Author: Derek
Ward Manor Happenings
The Wife and I – mostly The Wife – mounted my now four lightsabers in the short hallway between our offices. They look pretty neat when all lit up. Although whoever designed the sound for the Darksaber must have really wanted people not to turn it on.
In addition to putting up the lightsabers, we laid down a new mat in the cat room, which we hope will make it easier to keep clean. We also had a small incident with the door to the garage. Namely it suddenly wouldn’t open. After a few minutes of fiddling, we figured out that one of the screws fell out and jammed the door. Good news, we managed to get the screw out and door open. Better news for me, it means we get to switch out the door handle from the one that came with the house to something more robust.
While I went wild with the lightsaber acquisitions, The Wife, MIL, and Mom all got Bogg bags. The Wife wanted one for a while. Then we decided to get one for Mom as she had need for that kind of bag. Which resulted in The Wife deciding to get one for herself, and then getting one for MIL. Then accessories. Then initials for the bags. I don’t ask questions. Not when I now have four lightsabers.
Over the weekend was The Niece’s birthday party, so we traveled over to Titusville. AppleMaps routed us a new route to avoid flood warnings. Which gave us a chance to see how flooded parts of Manatee still were. It was quite dramatic. The party was a fun time, as The Niece and her gaggle of friends hung out in one part of the house, while the rest of the family caught up in another. However, we did come home with something to remember. Namely a crack in the Ward Wagon’s windshield. I was also annoyed that BIG NAME WINDSHIELD REPAIR company no longer does home service in my area. So, off to find a place to take the Ward Wagon before it grows from a quarter to something larger.
Monday Links
This is going to be a weird one, as I have only one Reason article.
Now for a couple of Ground News aggregations.
DOJ is going after a software firm saying that their algorithm allows landlords to raise rents.
Former deputy who killed airman is being charged with manslaughter. I would like to think that a private citizen would get the same consideration in terms of charging.
For news items from other sources.
Duke Medical study finds gun laws have mixed impact on suicide and homicide rates. Almost as if murder and suicide are complex problems that can’t be fixed with “one simple solution.”
Local news station is advising people not to trust flood maps when deciding to buy flood insurance. Note to any new or prospective resident of Florida – you need flood insurance. I don’t care where you live in Florida, you need flood insurance.
The Verge is reporting that Chik-Fil-A is looking into launching a streaming service. Um, okay. Question. Will it run on Sundays?
Creative Loafing Tampa is reporting on Busch Gardens shutting down the Scorpion roller coaster. I remember when that coaster opened, and rode it a lot when I was younger, thinner, and able to ride coasters without feeling like I got bashed around.
Another Guardian article, but this one on the reveal of some of the major features of Civ 7. There’s been a lot of sturm und drang among the Civ FB groups on the changes. I’m going to wait until I’ve played before making judgements. I will say that I’m inordinately excited that rivers will now be navigable.
Via The Brother, there’s this nifty USGS site showing all of the world’s water in a sphere.
Not Exactly How I Planned To Spend My Sunday
Sunday began with the distinctive chirping of one of the smoke alarms telling me that the batteries were dead. Joy. After locating the offending device, I switched out the batteries. Still not working. Popped out the new batteries. Well, hell, that looks like corrosion on one of the contacts. Check the old batteries. Yep, one burst and managed to take out the alarm. Fortunately Amazon has same day delivery for a replacement.
The Wife and I then got ready for a trip to Apopka. On Friday, I won an auction on Gunbroker and the store handling the auction was in Apopka. Rather than have them ship the pistol over to their store nearby, The Wife and I decided it would be a fun little jaunt to just travel the two hours. It would give her time to crochet while the both of us listened to our audiobook.
We got to the store and found out that their Gunbroker auctions group didn’t work weekends. In other words, Derek jumped the gun instead of waiting for the email/call that my gun was ready for pickup. But it should be done in a day or two. Um, yeah, I’m not going to be able to make that trip anytime soon. I asked if they would please let their Gunbroker folks know to ship it over to the local store. They would have them call me.
As we were leaving, The Wife looked at her phone and asked if we wanted to go hit Disney Springs. After all, I wanted to pick up another lightsaber. We have plans for mounting them in the space between our offices. Except there was one small problem. I wasn’t planning on going to Disney, and I had a variety of devices that Disney frowns on bringing into their various attractions. Well, we were at a gun store. We found one that I liked and got it set up in the Ward Wagon. One of those times I was glad that I had TSA’d my sling bag.
Let’s just say if we knew we were going to make the trek to Disney Springs we would have made different wardrobe changes. But we hiked from the parking garage to the Star Wars store. There was momentary panic because they moved the lightsaber case. I had a hard time deciding between Luke’s green saber from Return of the Jedi and the Darksaber. The clerk informed us that if we ordered the Darksaber from the online Disney store, it was cheaper. That much was true. It was also sold out with no timeline for restock. The Wife looked at the budget and saw there was some play. Both of them ended up coming home with us. Now, I have to figure out how to mount the Darksaber, because it won’t use the ones I bought for my lightsabers.
It was not the day we planned, but it was a good day nonetheless.
It’s A Good Thing Ward Manor Is On High Ground
Manatee and Sarasota counties saw some significant flooding from Hurricane Debby – although I think it was technically a tropical storm when it hit us. The storm really demonstrated the impact of the rapid building in the area – as well as the incompetence of many elected officials.
This was particularly true in regards to the “strategic release” of water from the Lake Manatee dam. Here’s coverage from the Bradenton Times and here’s another article from the Florida Trident. I’ll be quoting from both.
Manatee County officials have known for years that an aging and problem-plagued dam at Lake Manatee posed a threat to public safety, but reduced outflow 48 hours before Debby instead of increasing it ahead of forecasted rainfall, according to records obtained by the Florida Trident.
According to engineering reports reviewed by the Trident, the only option to prevent a catastrophic collapse of the entire 6 billion-gallon reservoir was to remove earthen plugs above an emergency spillway just to the north of the dam. The plugs and emergency spillway were designed to relieve pressure on the dam by opening an additional channel to discharge water.
The engineering feat had never been done before during a rain event. No one knew for certain what would happen. But officials did know one of three gates at the dam was inoperable, restricting the ability to discharge water.
From Bradenton Times:
On Monday morning, as the county entered its second day of near continuous rainfall, residents east of I-75—with addresses in Bradenton, Parrish, and Myakka—received the first emergency alert from Manatee County Government warning them of a potentially life-threatening situation.
It was approximately 10:30 a.m. when the county issued the Integrated Public Alert & Warning System (IPAWS) message:
“Manatee Dam doing strategic release to cause dangerous swift moving water and flooding. Leave area NOW. Shelters available. Highwater vehicles being staged in area. Call 311 for information. Use 911 for emergencies ONLY.”
Many residents who received the alert took to social media, posting to ask friends and neighbors what the alert meant and whether they needed to evacuate.
Complicating the situation was the fact that the county’s official social media pages did not mention the IPAWS alert or the anticipated release at the dam. Nothing was posted on the county’s Public Safety Department’s social media accounts, either.
The Manatee County Government website was also void of information about the alert.
Local authorities were less than helpful about what to do and where to go. People were also told to evacuate and ran into high water – and then had to be rescued.
This is one of the reasons I’m voting against most of the incumbents on the county commission. They’ve been so recklessly in the pocket of the developers that they haven’t built up the infrastructure to deal with things like storms.
Also, whoever told new residents that they didn’t need flood insurance fucking lied to them. This is Florida. You need flood insurance. Especially when all the new construction isn’t able to handle all the water.
Monday Links
Stop! Reason time!
Oh look, someone’s already challenging Florida’s law banning lab-grown meat. Because bullshit crony-protectionism laws needs to be taken down.
The Fifth Circuit is taking down geo-fencing warrants. See what I did there. Taking down a fence?
IJ is going after Indiana claiming the state is seizing millions from FedEx packages. Seriously, there needs to be a constitutional amendment banning seizure of property without an underlying criminal conviction.
On to other stories.
Massad Ayoob talks about Salman Rushdie’s new book Knife. He particularly goes over how Rushdie froze when he was attacked.
CrowdStrike’s president showed up at DefCon to accept the award for “Most Epic Fail” in person. I will give them kudos for showing up.