It’s supposed to get all the way up to 25° today! 
And as punishment, we’re also supposed to get another 6″ of snow. 
. Since being over three feet below average at the end of January, we have now gotten over four feet of snow in February and we’re now about two inches over our average for the season. And that’s in Syracuse – I have no way to tell what we’ve gotten here, except to say we’re feeling a little claustrophobic.
The dogs are getting pretty bored as well. The snow is well over their heads and they can’t really go anywhere I haven’t shoveled a path for them (which at least keeps them from hopping over the fence). I watched a herd of deer struggle to get through the snow earlier this morning (jumping like crazy just to move a foot or two). I don’t know what they’re finding to eat out there, and I feel terrible for them in all this cold. Them, and all the other critters out there that don’t have the sense to hibernate for the winter (something I truly wish I could do).
I’m trying to decide if I need to go to Costco this week, and I’m thinking that no, no I do not. I’d like to get some gas before it goes up any more (after an 18¢ per gallon jump last week, it’s only gone up another couple of cents this week, so I should probably go). I think I’m pretty much set for food, though, and I should probably quit spending money to save up to pay the heat bill (though to tell you the truth, it’s the damn electric bill that’s killing me).
I guess all the money I’m saving on beer (36 days w/o a beer, and 2,989 days until retirement – I put it in a spreadsheet) is going straight to NYS Gas and Electric. Well, and also to the dentist. Plus I got screwed on coffee mugs.
You’d think it would be fairly easy to find coffee mugs for sale. Specifically, I was looking for black mugs to fit my office decor (ideally either what I have come to find is called “funnel” shape – like my “Car Talk” mug, only black – or, failing that, “bistro” shape). This appears to be something impossible to find in stores. Or at least the stores I go to (which, come to think of it, is basically Costco with an occasional trip to the grocery store – which I frequent very rarely since what I don’t get from Costco I get from Amazon).
So I found something called Discount Mugs online. Let me say right off the bat that I do not recommend them (in fact, for the benefit of the search engines out there: “Discount Mugs Sucks” “don’t buy from discount mugs” “Discount Mugs Blows” “Fuck Discount Mugs” “Discount Mugs Ripoff” “discountmugs.com sucks”).
They had some mugs that looked like what I wanted, and they offered “free” samples (so that I could see if I should order 1,000 of them with my family crest on it for the big family reunion coming up). Free meant free, with $5 per each for shipping. So I ordered three blank sample mugs. I figured five bucks per mug wasn’t a great price, but not terrible either. So after a week or so, they arrived, and as soon as I picked up the box and heard the telltale sound of rattling ceramic, I knew something was wrong.
Yeah. Two out of three were broken (and while I like the way they look, they’re pretty goddamn thin – coffee poured in the one unbroken one cooled off in about ten seconds). So I went to their site where they have a claim form for broken shit that they send you, and I uploaded a photo (‘cuz god forbid they believe me) and they promptly responded with an offer of “store credit.” Well WTF am I gonna do with $10 store credit? I said, “hey, whattya say you send me two more unbroken mugs instead?” To which they responded offering store credit again. To which I responded, “no thanks – I’ll write it off as a bad investment.”
I mean, these things came so poorly packed that there’s no way I’d expect them to ever ship me an intact order. I’m surprised that one mug made it through, and if 67% of every order is going to come broken, there’s no way I’m ordering from them again. Hey, prove to me you can ship one intact order, and then maybe I’ll buy some shit from you. But to give me a credit of $10 that probably wouldn’t even cover the shipping on whatever broken crap you’re gonna send me next? I don’t think so.
Plus the mugs were made in China – probably by slave labor using some kind of lead/melamine poison glaze.
So “fuck you Discount Mugs”. Did I mention that “Discount Mugs Sucks” and that you should “never buy from discountmugs.com”?
Of course, my experience may not be typical (though based on subsequent reviews, they seem to be known for shipping broken shit).
Well, it’s getting late. I guess if I’m gonna make that Costco run, I’d better get going.
Have a good one.
Because we had a gorgeous day, a bit of snow is headed our way. A couple inches around here is treated as though we have the amount in that photo. It may be that they don’t teach weights and measures in the schools as the subject is considered atheist propaganda.
And for good measure: “Discount Mugs Sucks” “don’t buy from discount mugs” “Discount Mugs Blows” “Fuck Discount Mugs” “Discount Mugs Ripoff” “discountmugs.com sucks”
How about American made? You only need to buy 144 of ’em.
A Gun in Every Corner
Earlier this month — right between Groundhog Day and Valentine’s Day — Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, introduced a bill that would allow people from states with lax gun laws to carry their concealed weapons all around the country.
The goal, Mr. Cornyn said in a news release, is to treat local gun permits “like drivers’ licenses.”
“This operates more or less like a driver’s license,” he told a reporter for The Hill. “So, for example, if you have a driver’s license in Texas, you can drive in New York, in Utah and other places subject to the laws in those states.”
This is perfectly reasonable, except for the part about gun permits being anything whatsoever like drivers’ licenses.
If a citizen from Mississippi shows his driver’s license to someone in Connecticut, the Connecticut person has good reason to presume that the licensee can, um, drive. It’s not a perfect system — witness the fact that there are many, many licensed drivers in America who have successfully parallel parked only one time in their entire life. Still, no matter what state it comes from, a driver’s license generally signifies a certain level of accomplishment when it comes to the basics of stopping, starting and steering.
On the other hand, a permit to carry a concealed weapon from Mississippi is concrete proof of the owner’s ability to fill out an application. In Virginia, you can take an online course. You can get a permit from Florida without ever living in Florida, although you definitely do have to send $112 to the state Department of Agriculture.
In some states, you can be pretty certain that anyone with the legal right to carry a concealed weapon has been checked out carefully. In others, not so much. In 2007, the Sun Sentinel in Florida found that in a six-month period, more than 1,400 people who had pleaded guilty or no contest to felonies had been awarded concealed carry permits, along with 216 people with outstanding warrants, 28 people with active domestic violence injunctions against them and six registered sex offenders.
The Cornyn bill would set a national bar at the lowest denominator: “The situation in Florida is dire enough on its own. But this law would present a danger to the rest of us because of Florida’s abhorrently low standards,” said Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “Think about this in terms of states’ rights.”
You’d think that states’ rights would be a winning argument. However, as with so many, many things in this world, states’ rights is a theory that people only like when it’s going to get them something they already want.
In many crowded cities, gun safety means there’s almost nobody carrying but the cops. But it’s impossible to keep that kind of order when people are roaming the streets waving out-of-town gun permits, which local police frequently have no way to verify.
“It’s a nightmare for New York law enforcement,” said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. “In 20 states you can have a repeated history of mental health police visits and you can get a gun. You can have a domestic violence record. In many states, people subject to emergency orders of protection can be allowed to carry.”
Mr. Cornyn’s bill has been the top priority of groups like the National Rifle Association for years. That is, in part, because their base is irritated about not being able to drive around the country with a handgun in the glove compartment.
However, I suspect another part of the equation is that the gun lobby is running out of causes to rally the troops. Some states have already pretty much legalized everything. Once you’ve made it OK to carry a gun onto a playground, you’ve just about come to the end of the road.
The NRA doesn’t want to recruit members by arguing for Texans’ right to wave a pistol around the small appliance department at Target. It wants a big, meaty challenge — like fighting for looser gun regulation in states where the populace doesn’t want looser gun regulation.
Nobody doubts that the House of Representatives would pass a bill like Mr. Cornyn’s. (Really, just call them; they’ll come in and do it before dinner tonight.) The Senate has been more resistant, but, in 2013, the same proposal came within three votes of passage. And this is not an issue where minds are changed by an invigorating debate.
“You say: ‘Look, maybe this works in the rural parts of your state but it doesn’t work in Times Square,’” said Mr. Schumer. “They’re not even open to the argument.”
Now, with the new Republican majority, it’ll be extremely hard to keep a bill from being sent to the president. He could always veto it. Unless, of course, it’s tied to some crucial, desperately needed measure.
“This is awful, awful, awful,” said Mr. Schumer.
Maybe our best hope is that Congress will do what it does best and fail to pass any legislation whatsoever for the rest of the year.
I didn’t watch the Oscars so no spoiler please. I didn’t see any of the movies either so no spoilers please.
Anyone see if Laura Poitras and Glenn Greenwald won for CitizenFour? No, don’t tell me.
Thanks, pj. Now it went through. I was just kidding about the spoilers. I am sure Morning Jerk and insomnia will take care of it soon enough anyway. If they are in panic mode over there, MSNBC needs to lose that show sooner than later. I’d rather see Imus. At least he was entertaining and the racism was fairly overt.