is how blatantly this "project" looks like a ten minute rush job the morning it was due. I mean, it really looks like this kid grabbed a standard clock, unscrewed the housing, then put it back together in a different case. It'd be like cutting the rind off a honeydew melon, placing it on a cantalope, and then claiming you had genetically engineered a new fruit. And yet everyone has lost their bloody minds over this kid's engineering prowess - I'd say he's a fairly good *social* engineer, in that he has played his role perfectly.
#ShoutYourAbortion
Another one I won't dignify with a link. I'm trying really hard to wrap my mind around the concept that people are actually up-in-arms over the push to defund Planned Parenthood after the little incident about selling organs from aborted fetuses. The left is so desperate to continue the bulls**t "war on women" and hang it around the GOP that they are actively supporting monsters who sold human body parts from aborted fetuses. People, the goddamned NAZIS weren't this evil.
I'd urge you to think long and hard if the GOP is who you're angry with over this whole mess.
But yeah, go out and crow about murdering infants. That's certain to resonate with the vast majority of Americans who either haven't had abortions or at least had the common decency to realize that, while it might be the best of all possible bad outcomes, it's still a pretty damn horrible thing to do. It's certainly nothing to brag about, and if you do find yourself bragging about killing a baby to score political points, seek professional help. Look, I understand and accept that there are valid reasons for terminating a pregnancy. I don't think it should be illegal, but it should have more oversight than it currently does.
And now that I've thoroughly pissed everyone off, I'll go back to hibernation...
That is all.
Thursday, May 7, 2015
I'm Trying to Keep Up...
So, it was the organizer's fault for the shooting in Garland, TX? Is that really the message you want to convey?
She provoked the two men into attacking? Really? Leaving aside the soft racism of "those poor savages can't help themselves," isn't this a variation on the "if she didn't want to attract attention, she shouldn't have worn a low-cut shirt"?
She held an event centered around cartoons, for crying out loud. If your religion is so tenuous that you have to threaten deadly violence upon people for drawing a goddamn picture, maybe you need to rethink your tenets.
Christians didn't shoot anyone over The Last Temptation of Christ.
Or Piss Christ, for that matter.
"The Holy Virgin Mary"
Heck, Sinead O'Connor.
Now, there's a good deal of violence perpetrated over the subject of abortion, I'll grant, and while I vehemently disagree with it, at least there's an action at the root of it, not a cartoon.
Of course, we've also got Chris Cuomo claiming that the Constitution has a "hate speech exemption" in it, so at least there's some consistency. They at least hate the first amendment as much as the second, and have about the same grasp of Constitutionality on both.
That is all.
She provoked the two men into attacking? Really? Leaving aside the soft racism of "those poor savages can't help themselves," isn't this a variation on the "if she didn't want to attract attention, she shouldn't have worn a low-cut shirt"?
She held an event centered around cartoons, for crying out loud. If your religion is so tenuous that you have to threaten deadly violence upon people for drawing a goddamn picture, maybe you need to rethink your tenets.
Christians didn't shoot anyone over The Last Temptation of Christ.
Or Piss Christ, for that matter.
"The Holy Virgin Mary"
Heck, Sinead O'Connor.
Now, there's a good deal of violence perpetrated over the subject of abortion, I'll grant, and while I vehemently disagree with it, at least there's an action at the root of it, not a cartoon.
Of course, we've also got Chris Cuomo claiming that the Constitution has a "hate speech exemption" in it, so at least there's some consistency. They at least hate the first amendment as much as the second, and have about the same grasp of Constitutionality on both.
- The Second Amendment is not about hunting. Nor does it apply only to muskets. Or state militias.
- The First Amendment doesn't just protect "love speech." It protects speech we find distasteful, or obscene, or provocative.
That is all.
Tuesday, April 28, 2015
I Wonder...
First it was Ferguson and Michael Brown.
Then NYC and Eric Garner.
Now it's Baltimore and Freddie Gray.
Racial tensions are inflamed as people clash with police. In each case, claims of racism and disproportionate use of force when dealing with black suspects abound. In the Michael Brown case, even a Federal review found the police officer to have acted appropriately; yet we still hear the (complete fabrication) of "Hands up, don't shoot."
Are some of these claims legitimate? Almost certainly. I'd be astounded if there wasn't a hint of prejudice and profiling behind some of the incidents. Maybe not the ones we're hearing about, but there have been enough legit cases - like the SC police officer who shot a suspect in the back and is now facing murder charges - to support at least skepticism.
I have to wonder, though. I wonder how many who are standing with the protestors also claim that "only the police should have guns" or that police should be exempt from gun laws? How many of these same people claim that police are better trained, the "only ones professional enough" to handle firearms, etc.? I'll bet that Venn diagram overlaps a lot more than they would like to admit.
And on the flip side: How many FOP are *still* going to stand behind gun-grabbers at photo-ops? How many police chiefs are going to throw their support behind politicians grandstanding on these events? I suspect, here, that we won't see any significant shift from the status quo despite the rhetoric being tossed around.
As a supporter of the Second Amendment and the RKBA, I have to shake my head in disbelief. For years we have decried states - like Massachusetts - where the local police decide who can exercise their 2A rights. We've watched as state after state passed draconian gun bans, "assault weapon" bans, magazine capacity bans, etc. with every single one having a law enforcement exemption. Heck, the Federal ban had an LEO exemption.
And now we're watching many of the same politicians, talking heads, and "community activists" accusing police officers of all kinds of heinous crimes. Murder, assault, battery, racism; for the past year we've watched city after city burn as the media fans the flames of racial division, almost exclusively aimed at the law enforcement community.
These same police officers that for the past 20+ years we've been told are the only ones that should own guns, or have standard capacity magazines, or adjustable stocks; all of a sudden they went from Officer Friendly to persona non grata. It begs the question, does it not, of whether or not the next time gun control is brought up - and it will be - will the police go back to their lofty position of "Only Ones" despite these protests?
That's a rhetorical question, mind you...
That is all.
Then NYC and Eric Garner.
Now it's Baltimore and Freddie Gray.
Racial tensions are inflamed as people clash with police. In each case, claims of racism and disproportionate use of force when dealing with black suspects abound. In the Michael Brown case, even a Federal review found the police officer to have acted appropriately; yet we still hear the (complete fabrication) of "Hands up, don't shoot."
Are some of these claims legitimate? Almost certainly. I'd be astounded if there wasn't a hint of prejudice and profiling behind some of the incidents. Maybe not the ones we're hearing about, but there have been enough legit cases - like the SC police officer who shot a suspect in the back and is now facing murder charges - to support at least skepticism.
I have to wonder, though. I wonder how many who are standing with the protestors also claim that "only the police should have guns" or that police should be exempt from gun laws? How many of these same people claim that police are better trained, the "only ones professional enough" to handle firearms, etc.? I'll bet that Venn diagram overlaps a lot more than they would like to admit.
And on the flip side: How many FOP are *still* going to stand behind gun-grabbers at photo-ops? How many police chiefs are going to throw their support behind politicians grandstanding on these events? I suspect, here, that we won't see any significant shift from the status quo despite the rhetoric being tossed around.
As a supporter of the Second Amendment and the RKBA, I have to shake my head in disbelief. For years we have decried states - like Massachusetts - where the local police decide who can exercise their 2A rights. We've watched as state after state passed draconian gun bans, "assault weapon" bans, magazine capacity bans, etc. with every single one having a law enforcement exemption. Heck, the Federal ban had an LEO exemption.
And now we're watching many of the same politicians, talking heads, and "community activists" accusing police officers of all kinds of heinous crimes. Murder, assault, battery, racism; for the past year we've watched city after city burn as the media fans the flames of racial division, almost exclusively aimed at the law enforcement community.
These same police officers that for the past 20+ years we've been told are the only ones that should own guns, or have standard capacity magazines, or adjustable stocks; all of a sudden they went from Officer Friendly to persona non grata. It begs the question, does it not, of whether or not the next time gun control is brought up - and it will be - will the police go back to their lofty position of "Only Ones" despite these protests?
That's a rhetorical question, mind you...
That is all.
Monday, March 2, 2015
Disposable World...
So, we have a new printer at Casa G Sud (Free America version). The old printer - that we bought a little over a year ago - had a small touch screen that *someone* (no one 'fessed up) was a little too vigorous in pushing and shattered the LCD screen. It's weird, in that the actual touch part is completely intact; in fact, when the power is off it doesn't even look broken. However, navigating the print options is significantly more difficult, so off we went in search of a new printer.
We wound up with this guy:
Canon MX472
Here's the thing: It was $49.99 at BJs Warehouse. The replacement ink cartridges were $59.99. Now, yes, for that price you get two of the large black ink cartridges and one regular color cartridge, but I was struck by the dichotomy of the printer actually being less than the replacement cartridges. In a pinch, you would save $10 by purchasing a new printer rather than just getting more ink.
Interesting factoid: This is the first non-HP printer I've ever owned. I started out, more than 20 years ago, with a 712 (this is the color version shown; mine was just a B&W). Over the years we've had a steady string of printers, and the 712 went to the printer graveyard only a couple years ago when we moved. It hadn't been used in years, but still occupied a place on the desk.
Back when I bought the 712, it was purchased to complement a 486 DX33 with 8 MB Ram (which I paid extra for!) and a 550 MB hard drive. I had to purchase and install a soundcard and CD-ROM drive separately, and the whole setup cost me more than I paid for the car I drove in college. The last three computers we've owned - two of which were laptops - didn't cost *half* of what that computer cost...
And now it's cheaper to buy a new printer than to re-stock the ink; I guess that's progress...
That is all.
We wound up with this guy:
Here's the thing: It was $49.99 at BJs Warehouse. The replacement ink cartridges were $59.99. Now, yes, for that price you get two of the large black ink cartridges and one regular color cartridge, but I was struck by the dichotomy of the printer actually being less than the replacement cartridges. In a pinch, you would save $10 by purchasing a new printer rather than just getting more ink.
Interesting factoid: This is the first non-HP printer I've ever owned. I started out, more than 20 years ago, with a 712 (this is the color version shown; mine was just a B&W). Over the years we've had a steady string of printers, and the 712 went to the printer graveyard only a couple years ago when we moved. It hadn't been used in years, but still occupied a place on the desk.
Back when I bought the 712, it was purchased to complement a 486 DX33 with 8 MB Ram (which I paid extra for!) and a 550 MB hard drive. I had to purchase and install a soundcard and CD-ROM drive separately, and the whole setup cost me more than I paid for the car I drove in college. The last three computers we've owned - two of which were laptops - didn't cost *half* of what that computer cost...
And now it's cheaper to buy a new printer than to re-stock the ink; I guess that's progress...
That is all.
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
People Are Stupid...
So, yesterday we had our first snowfall. Much like in New England, the first snow of the season is always a special occasion, and by "special" I mean "filled with a kind of stupid that brings about a frothing rage." I saw, in no particular order, the following:
*A person stop at a red light, and then - while the light is still red - make a U-turn into oncoming traffic. Mind you, the oncoming traffic had both a green light and was heading downhill. In the snow.
*A woman in a Mustang convertible STOP IN THE TRAVEL LANE on the highway to clear the ice off her windshield wipers. Stopped. IN THE TRAVEL LANE. She just brought her car to a stop and hopped out and started clearing - AND LEFT HER DAMN DOOR OPEN.
*A jackass in a black F-150 who, despite the two lanes of traffic attempting to merge onto the completely packed three-lane highway, dove into the breakdown lane and rode straight into the thick of things. A double damnation on the imbecile who let him in.
I left my house at 6:15 yesterday morning. I arrived at work, some 18 miles away, at 9:00. I could have biked to work in less time.
There were dozens of other, smaller stupid instances, like - yet again - idiots who stop on a snow-covered hill, or morons who make right turns on red despite oncoming traffic. Those are so common as to not even be worth mentioning otherwise. Like the dunderheads in their $80K luxury cars that don't understand the concept of "mashing the gas to the floor only makes the rear tires spin faster"...
It's funny how the same types of idiots exist in both the northeast and in northern Virginia...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
*A person stop at a red light, and then - while the light is still red - make a U-turn into oncoming traffic. Mind you, the oncoming traffic had both a green light and was heading downhill. In the snow.
*A woman in a Mustang convertible STOP IN THE TRAVEL LANE on the highway to clear the ice off her windshield wipers. Stopped. IN THE TRAVEL LANE. She just brought her car to a stop and hopped out and started clearing - AND LEFT HER DAMN DOOR OPEN.
*A jackass in a black F-150 who, despite the two lanes of traffic attempting to merge onto the completely packed three-lane highway, dove into the breakdown lane and rode straight into the thick of things. A double damnation on the imbecile who let him in.
I left my house at 6:15 yesterday morning. I arrived at work, some 18 miles away, at 9:00. I could have biked to work in less time.
There were dozens of other, smaller stupid instances, like - yet again - idiots who stop on a snow-covered hill, or morons who make right turns on red despite oncoming traffic. Those are so common as to not even be worth mentioning otherwise. Like the dunderheads in their $80K luxury cars that don't understand the concept of "mashing the gas to the floor only makes the rear tires spin faster"...
It's funny how the same types of idiots exist in both the northeast and in northern Virginia...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Monday, December 29, 2014
Traveling, For the OCD...
So, we went north for the holidays this year. I had kept radio silence for op-sec reasons - since I no longer have a retired police officer with a vested interest next door, I figured it was best not to mention we'd be out of state for a week... We made arrangements with a friend to pick up the mail, and had lights on a timer, so we were pretty well covered.
Of course, that didn't stop me from thinking of the nine million things that can go horribly, horribly wrong in the course of a week...
As we turned into the subdivision, it hit me that I had a hierarchy of assessing how things held up in our absence:
1. The house is still standing - it didn't burn to the ground while we were gone.
2. The front door is intact - we didn't have a home invasion.
3. We have power.
4. Walking in, there's no water flowing through the house.
5. TV/computer/etc. are still where they're supposed to be.
Most items are obviously outside of my control; I suppose we could shut off the water and gas mains before we left and shut down the power, but that's a little extreme for something that normally isn't a problem. The wildcard is a burglary; we've taken steps to mitigate the chance of that, like keeping mum on vacation plans, having a security system and locking all doors and windows.
Fear of something happening isn't so big that it keeps us from leaving the house, that's borderline paranoia. When you're 500 miles from home, though, and things are quiet, you starting revisiting all the horror stories you've ever heard: the toilet that mysteriously started running and flooded the house; the electrical short that caused a spark and initiated a fire, etc.
What it does make you revisit, though, is having access to things like insurance policies, home furnishing records, etc. in places other than a hard copy file. Inexpensive flash drives mean you can keep scans of all vital records close at hand without relying on internet security - might not be a bad idea to have a "master file" on a drive you keep on your keychain.
These are the things I think of when sleeping on a pull-out couch...
That is all.
Of course, that didn't stop me from thinking of the nine million things that can go horribly, horribly wrong in the course of a week...
As we turned into the subdivision, it hit me that I had a hierarchy of assessing how things held up in our absence:
1. The house is still standing - it didn't burn to the ground while we were gone.
2. The front door is intact - we didn't have a home invasion.
3. We have power.
4. Walking in, there's no water flowing through the house.
5. TV/computer/etc. are still where they're supposed to be.
Most items are obviously outside of my control; I suppose we could shut off the water and gas mains before we left and shut down the power, but that's a little extreme for something that normally isn't a problem. The wildcard is a burglary; we've taken steps to mitigate the chance of that, like keeping mum on vacation plans, having a security system and locking all doors and windows.
Fear of something happening isn't so big that it keeps us from leaving the house, that's borderline paranoia. When you're 500 miles from home, though, and things are quiet, you starting revisiting all the horror stories you've ever heard: the toilet that mysteriously started running and flooded the house; the electrical short that caused a spark and initiated a fire, etc.
What it does make you revisit, though, is having access to things like insurance policies, home furnishing records, etc. in places other than a hard copy file. Inexpensive flash drives mean you can keep scans of all vital records close at hand without relying on internet security - might not be a bad idea to have a "master file" on a drive you keep on your keychain.
These are the things I think of when sleeping on a pull-out couch...
That is all.
Wednesday, December 24, 2014
Technolousy...
So, the Mrs.' car has one of those "tire pressure indicator" lights on the dashboard. You know what I'm talking about: a warning light goes on when one of the tires is a certain percentage below the recommended air pressure. Her car even has a helpful schematic that shows which tire is responsible.
Sounds great, doesn't it? I know one of my biggest worries with the truck stems from tire pressure. Now, granted, that comes from having run over a large spike, blowing one of the rear tires, and having to deal with a 3-ton pickup truck with only three points of contact with the ground instead of four (yes, I know the blown tire was still contacting the ground, but you know what I mean).
Except that the sensor has been right twice, and wrong about 180 other times.
It kicks on when the temperature changes. It kicks on when it rains. It kicks on when a butterfly flaps its wings too fast in the Andes. It's on a lot. When we first got the car, the light coming on was cause for much consternation. "Check the tire pressure, quick!" we'd yell, as these are moderately pricey tires (and there may have been an incident involving a car that needed an alignment and four new Pirelli tires, two of which were ruined inside of a month that I may or may not have reminded the Mrs. of once or a dozen times...)
So, now, we ignore the light. Sure, I'll glance at the alleged offender when I get out of the car, see that it doesn't look low. I might even hook it up to the (free) air station at the local gas station to find out that the tire is perfectly fine. More or less, though, we don't pay the light any attention whatsoever.
Basically, that warning light is useless. It has been used so many times, and been wrong so many times, that the one or two times that a tire has actually been low (and not dangerously low either time, once it was 10 PSI low, the other in the single digits) it's been right only through attrition. Imagine that: cry wolf enough times, and the warning starts going unheeded.
It's almost like something else I keep hearing, but just can't put my finger on...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Sounds great, doesn't it? I know one of my biggest worries with the truck stems from tire pressure. Now, granted, that comes from having run over a large spike, blowing one of the rear tires, and having to deal with a 3-ton pickup truck with only three points of contact with the ground instead of four (yes, I know the blown tire was still contacting the ground, but you know what I mean).
Except that the sensor has been right twice, and wrong about 180 other times.
It kicks on when the temperature changes. It kicks on when it rains. It kicks on when a butterfly flaps its wings too fast in the Andes. It's on a lot. When we first got the car, the light coming on was cause for much consternation. "Check the tire pressure, quick!" we'd yell, as these are moderately pricey tires (and there may have been an incident involving a car that needed an alignment and four new Pirelli tires, two of which were ruined inside of a month that I may or may not have reminded the Mrs. of once or a dozen times...)
So, now, we ignore the light. Sure, I'll glance at the alleged offender when I get out of the car, see that it doesn't look low. I might even hook it up to the (free) air station at the local gas station to find out that the tire is perfectly fine. More or less, though, we don't pay the light any attention whatsoever.
Basically, that warning light is useless. It has been used so many times, and been wrong so many times, that the one or two times that a tire has actually been low (and not dangerously low either time, once it was 10 PSI low, the other in the single digits) it's been right only through attrition. Imagine that: cry wolf enough times, and the warning starts going unheeded.
It's almost like something else I keep hearing, but just can't put my finger on...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Monday, December 22, 2014
Light Week Ahead...
Family obligations up the wazoo this week, not a lot of time to post, sorry.
The holidays are always extra crazy to begin with, but when it encompasses family several states away, it's even harder. Time is even more precious than normal, and trying to get everything we need/want to do in is even harder than in years passed.
Now, granted, it's better than it was last year, but that's not saying much. This time last year we were a day away from closing on our VA house, and had little tracking information on where our worldly possessions were at that moment in time. We knew we'd be spending Christmas in the new house; what we didn't know is whether we would have beds to sleep on.
Everything worked out, and we only lost a handful of secondary items in the move. The movers showed up on December 24th, and left with an empty trailer at 7 PM. We spent Christmas Eve frantically unpacking the boxes we thought we'd need for getting through the week, and wound up having Christmas Eve dinner at Target...
On the plus side, it's the kind of memory that'll stay with you forever, kind of like a kidney stone...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
The holidays are always extra crazy to begin with, but when it encompasses family several states away, it's even harder. Time is even more precious than normal, and trying to get everything we need/want to do in is even harder than in years passed.
Now, granted, it's better than it was last year, but that's not saying much. This time last year we were a day away from closing on our VA house, and had little tracking information on where our worldly possessions were at that moment in time. We knew we'd be spending Christmas in the new house; what we didn't know is whether we would have beds to sleep on.
Everything worked out, and we only lost a handful of secondary items in the move. The movers showed up on December 24th, and left with an empty trailer at 7 PM. We spent Christmas Eve frantically unpacking the boxes we thought we'd need for getting through the week, and wound up having Christmas Eve dinner at Target...
On the plus side, it's the kind of memory that'll stay with you forever, kind of like a kidney stone...
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Thursday, December 18, 2014
I Just *D'oh*n't Know
25 random facts about 'The Simpsons'
I've been a fan pretty much from day one; heck, I watched them in '87 on the Tracey Ullman Show. The earlier seasons, when Conan O'Brien was writing for them, were the best IMHO. Classics like "Monorail", "Homer's Heart Attack", "Stonecutters", and "Lisa's Wedding" never get old. The newer stuff saw Homer get stupid to the point of ridiculous, and I stopped watching somewhere in the 'teens. Recent stuff seems to be getting better, although that's damning with faint praise.
In closing, my favorite scene ever:
"Batman's a scientist." Whoever came up with that deserves a Grammy for spoken word...
That is all.
When crudely drawn animated shorts about a dysfunctional American family began appearing on Fox's "The Tracey Ullman Show" in 1987, nobody predicted the birth of a cultural phenomenon.25 years. When "The Simpsons" debuted on Fox, I was 18 years old. I had hair. Now I look like Homer (and, according to show canon, I am now older than Homer. Both of my kids are older than Bart.) George Herbert Walker Bush was president. Saddam Hussein was ruler of Iraq, and hadn't even invaded Kuwait yet. Barack Obama was still 7 years too young to run for President. Gas was $0.97, and a stamp was $0.25.
But Wednesday marks the 25th anniversary of "The Simpsons," which debuted as a half-hour sitcom on December 17, 1989. That's 561 episodes and counting -- and a lot of D'ohs! and donuts.
I've been a fan pretty much from day one; heck, I watched them in '87 on the Tracey Ullman Show. The earlier seasons, when Conan O'Brien was writing for them, were the best IMHO. Classics like "Monorail", "Homer's Heart Attack", "Stonecutters", and "Lisa's Wedding" never get old. The newer stuff saw Homer get stupid to the point of ridiculous, and I stopped watching somewhere in the 'teens. Recent stuff seems to be getting better, although that's damning with faint praise.
In closing, my favorite scene ever:
"Batman's a scientist." Whoever came up with that deserves a Grammy for spoken word...
That is all.
Monday, December 8, 2014
There's Something Happenin' Here...
I'm really not sure where this is going - if it's going anywhere at all.
First we had Trayvon Martin. This poor, innocent child, returning from a quick trip to the convenience store for some candy, was followed by some creepy white dude, who shot him dead for no apparent reason.
Then there was Mike Brown. For no reason other than he was walking down the street, Brown was shot dead, execution-style, in the back by a trigger-happy racist cop.
Next up we have a sordid tale of a young college student, viciously gang-raped by nameless and faceless fraternity brothers as part of some bizarre initiation ritual.
Problem is, in each of these stories, reality turned out to be nothing even remotely like the narrative. The media, desperately clinging to the "innocent boy vs. horrible racist man" narrative, kept showing pictures of Trayvon Martin when he was 12. We saw the same tactic with Mike Brown, with his high school graduation picture being apparently the only photograph ever taken.
They did get smarter with the UVA case, though. Since it was a sexual assault, the alleged victim wasn't named - couldn't be named. With that anonymity, the story is easier to stick to - no need to find 5 year old pictures when you conveniently can't show the victim at all.
In all these cases, though, the narrative fell apart despite the best attempts of the media to maintain it. George Zimmerman may have made poor decisions the night he shot Martin, but he hardly attacked this darling young boy. Officer Wilson certainly didn't shoot Mike Brown in the back. And while something might have happened at UVA, it's hard to believe this horrific gang rape occurred as part of an initiation ritual in the fall - when pledging takes place in the spring.
It makes you wonder. Sure, part of the problem is the rush to be first. Why be right when you can be right now? How many mass shootings has the media reported on where they claim multiple shooters, yet the reality is the vast majority are single? The stories as we initially hear them are juicy - a young man shot dead for no reason, a racist police officer shooting a black teen in the back, a college coed brutalized by frat brothers.
I'd be surprised if the media didn't report these stories.
It's the later, when the evidence starts pouring in that suggests things didn't happen the way the media wanted it to happen, that's critical. Rather than report the facts as they come in, we're treated to a litany of excuses. How many times did we hear the grand jury testimony in the Wilson hearing contained "conflicting accounts," yet we never heard that the reason accounts were conflicting is that witnesses who agreed with the "shot in the back" narrative were confronted with hard-and-fast evidence proving it couldn't have happened the way they claimed.
In the UVA case, this woman made numerous accusations that could have been (and eventually were) followed up on and found lacking. The first and most glaring being the initiation angle - a quick call to the national charter would have yielded the critical information that pledging occurs in the spring, so something like this happening as an initiation ritual is quite unlikely in the fall. Simple follow-ups fell by the wayside in the rush to bring these salacious and outrageous stories to print.
Even more troubling, though, is the aftermath. "Hands up" has become a rallying cry, despite there being not a single shred of evidence that Brown ever put his hands up. All greek organizations were suspended as a result of the Rolling Stone interview and alleged sexual assault; when it was brought up that perhaps the UVA President owed the fraternity an apology, the thought was violently shouted down. Oh, sure, maybe *this* assault didn't happen, but those evil frats have been doing stuff like this for a long time.
"Everybody knows" isn't a reason. The list of things "everybody knows" that has turned out to be completely wrong is so long we could spend all day on it and not even scratch the surface. It's certainly no reason to indict an entire profession (police) or condemn a specific fraternity for crimes no one can prove ever happened. Other injustices committed by other groups, no matter how similar, should have zero bearing on the actual event.
Every time the media blows a story out of proportion, though, the *real* stories get lost. Worse, they end up making things worse for real stories - by the time we got around to Eric Garner being killed by NYPD, we were all "outraged-out" after Mike Brown. Eric Garner was killed "resisting" NYPD over the sale of loose cigarettes. He wasn't knocking over convenience stores or selling drugs; he was committing the unpardonable crime of taking tax dollars away from the state. And he died as a result of police attempts to apprehend him.
That's a WAY more sympathetic story than the reality of Mike Brown, isn't it?
In the same vein, our Rolling Stone interviewee whose story seems to have fallen apart upon review has almost certainly caused severe harm to real cases of rape. Some will fail to report what happened, fearing that increased scrutiny in the wake of the embarrassing UVA report might further victimize them. Others might get overlooked as coverage is denied, again with a gunshy media deciding that silence is golden - after all, you can't get a story wrong that you don't report.
I'd like to believe that each of these cases are nothing more than the media just doubling down on their own stupidity. It's tempting to think there's some grand conspiracy here, that the media has this master template for fomenting dissent and hate in some bizarre attempt to make headlines and sell newspapers. Reality, though, dictates that the far more logical reason is simply that they don't want to admit they're wrong, and they're willing to burn the village in order to save it. Rather than say, hey, we messed up and didn't fully investigate that story, they're digging deeper and deeper.
Because if it really is some sinister conspiracy, I'm terrified to think that people are dumb enough to fall for it...
That is all.
First we had Trayvon Martin. This poor, innocent child, returning from a quick trip to the convenience store for some candy, was followed by some creepy white dude, who shot him dead for no apparent reason.
Then there was Mike Brown. For no reason other than he was walking down the street, Brown was shot dead, execution-style, in the back by a trigger-happy racist cop.
Next up we have a sordid tale of a young college student, viciously gang-raped by nameless and faceless fraternity brothers as part of some bizarre initiation ritual.
Problem is, in each of these stories, reality turned out to be nothing even remotely like the narrative. The media, desperately clinging to the "innocent boy vs. horrible racist man" narrative, kept showing pictures of Trayvon Martin when he was 12. We saw the same tactic with Mike Brown, with his high school graduation picture being apparently the only photograph ever taken.
They did get smarter with the UVA case, though. Since it was a sexual assault, the alleged victim wasn't named - couldn't be named. With that anonymity, the story is easier to stick to - no need to find 5 year old pictures when you conveniently can't show the victim at all.
In all these cases, though, the narrative fell apart despite the best attempts of the media to maintain it. George Zimmerman may have made poor decisions the night he shot Martin, but he hardly attacked this darling young boy. Officer Wilson certainly didn't shoot Mike Brown in the back. And while something might have happened at UVA, it's hard to believe this horrific gang rape occurred as part of an initiation ritual in the fall - when pledging takes place in the spring.
It makes you wonder. Sure, part of the problem is the rush to be first. Why be right when you can be right now? How many mass shootings has the media reported on where they claim multiple shooters, yet the reality is the vast majority are single? The stories as we initially hear them are juicy - a young man shot dead for no reason, a racist police officer shooting a black teen in the back, a college coed brutalized by frat brothers.
I'd be surprised if the media didn't report these stories.
It's the later, when the evidence starts pouring in that suggests things didn't happen the way the media wanted it to happen, that's critical. Rather than report the facts as they come in, we're treated to a litany of excuses. How many times did we hear the grand jury testimony in the Wilson hearing contained "conflicting accounts," yet we never heard that the reason accounts were conflicting is that witnesses who agreed with the "shot in the back" narrative were confronted with hard-and-fast evidence proving it couldn't have happened the way they claimed.
In the UVA case, this woman made numerous accusations that could have been (and eventually were) followed up on and found lacking. The first and most glaring being the initiation angle - a quick call to the national charter would have yielded the critical information that pledging occurs in the spring, so something like this happening as an initiation ritual is quite unlikely in the fall. Simple follow-ups fell by the wayside in the rush to bring these salacious and outrageous stories to print.
Even more troubling, though, is the aftermath. "Hands up" has become a rallying cry, despite there being not a single shred of evidence that Brown ever put his hands up. All greek organizations were suspended as a result of the Rolling Stone interview and alleged sexual assault; when it was brought up that perhaps the UVA President owed the fraternity an apology, the thought was violently shouted down. Oh, sure, maybe *this* assault didn't happen, but those evil frats have been doing stuff like this for a long time.
"Everybody knows" isn't a reason. The list of things "everybody knows" that has turned out to be completely wrong is so long we could spend all day on it and not even scratch the surface. It's certainly no reason to indict an entire profession (police) or condemn a specific fraternity for crimes no one can prove ever happened. Other injustices committed by other groups, no matter how similar, should have zero bearing on the actual event.
Every time the media blows a story out of proportion, though, the *real* stories get lost. Worse, they end up making things worse for real stories - by the time we got around to Eric Garner being killed by NYPD, we were all "outraged-out" after Mike Brown. Eric Garner was killed "resisting" NYPD over the sale of loose cigarettes. He wasn't knocking over convenience stores or selling drugs; he was committing the unpardonable crime of taking tax dollars away from the state. And he died as a result of police attempts to apprehend him.
That's a WAY more sympathetic story than the reality of Mike Brown, isn't it?
In the same vein, our Rolling Stone interviewee whose story seems to have fallen apart upon review has almost certainly caused severe harm to real cases of rape. Some will fail to report what happened, fearing that increased scrutiny in the wake of the embarrassing UVA report might further victimize them. Others might get overlooked as coverage is denied, again with a gunshy media deciding that silence is golden - after all, you can't get a story wrong that you don't report.
I'd like to believe that each of these cases are nothing more than the media just doubling down on their own stupidity. It's tempting to think there's some grand conspiracy here, that the media has this master template for fomenting dissent and hate in some bizarre attempt to make headlines and sell newspapers. Reality, though, dictates that the far more logical reason is simply that they don't want to admit they're wrong, and they're willing to burn the village in order to save it. Rather than say, hey, we messed up and didn't fully investigate that story, they're digging deeper and deeper.
Because if it really is some sinister conspiracy, I'm terrified to think that people are dumb enough to fall for it...
That is all.
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Sorry, Just Don't Have It...
Watching my Facebook feed fill up with news out of Missouri, I can't help but feel the same frustration as when I hear the latest SJW complain about a racy shirt on a science geek or crap about "cis-male" anything. The frivolous use of any "ism" - whether it be sexism, ageism, racism, etc. - detracts from legitimate cases.
Complaining about some science geek's hawaiian shirt - making it the center of a news story about an exciting scientific event - takes away from the thousands (probably more) of cases of legitimate sexual harassment that occur throughout the country on a regular basis. Claiming "racism" when a thug charges a cop and gets shot for it detracts from legitimate instances of police overreach, profiling, and overreaction.
Hell, I'll be one of the first to agree that there are plenty of stories about cops being too quick to go to guns. That's a training issue, and everyone would benefit from increased training that lessened the reliance on deadly force and made the application thereof more effective. No one likes stray rounds, not even the most gung-ho officer.
When armored vehicles rumbled through Boston suburbs and cops were pointing machine guns into houses without a single thought for the occupants inside (who, mind you, were ordered to stay inside, so the cops knew folks were in those houses), there were no protests. It's hard to envision a more heavy-handed application of police power than forcing folks to stay in their homes and rolling military-grade weaponry through the streets with no regard for Rule 4, yet no one rioted.
Police can and do make mistakes. We've seen enough no-knock warrants to have ample evidence of that. When they do, they need to be held accountable. When Officer Roid Rage in Ohio can't be fired after threatening to murder a concealed-carry permit holder, there's a problem with oversight. But there were no riots then, either?
When we see images of businesses being put to the torch and consumer electronics and alcohol being stolen under cover or protest, it significantly lowers the give-a-s**t-meter for actual cases of racism and police overreach. My fear is that real, legitimate cases of abuses of power will be pooh-poohed, swept away by the brush these protestors helped create by destroying Ferguson, MO in the wake of this decision.
It's like none of these people ever heard the story of the boy (Gender normalism!) who cried wolf (animal stereotyping!)...
That is all.
Complaining about some science geek's hawaiian shirt - making it the center of a news story about an exciting scientific event - takes away from the thousands (probably more) of cases of legitimate sexual harassment that occur throughout the country on a regular basis. Claiming "racism" when a thug charges a cop and gets shot for it detracts from legitimate instances of police overreach, profiling, and overreaction.
Hell, I'll be one of the first to agree that there are plenty of stories about cops being too quick to go to guns. That's a training issue, and everyone would benefit from increased training that lessened the reliance on deadly force and made the application thereof more effective. No one likes stray rounds, not even the most gung-ho officer.
When armored vehicles rumbled through Boston suburbs and cops were pointing machine guns into houses without a single thought for the occupants inside (who, mind you, were ordered to stay inside, so the cops knew folks were in those houses), there were no protests. It's hard to envision a more heavy-handed application of police power than forcing folks to stay in their homes and rolling military-grade weaponry through the streets with no regard for Rule 4, yet no one rioted.
Police can and do make mistakes. We've seen enough no-knock warrants to have ample evidence of that. When they do, they need to be held accountable. When Officer Roid Rage in Ohio can't be fired after threatening to murder a concealed-carry permit holder, there's a problem with oversight. But there were no riots then, either?
When we see images of businesses being put to the torch and consumer electronics and alcohol being stolen under cover or protest, it significantly lowers the give-a-s**t-meter for actual cases of racism and police overreach. My fear is that real, legitimate cases of abuses of power will be pooh-poohed, swept away by the brush these protestors helped create by destroying Ferguson, MO in the wake of this decision.
It's like none of these people ever heard the story of the boy (Gender normalism!) who cried wolf (animal stereotyping!)...
That is all.
Friday, November 14, 2014
Fixin' Stuff
So, this past weekend saw some minor home improvements as we prepare for colder weather (winter is coming!). Some additional weatherstripping around the entry doors, some insulation for the pipes in the basement; it's amazing how looking at things through a northeastern viewpoint changes the southern build...
Since we were already making a pilgrimage to the home improvement store, I grabbed some minor repair items as well. The hall half-bath commode had started making odd noises, not water hammer but unnatural sounds that heralded the replacing of internal parts. Even though replacing the fill valve is trivially easy, it involves toilets, which are naturally evil creatures, so I held my breath until the job was complete and 24 hours had passed with no leaks to declare triumph.
As I was in full-on handyman mode, I next tackled the door to the basement storage (where the reloading bench is set up and ammo is stored). It had never closed properly, so a quick realignment of the strike plate was in order. It's amazing how efficient a good whap-o-stat can be at persuading a strike plate it needs to be 1/4" lower...
It's not much, I know. Guys like og or doubletrouble or Wally who can tear stuff down to component molecules, fix what's broken, and put it all back together in a functional manner have always fascinated me. Part of it has to do with knowing my limitations - I know I get frustrated easily when things don't work as expected, and I doubt my abilities perhaps more than I should. I don't tackle what I consider complicated tasks out of fear of screwing it up, which is (I know) how you learn best.
So, with that said, how difficult is it to replace a kitchen faucet? Ours has been dripping for a while now, just enough that something needs to be done, but not enough to require immediate action. We know from our previous house that once faucets start dripping, there's little to do other than replace them (this is hard-won wisdom after replacing every single seal, washer, and o-ring in the $25 Delta faucet in the master bath in the old house...). We picked up a replacement kitchen faucet at Lowe's as a stop-gap, as at some point the kitchen is going to get an upgrade involving new counters/sink/range/etc. and there's no point spending a lot of money.
I've been going back and forth between just hiring a plumber to replace the faucet and tackling the job myself, and I'm squarely on the fence. On one hand, hiring the professional means I don't have to worry about screwing it up, and it will get done in an hour as opposed to half the weekend. Yes, it costs money, but if the job gets botched, someone else pays to fix the mistake. On the other hand, it looks *really* simple - shut off the water, unscrew the connections, remove old faucet, install new faucet. I found a guide to the process; it looks pretty simple especially considering I don't have to install shut-off valves.
Then again, don't all home-improvement nightmares start with "it looks easy; what could possibly go wrong?"
That is all.
Since we were already making a pilgrimage to the home improvement store, I grabbed some minor repair items as well. The hall half-bath commode had started making odd noises, not water hammer but unnatural sounds that heralded the replacing of internal parts. Even though replacing the fill valve is trivially easy, it involves toilets, which are naturally evil creatures, so I held my breath until the job was complete and 24 hours had passed with no leaks to declare triumph.
As I was in full-on handyman mode, I next tackled the door to the basement storage (where the reloading bench is set up and ammo is stored). It had never closed properly, so a quick realignment of the strike plate was in order. It's amazing how efficient a good whap-o-stat can be at persuading a strike plate it needs to be 1/4" lower...
It's not much, I know. Guys like og or doubletrouble or Wally who can tear stuff down to component molecules, fix what's broken, and put it all back together in a functional manner have always fascinated me. Part of it has to do with knowing my limitations - I know I get frustrated easily when things don't work as expected, and I doubt my abilities perhaps more than I should. I don't tackle what I consider complicated tasks out of fear of screwing it up, which is (I know) how you learn best.
So, with that said, how difficult is it to replace a kitchen faucet? Ours has been dripping for a while now, just enough that something needs to be done, but not enough to require immediate action. We know from our previous house that once faucets start dripping, there's little to do other than replace them (this is hard-won wisdom after replacing every single seal, washer, and o-ring in the $25 Delta faucet in the master bath in the old house...). We picked up a replacement kitchen faucet at Lowe's as a stop-gap, as at some point the kitchen is going to get an upgrade involving new counters/sink/range/etc. and there's no point spending a lot of money.
I've been going back and forth between just hiring a plumber to replace the faucet and tackling the job myself, and I'm squarely on the fence. On one hand, hiring the professional means I don't have to worry about screwing it up, and it will get done in an hour as opposed to half the weekend. Yes, it costs money, but if the job gets botched, someone else pays to fix the mistake. On the other hand, it looks *really* simple - shut off the water, unscrew the connections, remove old faucet, install new faucet. I found a guide to the process; it looks pretty simple especially considering I don't have to install shut-off valves.
Then again, don't all home-improvement nightmares start with "it looks easy; what could possibly go wrong?"
That is all.
Monday, November 10, 2014
Of Bargaining...
There are many reasons I'm in no rush to replace the Earthf**ker. Some are financial: Having no car payment is really nice, doubly so now that the Mrs.' car is paid off, too. Taxes are lower on an 8-year old vehicle, as is insurance. It may need the occasional repair, that's true, but unless and until something major goes wrong, I think I'll hang on to the Dodge for as long as I can.
The real reason for this revelation, you ask?
Simple. I *HATE* the car shopping process. When I bought the Earthf**ker, I had it narrowed down to three vehicles: The F-150, the Toyota Tundra, and the Dodge. I forget exactly what it was about the F-150 that turned me off, especially considering I have a friend who's a Master Mechanic for Ford, but the decision came down to the Tundra vs. the Ram.
I was all set to sign on the Tundra, too.
And then the dealership went and reneged on their deal, expecting the Toyota name to be worth enough that I would accept $2,500 below book value for my trade while paying above MSRP for the Tundra. Nope. Doesn't work that way, guys. You want above MSRP for your new vehicle, you pay me top dollar for my trade. You don't undercut every single used car guide out there and not take a penny off the sticker price.
Needless to say, I am looking forward to buying a new car with about as much relish as I am going back to the dentist after a long absence.
It helps that I have a larger pool this time. I'm looking at small, economical cars. If gas prices stay where they have been, this will be an easy thing. When gas was $4 a gallon, you couldn't get anywhere near a Toyota Corolla. Now that it's under $3 (I paid $2.57 yesterday), larger vehicles are back in vogue.
Also, the field is larger. While there are five vehicles that qualify as full-size pick-up trucks (counting GMC and Chevy as one, of course), there are literally dozens of small, fuel efficient cars out there. I'm also not averse to looking at the used market, either - I won't do that for a truck that will be used for towing, because I've seen *way* too many abused trucks out there to pick up someone else's tow vehicle (unless I personally knew the person selling the truck).
Being willing to walk helps. I'll do my research, have a half-dozen competitors' vehicles in mind, and gather several appraisals of my trade-in (KBB, NADA, representatives on the used market). I'm also not opposed to selling the truck privately if I get a screwball low offer, either. We recently sold our travel trailer in record time in the off season because we knew a willing buyer and made them a rather generous offer. While we could have waited until spring, cleaned the RV up and put out ads, we offered it for a bit below the going rate for other campers of that size and vintage. I'm willing to do the same with the Earthf**ker if I have to sell it outright.
But no, I'm not looking forward to the new car buying experience.
That is all.
The real reason for this revelation, you ask?
Simple. I *HATE* the car shopping process. When I bought the Earthf**ker, I had it narrowed down to three vehicles: The F-150, the Toyota Tundra, and the Dodge. I forget exactly what it was about the F-150 that turned me off, especially considering I have a friend who's a Master Mechanic for Ford, but the decision came down to the Tundra vs. the Ram.
I was all set to sign on the Tundra, too.
And then the dealership went and reneged on their deal, expecting the Toyota name to be worth enough that I would accept $2,500 below book value for my trade while paying above MSRP for the Tundra. Nope. Doesn't work that way, guys. You want above MSRP for your new vehicle, you pay me top dollar for my trade. You don't undercut every single used car guide out there and not take a penny off the sticker price.
Needless to say, I am looking forward to buying a new car with about as much relish as I am going back to the dentist after a long absence.
It helps that I have a larger pool this time. I'm looking at small, economical cars. If gas prices stay where they have been, this will be an easy thing. When gas was $4 a gallon, you couldn't get anywhere near a Toyota Corolla. Now that it's under $3 (I paid $2.57 yesterday), larger vehicles are back in vogue.
Also, the field is larger. While there are five vehicles that qualify as full-size pick-up trucks (counting GMC and Chevy as one, of course), there are literally dozens of small, fuel efficient cars out there. I'm also not averse to looking at the used market, either - I won't do that for a truck that will be used for towing, because I've seen *way* too many abused trucks out there to pick up someone else's tow vehicle (unless I personally knew the person selling the truck).
Being willing to walk helps. I'll do my research, have a half-dozen competitors' vehicles in mind, and gather several appraisals of my trade-in (KBB, NADA, representatives on the used market). I'm also not opposed to selling the truck privately if I get a screwball low offer, either. We recently sold our travel trailer in record time in the off season because we knew a willing buyer and made them a rather generous offer. While we could have waited until spring, cleaned the RV up and put out ads, we offered it for a bit below the going rate for other campers of that size and vintage. I'm willing to do the same with the Earthf**ker if I have to sell it outright.
But no, I'm not looking forward to the new car buying experience.
That is all.
Monday, October 27, 2014
Equal Footing
So, I've been watching "Game of Thrones" lately. I started watching the series when the fourth season started up earlier this year, and was surprised at how much I enjoyed the series. Good writing, good acting, swords and axes and armor, all the makings of a good time. I started watching the show from the beginning to fill in what I was missing the past couple of weeks, and one thing struck me:
Civilization is a paper-thin veneer.
While I understand that the TV show is hardly historically accurate (especially considering it takes place in some sort of alternate universe where winters last years), there's plenty taken from our own history as well as history that might have been (but uninteresting enough for anyone to record for posterity). There's certainly enough of our own history to trace back the phrase "might makes right" and instances. Thucydides uses the concept in the History of the Peloponnesian War, about the war between Sparta and Athens.
The character Gregor Clegane, better known as "The Mountain" in Game of Thrones, is portrayed as a large, powerful man prone to fits of extreme violence who, owing to his size and strength, pretty much does whatever he wants to whoever he wants without consequence. His prowess with a blade, combined with extreme strength and complete lack of anything resembling morals, allows him to violate the rules at will - although "ignore" is a better term. Rules simply don't apply to him.
Take what you want, because no one can stop you. That's what happens when the stronger have no morals, and the weaker have no effective means of defense. Martial arts are meaningless if the other guy is three times stronger and twice as fast, no matter how good you happen to be. You might be the smartest human on the planet, but if your house/jacket/mate garners the attention of someone larger, you're going to be hard-pressed to effectively fight to keep what you have.
There's one difference now, though: firearms put us all on equal footing. Being the biggest, strongest SOB on the planet is meaningless when the person you're trying to intimidate can launch 230 grains of equalizing goodness in response to your aggression. While they may have been powerless against you in bare-knuckle brawling, they do not need to descend to that level for their own defense.
The firearm puts us on equal footing, whereas edged or impact weapons do not...
That is all.
Civilization is a paper-thin veneer.
While I understand that the TV show is hardly historically accurate (especially considering it takes place in some sort of alternate universe where winters last years), there's plenty taken from our own history as well as history that might have been (but uninteresting enough for anyone to record for posterity). There's certainly enough of our own history to trace back the phrase "might makes right" and instances. Thucydides uses the concept in the History of the Peloponnesian War, about the war between Sparta and Athens.
The character Gregor Clegane, better known as "The Mountain" in Game of Thrones, is portrayed as a large, powerful man prone to fits of extreme violence who, owing to his size and strength, pretty much does whatever he wants to whoever he wants without consequence. His prowess with a blade, combined with extreme strength and complete lack of anything resembling morals, allows him to violate the rules at will - although "ignore" is a better term. Rules simply don't apply to him.
Take what you want, because no one can stop you. That's what happens when the stronger have no morals, and the weaker have no effective means of defense. Martial arts are meaningless if the other guy is three times stronger and twice as fast, no matter how good you happen to be. You might be the smartest human on the planet, but if your house/jacket/mate garners the attention of someone larger, you're going to be hard-pressed to effectively fight to keep what you have.
There's one difference now, though: firearms put us all on equal footing. Being the biggest, strongest SOB on the planet is meaningless when the person you're trying to intimidate can launch 230 grains of equalizing goodness in response to your aggression. While they may have been powerless against you in bare-knuckle brawling, they do not need to descend to that level for their own defense.
The firearm puts us on equal footing, whereas edged or impact weapons do not...
That is all.
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Car-nundrum, Redux...
So, I'm still thinking about a new vehicle. Even though gas is under $3/gallon here in VA, it's still expensive running the Earthf**ker every day back and forth in traffic. I'm getting under 14 MPG and going through a tank of gas a week, and while it's costing less to fill that tank, it's still way more money that I would like.
Not to mention, the truck is 8 years old and has almost 100K on the clock. While it's running great now, it won't be long before time takes its course and things start needing to be replaced. On top of that, it's got the archetypal rust starting to poke through on the fenders (which pisses me off to no extent, mind you. For 7 out of the last 8 years this truck has been garaged all winter long. The wife's Accord lasted 10 years with ZERO rust).
Yes, fixing the rust and dealing with problems as they come up is undoubtedly less expensive than a new car payment. I totally get that. I'm going to try to run the Dodge for at least a couple more years - I'm thinking that around 125K or so it's going to be due for new tires and brakes, and that gives 2 years for the rust situation to shake out, as well. I may reassess and decide it's worth dropping money into new tires/brakes/etc., or it may be time to trade the Earthf**ker in.
At some point next year, we should see the Elio hit the market. If - and this is the kicker - the price of $6,800 is correct (plus or minus a little bit; I'm willing to pay extra for an automatic transmission, frex) *and* the mileage is even close to what they're claiming (84 MPG highway seems very optimistic, although 49 MPG city seems possible), I will bring one of the little Elios home. At $7K give-or-take it can be financed painlessly over a couple years, three max, and having the Dodge relegated to once-a-month and bad-weather driving will significantly extend the life.
But we're all about planning, y'see. If for whatever reason the Elio doesn't make it to market or deviates substantially from the claims, I want to be ready for that possibility. As much as I dearly love the idea of a three-wheeled enclosed motorcycle (YAY HOV LANE!), I'm not going to pay Polaris Slingshot money for one. And that's without a cover that would enable me to drive the Slingshot year-round or even in the rain.
So, what does it boil down to? Sadly, the days of owning a pickup will be over should the Elio not happen. There are just too many good small cars out there to take the gas mileage hit - the last time I put money down on a big truck, gas shot up to $4 a gallon. I figure if I pick up a fuel efficient car, we'll see gas prices plummet below $2 a gallon for sure... While I really like the Toyota Tacoma crew cab, it's both more expensive than I need and the mileage isn't there. No truck comes even vaguely close to what I'd be looking for.
What then? Well, it would be a small car, like the Nissan Versa or the Toyota Yaris. The Yaris doesn't have a sedan version (strike one) and is considerably more expensive (like $2K, not counting the automatic - strike two). Other options are the Mazda 2, which is the same price as the Versa, but doesn't have a sedan and gets considerably worse gas mileage (28/34 city/highway compared to the Versa's 31/40). There's the Honda Fit, which again doesn't have a sedan version and is slightly more ($800) but offers slightly better gas mileage (33/41). The Civic brings the sedan, and the HF version gets the same gas mileage, but the price veers over $20K.
Again, a lot can change in two years. If gas prices take a sharp uptick, fuel-efficient cars start to become a premium, and gas-guzzling pickup trucks and SUVs are harder to move. That makes selling a 10-year old Earthf**ker harder and finding a reasonably priced econobox harder as well. If gas prices stay low (under $3/gallon), then the reverse should hold true - small, fuel efficient cars look less attractive when gas isn't terrifically expensive. Two years can change a lot of things...
The really hard part comes if I get offered a lowball figure for the Dodge. I'm willing to walk - heck, the Dodge is a result of me walking out of a Toyota dealership because they out-and-out lied to me about what they would give me for my Durango - but if the third place makes the same lowball offer, there's gotta be a reckoning. Is it worth holding onto the Earthf**ker and maybe getting a stripped Kia rather than trading the Dodge in and getting a Civic?
Now, I really do hope the Elio comes out on schedule and close to as promised. I can live with a few MPG off estimate, especially highway - my commute, while 90+ highway, is city mileage with all the stop-and-go. If the city is close - and the 1990s Geo Metro XFI got something like 45 MPG in city driving - that's a *HUGE* boost for me. Going from 14 MPG on a good day to 45 would cut my fuel bill by 1/3.
Do the math time: 200 miles a week by 50 weeks is 10K miles a year. At 14 MPG, that's 714.3 gallons. At 45 MPG, it's 222.2. Even at $3 a gallon, that's a savings of nearly $1,500 a year in gas alone, just from the daily commute. If I kept the Elio for 5 years, I would break even just on the gas used to commute at $3/gallon. Yes, it doesn't cover the cost of insurance or taxes, but those would break even just on the reduced wear on the truck (or close enough to it). Not to mention that sweet, sweet HOV lane...
Price also factors into the equation. The Elio is a dream at under $8K. At $14K, not so much - it doesn't have the creature comforts nor the carrying capacity to justify the price of a new Versa sedan. I don't see taking the Elio up North for a bloggershoot, that's for certain. They're pitching it, smartly, as an "and" car - as in, I have a [regular vehicle] *and* I commute in an Elio. They bring the Elio to market at ~ $7,500 (figure a little extra for the auto transmission) and it gets 60/45 (highway/city), I will snap one up so fast it'll leave a vapor trail out of the dealership.
If I can pick up the Elio for close to what's been proposed, I'll do it in a heartbeat and keep the Ram for weekends and bad winter driving. Having a pickup is awesome for all sorts of reasons - taking TheBoy camping, hauling a trailer, making large item purchases, etc. It's paid for; by the time the Elio is out it will have been paid for nearly four years. It won't owe me a thing. If I can drastically reduce the wear and tear on it, it should last another five years without breaking a sweat.
The hardest part will be not giving it to TheBoy when he gets his license - and believe me, there is no way on G-d's Green Earth I am handing the keys to a 350HP, Hemi-V8-powered truck with a cap on the back to a teenaged boy...
That is all.
Not to mention, the truck is 8 years old and has almost 100K on the clock. While it's running great now, it won't be long before time takes its course and things start needing to be replaced. On top of that, it's got the archetypal rust starting to poke through on the fenders (which pisses me off to no extent, mind you. For 7 out of the last 8 years this truck has been garaged all winter long. The wife's Accord lasted 10 years with ZERO rust).
Yes, fixing the rust and dealing with problems as they come up is undoubtedly less expensive than a new car payment. I totally get that. I'm going to try to run the Dodge for at least a couple more years - I'm thinking that around 125K or so it's going to be due for new tires and brakes, and that gives 2 years for the rust situation to shake out, as well. I may reassess and decide it's worth dropping money into new tires/brakes/etc., or it may be time to trade the Earthf**ker in.
At some point next year, we should see the Elio hit the market. If - and this is the kicker - the price of $6,800 is correct (plus or minus a little bit; I'm willing to pay extra for an automatic transmission, frex) *and* the mileage is even close to what they're claiming (84 MPG highway seems very optimistic, although 49 MPG city seems possible), I will bring one of the little Elios home. At $7K give-or-take it can be financed painlessly over a couple years, three max, and having the Dodge relegated to once-a-month and bad-weather driving will significantly extend the life.
But we're all about planning, y'see. If for whatever reason the Elio doesn't make it to market or deviates substantially from the claims, I want to be ready for that possibility. As much as I dearly love the idea of a three-wheeled enclosed motorcycle (YAY HOV LANE!), I'm not going to pay Polaris Slingshot money for one. And that's without a cover that would enable me to drive the Slingshot year-round or even in the rain.
So, what does it boil down to? Sadly, the days of owning a pickup will be over should the Elio not happen. There are just too many good small cars out there to take the gas mileage hit - the last time I put money down on a big truck, gas shot up to $4 a gallon. I figure if I pick up a fuel efficient car, we'll see gas prices plummet below $2 a gallon for sure... While I really like the Toyota Tacoma crew cab, it's both more expensive than I need and the mileage isn't there. No truck comes even vaguely close to what I'd be looking for.
What then? Well, it would be a small car, like the Nissan Versa or the Toyota Yaris. The Yaris doesn't have a sedan version (strike one) and is considerably more expensive (like $2K, not counting the automatic - strike two). Other options are the Mazda 2, which is the same price as the Versa, but doesn't have a sedan and gets considerably worse gas mileage (28/34 city/highway compared to the Versa's 31/40). There's the Honda Fit, which again doesn't have a sedan version and is slightly more ($800) but offers slightly better gas mileage (33/41). The Civic brings the sedan, and the HF version gets the same gas mileage, but the price veers over $20K.
Again, a lot can change in two years. If gas prices take a sharp uptick, fuel-efficient cars start to become a premium, and gas-guzzling pickup trucks and SUVs are harder to move. That makes selling a 10-year old Earthf**ker harder and finding a reasonably priced econobox harder as well. If gas prices stay low (under $3/gallon), then the reverse should hold true - small, fuel efficient cars look less attractive when gas isn't terrifically expensive. Two years can change a lot of things...
The really hard part comes if I get offered a lowball figure for the Dodge. I'm willing to walk - heck, the Dodge is a result of me walking out of a Toyota dealership because they out-and-out lied to me about what they would give me for my Durango - but if the third place makes the same lowball offer, there's gotta be a reckoning. Is it worth holding onto the Earthf**ker and maybe getting a stripped Kia rather than trading the Dodge in and getting a Civic?
Now, I really do hope the Elio comes out on schedule and close to as promised. I can live with a few MPG off estimate, especially highway - my commute, while 90+ highway, is city mileage with all the stop-and-go. If the city is close - and the 1990s Geo Metro XFI got something like 45 MPG in city driving - that's a *HUGE* boost for me. Going from 14 MPG on a good day to 45 would cut my fuel bill by 1/3.
Do the math time: 200 miles a week by 50 weeks is 10K miles a year. At 14 MPG, that's 714.3 gallons. At 45 MPG, it's 222.2. Even at $3 a gallon, that's a savings of nearly $1,500 a year in gas alone, just from the daily commute. If I kept the Elio for 5 years, I would break even just on the gas used to commute at $3/gallon. Yes, it doesn't cover the cost of insurance or taxes, but those would break even just on the reduced wear on the truck (or close enough to it). Not to mention that sweet, sweet HOV lane...
Price also factors into the equation. The Elio is a dream at under $8K. At $14K, not so much - it doesn't have the creature comforts nor the carrying capacity to justify the price of a new Versa sedan. I don't see taking the Elio up North for a bloggershoot, that's for certain. They're pitching it, smartly, as an "and" car - as in, I have a [regular vehicle] *and* I commute in an Elio. They bring the Elio to market at ~ $7,500 (figure a little extra for the auto transmission) and it gets 60/45 (highway/city), I will snap one up so fast it'll leave a vapor trail out of the dealership.
If I can pick up the Elio for close to what's been proposed, I'll do it in a heartbeat and keep the Ram for weekends and bad winter driving. Having a pickup is awesome for all sorts of reasons - taking TheBoy camping, hauling a trailer, making large item purchases, etc. It's paid for; by the time the Elio is out it will have been paid for nearly four years. It won't owe me a thing. If I can drastically reduce the wear and tear on it, it should last another five years without breaking a sweat.
The hardest part will be not giving it to TheBoy when he gets his license - and believe me, there is no way on G-d's Green Earth I am handing the keys to a 350HP, Hemi-V8-powered truck with a cap on the back to a teenaged boy...
That is all.
Friday, October 3, 2014
Burned Out...
It occurred to me that there have been a glut of stories recently about which I had been meaning to opine but just never got around to it:
Murdered realtor in AR
OK beheading
Ebola
Resignation of SS head for failure at White House
Killer enterovirus
I do think I touched on the egregious failure of the United States Secret Service right when it happened, but I really haven't followed up on the story much. It's kind of hard to, really, because the facts are few, speculation is rampant, and all we know is a mentally disturbed vet managed to vault the fence around 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, stroll across the White House lawn, and then walk through the unlocked door and past an agent.He was eventually tackled by an off-duty agent after passing the stairs to the Obama's private area.
Naturally, the Secret Service downplayed what happened and misled the American public, claiming that he was stopped at the door. That we found out about this at all puts the lie to the idea that the US Government is capable of keeping a conspiracy quiet at any level, although I'm certain it won't stop the 9/11 truther idiots from blathering on. It's a lot like how a chicken's body will run around for hours after the head has been removed...
As for enterovirus and ebola, well, I wouldn't say panic, but I'd sure as hell stock up on non-perishable food, bleach, and gloves. Everything I've read on ebola says it's on a par with AIDS - you need to come into contact with an infected person's bodily fluids in order to develop it. Also, the mortality rates are exceedingly high - but the disease has been striking in places with, well, less-than-stellar medical practices. Enterovirus, well, pretty much the same deal on prevention, and it doesn't seem to be particularly lethal except in conjunction with other medical issues.
I'm far more concerned about going primal on some nitwit warbling on about how eeeeevil Big Pharma is deliberately withholding the cure for ebola because it doesn't affect rich people...
As for the realtor and the OK beheading, well... There's evil out there. Whether it's crazy evil or just plain evil evil, it exists, it walks among us, and it can and will strike at any time. Never lose sight of that fact. As a wise man said, "Carry your damn guns". If you knew when and where evil was going to strike, you'd stay the hell away, right? Be prepared, like for everything else.
I'm staying the hell out of the whole "was the guy in OK a nutjob or a religious fanatic" argument. Honestly, it really doesn't matter a pinch to the person he killed, does it? Whether the person who killed you did so because they heard voices from Planet Weembo or because they really thought they'd get into heaven, you're no more or less dead in either case. There's plenty of whackos out there of all stripes without worrying about their motivation.
Worry about center-of-mass instead.
That is all.
Murdered realtor in AR
OK beheading
Ebola
Resignation of SS head for failure at White House
Killer enterovirus
I do think I touched on the egregious failure of the United States Secret Service right when it happened, but I really haven't followed up on the story much. It's kind of hard to, really, because the facts are few, speculation is rampant, and all we know is a mentally disturbed vet managed to vault the fence around 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, stroll across the White House lawn, and then walk through the unlocked door and past an agent.He was eventually tackled by an off-duty agent after passing the stairs to the Obama's private area.
Naturally, the Secret Service downplayed what happened and misled the American public, claiming that he was stopped at the door. That we found out about this at all puts the lie to the idea that the US Government is capable of keeping a conspiracy quiet at any level, although I'm certain it won't stop the 9/11 truther idiots from blathering on. It's a lot like how a chicken's body will run around for hours after the head has been removed...
As for enterovirus and ebola, well, I wouldn't say panic, but I'd sure as hell stock up on non-perishable food, bleach, and gloves. Everything I've read on ebola says it's on a par with AIDS - you need to come into contact with an infected person's bodily fluids in order to develop it. Also, the mortality rates are exceedingly high - but the disease has been striking in places with, well, less-than-stellar medical practices. Enterovirus, well, pretty much the same deal on prevention, and it doesn't seem to be particularly lethal except in conjunction with other medical issues.
I'm far more concerned about going primal on some nitwit warbling on about how eeeeevil Big Pharma is deliberately withholding the cure for ebola because it doesn't affect rich people...
As for the realtor and the OK beheading, well... There's evil out there. Whether it's crazy evil or just plain evil evil, it exists, it walks among us, and it can and will strike at any time. Never lose sight of that fact. As a wise man said, "Carry your damn guns". If you knew when and where evil was going to strike, you'd stay the hell away, right? Be prepared, like for everything else.
I'm staying the hell out of the whole "was the guy in OK a nutjob or a religious fanatic" argument. Honestly, it really doesn't matter a pinch to the person he killed, does it? Whether the person who killed you did so because they heard voices from Planet Weembo or because they really thought they'd get into heaven, you're no more or less dead in either case. There's plenty of whackos out there of all stripes without worrying about their motivation.
Worry about center-of-mass instead.
That is all.
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