Morning Seditionists

And so, 2011 comes to an end. And you know what that means. Yes, the Twilight Zone Marathon. It starts at 9:00 AM on the channel formerly known as Sci-Fi, and while its acquisition by NBC/Universal is gradually turning the channel to shit (wrestling on Friday nights? Really? WTF?) and they have cancelled some of its best shows (SGU, Caprica, Eureka, and now Warehouse 13? Again, WTF?), at least they continue TZ Marathon tradition. For now. Vernon sent me a link to an excerpt of a now completed manuscript by Rod Serling’s daughter Anne, which is more than worth a read, if you’re interested. Thanks for that, Vernon. (more…)

Another day, another…. I don’t know. Another boring post from me, I guess. Yesterday was a long, pain in the ass day. An outside contractor made some changes to a database that has nothing to do with me, but which my stuff interacts with in order to run scheduled batch reports (yes, this is the exciting work in which I operate). This caused the reports not to run, and of course the outside contractor (who seems none to sharp, IMHO) immediately engaged in what we in the IT world call “finger pointing.” Of course, nothing on our end of things had changed, everybody but the true schmucks of the world are off this week, and I got stuck spending my entire day researching it, and trying to figure out how to fix what this f*ckhead (sorry, but she was a very snotty in her e-mails, and was lucky she wasn’t in the same room with me, or I’d have choked her to the point of unconsciousness). We (and when I say “we,” I most definitely don’t include this ignorant, arrogant “contractor”) managed a workaround for now, but it killed my whole day yesterday (and who knows how much of today), and isn’t even something that’s in my sphere of responsibility. And I’ve got other shit I need to be doing – shit for which I was “discouraged” from taking any time off this week to finish (because the client didn’t send her changes to me until the afternoon of the Friday before Xmas Eve (a full week later than promised). Have I ever mentioned that I hate this shit?

Winter seems to have finally arrived here. It’s cold and snowy. Not major snow – just your basic white fluffy stuff to cover up the ground and pretty things up a bit. Not even enough to bother plowing the driveway (at least, I don’t think so; we’ll see when I try to leave this morning), and we’re still on track for the least December snow in recorded history (though we still have a couple days to go, so I wouldn’t bet on it). I don’t really mind the snow (to a certain limit; at a certain point it starts to get ridiculous) – but many of my moving parts don’t seem to like the cold all that much. Oh well. (more…)

I was reading the wrapper on a roll of toilet paper the other day (‘cuz I didn’t have my Kindle handy), and on the back was a personal note from the “Wegmans Family.” It started out with, “We couldn’t help but notice that some of you prefer single-ply toilet tissue.” First, what are they trying to imply there? That we’re weird or something because we use single-ply? Hey, we’re on a septic system, man. Makes you think about what goes into the crapper. ‘Cuz let me tell you, what goes down definitely has the potential to come back up again. And it aint pretty. (more…)

Back to work. Bleh. I actually did some work from home yesterday morning. If I have to work, I’d really prefer to do it from home. There’s really no reason I couldn’t. Except for the “Theory X” people in charge, who apparently feel that if you aren’t sitting at a desk in a windowless office, you won’t do anything. I honestly think I’d get more done from home and would probably work longer hours (I mean, a lot of my work day is comprised of getting ready and commuting – time I could spend actually accomplishing something). Plus I have a window. Daylight would go a long way toward making me happier and more productive. But, no. (more…)

Well, that’s over. A fairly painless holiday for me, and I actually managed to get a few chores done, which is nice. Yesterday started out as a white(ish) Christmas (just a dusting of snow to make things look nice), but then it got kind of warm and sunny, so the snow melted (at least the parts where the sun gets to – it doesn’t clear the trees in a lot of places at this time of year). I’m not sure if there’s anything out there this morning, ‘cuz it’s still too damn dark. Now it’s time to go fight the crowds at the mall. Not. (more…)

Happy birthday to Lola and Jesus. Glad to hear you’re feeling better (Lola, that is. Though I don’t think Jesus is feeling any pain these days either). If you’re into the whole Christmas thing, then Merry Christmas to you. If you’re in the middle of Chanukah, then Chappy Chanukah. If you’re into something else, then happy, joyous, whatever. And if you’ve just been waiting for the start of the NBA season, lucky you, it’s finally here. Whatever you’re up to today, enjoy it and try to remember those who are the most important. You know, millionaire job creators who shouldn’t have to pay taxes. (more…)

So, is “twas” a word? Or is it a contraction? I’m going with contraction.^[ct] And, in looking it up online, I see it is, indeed, a contraction. So good for me. Even better, the next word in the dictionary (online, anyway) is “twaddell,” which is an excellent word, whatever it is.^[twd] In the spirit of the season, I was looking for some feel-good, uplifting shit to add to my Netflix Instant Queue this morning, and settled on The Grapes of Wrath. Nothing like the Depression-era Dust Bowl to lift your spirits on Christmas Eve.^[gw] (more…)

It’s December 23^rd, which means the post-Christmas sales are in the works. And Mitt Romney got an early Xmas present, with the endorsement of Bush the First. I wonder if Jr will endorse somebody. He won the Iraq War, single-handedly killed Osama, balanced the budget, lowered taxes, and there were no terrorist attacks^[t] on his watch, so I think getting the nod from him would be pretty impressive. (more…)

Today is the shortest day of the year (yesterday was pretty much as short as today will be, though). Sunset here is at 4:33 this afternoon (in other words, about a half hour before I even emerge from my office – meaning even on a sunny day, it’s pitch black by the time I get in my car, let alone when I roll into my driveway. And the sun will never get higher than 23.5° at solar noon. Ah, but tomorrow…. Tomorrow we gain a whole 4 seconds of daylight (at least up here in my latitude). It isn’t much, of course, but at least we’ve turned the corner. (more…)

It’s the last day of Autumn, with winter officially arriving around here at 12:30 tomorrow morning. We’re celebrating with an expected high temp of 52°. It’s also the 33^rd anniversary of the Lockerbie bombing, which of course we always make a big deal about in these parts, though we don’t have Ghadaffi Duck to kick around anymore. Last I heard, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was still alive, though, and supposedly the new Libyan government has agreed to allow a new investigation into the incident, which could conceivably allow a retrial for al-Magrahi’s alleged cohort – Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah – who wasn’t convicted the first time around. Probably depends on what BP oil contracts are in the works.

Just when it looked as though the GOP had been Newtered, it seems that the Newt has hit the Great Wall of Mitt, and the two are now tied nationally in the race for the Republican nomination. Of course, thanks to our marvelous system, national numbers are pretty much meaningless, but it certainly seems that Republicans have remembered (or found out for the first time) just what Newt is. And I don’t think they like what they see. (more…)

As Vernon noted last night, Dear Leader has passed away. Not a surprise, as we all knew he was il. So I guess that means Junior Jr. is the new boss. Unless somebody takes him out. I think I’d be worried if I was him. But we’ll see. Maybe they’ll get somebody who isn’t crazy and will help the people out. Or at least somebody about whom they can say, “well, he isn’t as bad as l’il Kim, and half a loaf is better than none.” Actually, in North Korea, I guess even half a slice would be an improvement for most people. (more…)

I have a system. Not saying it’s a good system, but it’s a system. Here it is: I open a beer (so far, so good). I leave the bottle cap on the counter. I drink the beer. I get another beer, open it, and note the number of bottle caps on the counter. If that number is under my limit (+/- a couple), all is cool and the cycle continues. Over the limit, and it’s time to call it a night. This is especially important when I’m watching basketball (as I was last night), where the ebb and flow has me pounding them down rather furiously (either in joy and excitement, or in anger and frustration, depending on the game). Unfortunately my wife has a tendency to throw away the bottle caps when I’m not looking, thereby throwing off my count. (more…)

Another day, another adventure in spelunking for Senate Democrats. I of course refer to their caving in on the payroll tax cut thingie. In exchange for a honking two whole month extension of payroll tax cuts for the unwashed masses, Democrats agreed to a provision forcing Obama to take a stand on the Keystone pipeline. This is seen as terrible for Obama, because he actually has to take a position on something. Dreadful. I’m confident he’ll find a way to either weasel out of making a decision, or just go ahead and cave in on the pipeline completely (which, let’s face it, he’s gonna do in the end anyway). Or I suppose he could just veto the extension. But that would take a lot of guts – and I have yet to see anything from him that would lead me to believe he has any guts. Of course, House Republicans have to sign off the deal too, so expect to see some more caving in the days ahead. (more…)