A recent poll says the First Amendment gives too many protections. This is an example of a worrying trend where both sides want fewer civil rights so that they can use power against the other.
From Bloomberg, a federal judge rules Google violated anti-trust law. Considering the AI wave coming, I’m really getting late nineties Microsoft echoes. The most ridiculous claims the prosecutors put out? That because of Google’s dominant position in search, they failed to innovate and hurt consumers. Bitch, that’s what’s called a market opportunity.
This is from Fox News, so I’m not sure how click-baitey the story is. However, the fact that the Met’s Commissioner says it will seek extradition for folks violating their ridiculous social media laws regarding their recent rioting is enough to make me want to dig more. My immediate reaction is very Molon Labe. My next reaction is that it’s very rich that Britain has refused to extradite murderers because they were facing the “barbaric” death penalty. I think the American government would be in the right to tell the Brits that turnabout is fair play. My final thought is that the states should go tell the feds to pound sand if they try to extradite any of their residents to the Brits over this shit.
Day Job Happenings – The big news around the Manor is that I formally requested a transfer from the current day job to my old day job. The new job was poorly conceived and the politics of my current place morphed it into something where I often dread going into the office. Not to say there weren’t parts I liked, but it wasn’t worth the stress. I have to take a pay cut, but since The Wife and I budget relentlessly, it’s more of an inconvenience than a hardship.
Anyways, I’m in that wonderful time where I’ve notified my supervisor (who was not surprised), but I’m waiting on a timeline for how the transfer will occur. Most likely it will take about a month. Maybe more, maybe less. Then comes the fun of informing everyone else. TBH, some of that will be fun. Others will be less so.
Weather Happenings – We got our first semi-decent tropical near us for the season. This meant pulling down the bird feeders. Also gave me the reason to replace one of the poles which wasn’t holding up too well. It’s always fun explaining to newbies that while, yes, the storm is going to make landfall north of us, we’re going to get some interesting weather from it due to the size of the storms.
Fortunately for us, all we got was some real sporty thunderstorms and wind. Our lanai got a bit flooded due to rain coming in – sideways – faster than it could drain. The pond out back probably rose about six inches. The county as a whole saw about 14″ of rain drop over a couple of days, but my little corner saw almost 19 inches. There was pretty nasty flooding across the county and one of the dams south of us had to release some water causing more flooding. So, we’re good, but a lot of our neighbors are going through a rough time.
Derek’s Mind Works In Odd Ways – I’ve recently started picking up some of the GI Joe Classified series figures. For those unaware, these are mostly based on the old 80’s toys, but at six-inch scale, with more articulation and more gear. Okay, I know GI Joe was known for, let’s just say, a unrealistic edge to their weapons and gear. I mean, a motorcycle with a gatling gun sidecar is neat, but not feasible. However, I’m hitting an odd “uncanny valley” issue. For instance, I recently picked up this set. Shockwave was one of my fav’s back in the day, and I’m looking at putting together an urban warfare scene with some Alley Vipers I picked up. Anyhoo, here’s my brain conundrum. The idea of a SWAT-style guy on the team lives on one side of the uncanny valley, while the gatling gun-armed motorcycle lives on another. The double-barrel AR falls directly into the valley. Why? Because it’s a real thing, but there’s no way I can see an elite unit actually using it in combat. I can’t tell you why that bothers me, but it bothers me.
I don’t understand all the hate I’ve been hearing from the professional movie reviewers. It kind of reminds me the reviews around Bright. I was laughing pretty much non-stop throughout the film.
My general rule for these reviews is no spoilers. Which makes it difficult because there are so many – I can’t really call them Easter Eggs. I would call them more “surprise guest stars”. Let’s just say if you’ve been a Marvel movie watcher since the mid-90’s, there’s plenty of callback, gags, and homages.
I will say watching Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds together was a joy. It was clear they had a ball making the film.
Like the previous Deadpool films, there are a lot of fourth-wall breaks and callouts to the comics movie universe. It all comes fast and furious. I’ll have to watch again just to see what I missed.
Here’s two takes on Biden’s Supreme Court reform proposals. One from the Volokh Conspiracy and one from Reason. My opinion? I like the idea of twenty year term limits on the Supreme Court, but if and only if the judicial filibuster is established in law. I would like some more generational turnover, but I don’t want justices becoming enmeshed in the campaign fray. Also, it would help if Congress would do their damned job.
Reporting from The Reload on the judge denying New York’s demand for a monitor over the NRA. Also, WLP is banned from holding a position in the NRA for a decade. There were also some other recommendations. I’m still leery of rejoining the NRA in light of the recent appointments of the old guard to key committees and reformers being almost exclusively shut out of those committees.
This year’s Prime Day was focused around a couple of re-orgs I’ve been wanting to do.
Bed stand Reorganization
My bed stand was getting cluttered, and I’ve been wanting to clean it up. One of the big areas is the collection of tablets. The tablet rack I was using wasn’t working and was too bulky. So, I switched out for this one.
Another item was all the charging cables. I reduced them somewhat and gained some space using this Anker wireless charging station for my phone, watch, and airpods.
Sling Bag Reorganization
After multiple times of having to quickly make my sling bag TSA-compliant, I’ve decided to just keep it that way. Which meant the knives and lighter. I switched out the lighter for one of these firestarters. Is it as convenient or handy as a lighter? Nope. Will it get through security? Yep.
I’ve also added an Anker Mag Safe battery pack. This one has a bit more oomph than the one I currently have. Plus, if our trip out west proved anything, it’s damned useful to have as much stored power as possible.
For the last couple of weeks, the Ward household traveled to Washington State for two big family events. First, we needed to spread FIL’s ashes where he wanted. Second, The Wife’s nephew and his fiancee decided to get hitched out there. This trip had been in the works since shortly after FIL’s passing. It was almost derailed when COVID blew through the Ward household the week prior to leaving. I was actually recovering from COVID when we left.
The TLDR is both events went off splendidly, if not with some hiccups.
So, one of the things we decided to do was splurge a bit on our rental car. We ended up with a BMW X6 hybrid. It was fun to drive and easy to speed in because you just didn’t realize how fast you were going just by the feel of the car. I also really liked the little HUD for the driver and the fact that it was a bluetooth carplay. The range was amazing, which with a 20 gallon tank is not surprising. What I didn’t like? First and foremost was that it was overly complicated for a short duration trip. It took us far too long to find the important gauges (like the fuel gauge) and functions. I also dislike cars where the environmental controls have to be handled through their touchscreens. I want tactile knobs for those kinds of things so I don’t have to take my eyes off the road. I also don’t like that when its put in gear there’s no idle until you hit the gas.
Days Oneand Two
Flying while wearing a mask is not fun. I wore one because I was still dealing with COVID symptoms, and I didn’t need to be coughing and sneezing on folks. It didn’t help that TSA pinged FIL’s cremains as possible drugs/explosives. They were surprisingly polite (which is not the normal experience in Tampa), but it was a bit of annoyance.
Fortunately it was a straight flight from Tampa to Seattle, and we sprung for first-class. We picked up the rental car and drove to the AirBnB in the Tri-Cities area. This is where we learned about how easy to speed with the BMW when The Wife was hitting nearly 100 mph without noticing it. Fortunately, we had a spacious place in West Richland, and the Tri-Cities have almost non-existent traffic compared to our area. I spent most of the first couple of days resting and watching anime while the others visited with family.
Days Three and Four
We traveled to Mazama in the Methow area of Washington. FIL’s family have a small cabin in the area that’s been in the family for many decades. It was a special place for him, and this is where he asked for his ashes to be spread.
The Wife and her family met up with folks they hadn’t seen in nearly forty years from her father’s side of the family. There was many reminisces about days spent at the cabin. The original plan was to spread FIL’s ashes along the bank of the Goat Creek. However, in the intervening years, many of the open spaces have been purchased, which limited the number of public parking spaces along the creek. So, the family agreed to spread FIL’s ashes among some trees at the cabin. The Wife did a wonderful job of reading the eulogy.
The only downside were the accommodations we rented in Mazama. The place wasn’t bad, but 1) we were not its expected demographic, and 2) the area was in the midst of a pretty decent heatwave. The rooms did not have A/C and the only fans were oscillating desk fans. It was pretty miserable sleeping there due to lack of airflow. Some of our party ended up sleeping in their cars.
Still, the local shops were pretty neat.
Day 5
The family descended on the city of Leavenworth. This is a former logging town that turned itself into a tourist area by remodeling into a faux Bavarian village. In some ways, it kind of reminds me of the historic district of St. Augustine in that it’s a bunch of little shops hiding behind a facade. Not that I mind in either case.
I found one of those carousels in a store where they have pocketknives with people’s names engraved on the handle. Very touristy. Much to my surprise, they had one with my name spelled correctly. The Wife pushed for me to purchase it, but as I told her, I’m more discerning with my knives. She did find a fake street sign with my name, so we bought that. We also ended up getting this nifty wall thing that has small versions of the first six Star Wars movies along with film cells from each film. The other interest find was a store that sold bubble tea as well as “fish croissants”. These were essentially taiyaki. The Wife and MIL looked on with confusion as I ate a red bean filled one. I just wanted to try one after seeing them so many times in anime. Not bad, but not something I would go out of my way to get another.
There was some interesting drama on the way up to Leavenworth. As we were traveling up to Leavenworth, a beat-up Pontiac Vibe came up on us. Veering all over the road. With its windshield wipers going. Yeah, this dude was clearly intoxicated on something. Then a Washington state trooper came up behind with lights going. Oh good, this was going to be over quickly. Then the guy just kept going. At first, I thought the guy was just so intoxicated he didn’t even notice the big SUV with the flashing lights behind him. Then, the speed increased. We followed them for some fifteen miles before our GPS routed us off the highway. As we joked, we would probably find out what happened on an future episode of “Body Cam” or “High Speed Chase.”
Days 6 to 11
We spent a lot of time in the Tri-Cities visiting with The Wife’s family and relaxed around the AirBnB. We also visited a couple of little shopping districts in the area. I ended up with a CRKT fixed blade knife.
We also spent some time with The Wife’s Childhood BFF and her husband. There was much reminiscing among them while. Plus, Husband and I had long discussions on prepping. Yeah, I get along well with him. We also got to see their new #vanlife Ford Sprinter van. It was kind of neat, and The Wife and I have been discussing if we want something similar. It would be interesting for little trips where we didn’t want to rent hotels. Plus we could make sure we have some of our CBFF’s Husband told us about a dealership in Gainesville that might be able to rent us something similar. We’re going to experiment if we can deal with the small confines of #vanlife.
One thing that kept coming up was The Wife becoming disillusioned with some stores and restaurants she loved as a child. I guess that happens to everyone as they age and their tastes change. We did find a couple of good places to eat and the Indian restaurant that the Wife and I discovered when we were in the Tri-Cities a couple of years ago.
We also traveled up to Lewiston to visit one of The Wife’s aunts. I don’t know if it’s a Washington thing, or a PNW thing, but they do seem to love to make oblong burgers on sandwich rolls.
The last day we had a send off breakfast for some of the family. We found a place in the Tri-Cities called Spudnuts that makes doughnuts out of potato bread. Those were some damned good doughnuts. When we make it back out there, we will definitely need to hit there.
Day 12
We left the Tri-Cities for Seattle. Over breakfast, we decided to return our rental cars a bit early and use Uber to get around Seattle. None of us wanted to deal with Seattle traffic, or deal with Seattle’s bus between the rental car place and the airport. We had a lot of luggage. Let’s just say the ride back to the rental kind of proved our point. Seattle traffic is fucking nuts.
Day 13
Wedding day for the nephew. I spent the day getting as much packed as possible as The Wife and the bride got their hair and makeup done. Then I got into my kilt suit. Much to The Wife’s chagrin, I think the Stetson complimented the suit nicely.
There was a bit of a hiccup at the beginning. When we arrived, the venue was all locked up. And there was no one around. For about twenty minutes we were unsure if we were going to have the wedding in the venue or have it on the lawn outside. Finally, an employee showed up, but since she was from another section, her keys didn’t work. However, this employee was not daunted and did some ninja shit to find a door she could access. Just as the bride was arriving to finish getting ready, we were able to get into the venue.
The wedding went off beautifully. Many happy tears were shed. The Wife did a wonderful job officiating the ceremony. I couldn’t be happier for Nephew and his new wife.
Dinner afterwards was at one of Seattle’s upscale steakhouses. Most of the group were enjoying some exquisite cuts of Fillet Mignon. I am one of those unfortunate souls whose palate cannot distinguish the full richness of the different cuts and preparations of steak. It all kind of tastes the same as long as its cooked medium rare to medium. So, I just got a NY strip which was enough meat for me to enjoy and not over indulge.
Day 14
Travel day home. It was a long day. There was also the specter of the earlier cancellations from that screwy Microsoft update hovering over our travel plans. We figured if worst came to worst we would rent a vehicle and drive home. We manged to get to SeaTac around 0600 local. Checking in went relatively smoothly. Then we went to TSA. Let’s just say that Pre-Check is not well marked and it was only through the intervention of a helpful TSA agent (another surprise) that we were guided to where we needed to be. Fortunately, the small amount of FIL’s cremains didn’t flag another in-depth check.
The flight from Seattle to Detroit went smoothly, but our connector to Tampa was delayed. We didn’t get into Tampa until about 2230 local. Then there was a mix up with our ride as to whether she was in short term parking or economy parking. Hence, we did not arrive home until after midnight. Being us, we did our unpacking and crashed around 1am.
