Plantation Blues
23/05/21 07:10
It's a new week. Looks like a dandy out there this morning. Lots of sun and reasonably warm weather hereabouts. I've got me a to-do list that should keep me busy and out of trouble. I was thinking about putting something down on the deck but I'm not sure I want to do that with all the bird paraphernalia I have hanging around. I guess that's the responsible thing to do. Maybe the least I can do since I'm in control.
Israel is in the news over the weekend for bombing a building in Gaza that has housed Associated Press (AP) personnel for the past 15 years. It just so happens that Palestinian leadership also occupied the building, hence the notice by Israel. Israel put the AP on notice that they were going to light up (bomb them back to the Stone Age) the building amidst growing tensions between Israeli and the Palestinians after the Palestinians fired some 1500 rockets into Israel injuring and killing some Israeli's. Here's what I say to the AP: You sleep with dogs, you get fleas.
I have no vested interest one way or another in the outcome of the conflict although you might find me pulling for the Israeli's given that they are clear underdogs at least in terms of the numbers where their population is concerned. That is to say that they're surrounded by people who want to kill them. They are an island of democracy in a sea of madness, really. It's probably important to add here that I believe that Israel has the right to exist. And for those who have genocide on the brain, they need to cease and desist.
Tensions in the Mideast were lessening during the years Trump was in office because his administration worked hard to form coalitions between Israel and her neighbors. That all went into the proverbial dumpster not even 100 days into the Biden Administration. I don't know how and when the left went so wrong with their hatred for Israel, and maybe the Jewish people more specifically, but they wear it on their sleeves these days and it's not now, and never will be, a good look.
You've got that clown car and rabid anti-semite of a Senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders, calling for the defunding of Israel in the wake of all the turmoil. You also have those four Jew haters in Congress that the left affectionately refers to as "The Squad." Their virulent hatred for everything Jewish is on full display and they make no bones about it. When hasn't Bernie and the Squad, and other monsters of their ilk, wanted to see Israel and her people cast into the sea? How is it that Jews like Bernie Sanders hate the Jewish people and the State of Israel? Is this some sort of self loathing? It's sick, I tell you.
You really have to wonder who is providing the Palestinians with the rockets and associated armaments that they are using against Israel. If you're thinking the Iranians, then you're probably right. If you're thinking the Biden Administration, you're also right since they began funding the Palestinians straight away after Trump had put a stop to it. It's tantamount to throwing gasoline on a fire and the good people of Israel, whose lives are now at even greater risk than ever before, have the idiot in the White House to thank.
The missus ordered me a new bike helmet a few days back and it arrived yesterday. She's a beauty! It fits well and I'm happy to have it. My old helmet was about as beat up and worn out as a bike helmet can be after years of use. It stopped mattering to me a long time ago that the outer shell had cracked and had ultimately detached from the underlying styrofoam frame.
They were both black in color so nothing seemed particularly amiss and I felt no less safe truth be told. I let the missus convince me, yes I did, that the outer plastic shell was an important part of the protection scheme and I was better off with it than without it. It's never been about having a fashion accessory on my head. Not that I think anyone would even notice riding day in and day out as I do. Nonetheless, it's nice to have a new helmet with all the usual bells and whistles again. Here's a hat tip to the missus.
Have you been following the latest balderdash about UFO's in the news? What is that all about? The latest footage shows an object of questionable size and shape hovering above the surface of the ocean and then it dips into the ocean and disappears. In a separate account, some Navy sod comes on and says that there are numerous accounts of underwater incidents where these so called unidentified objects are clocked at speeds unimaginable knowing what we know today about the physics of underwater travel. Wut?
They also say that these UFO's have been seen around the globe and, more specifically, in and around military installations. It's almost like it's not enough just to have an occasional sighting. They need to embellish the story to do what? Make it more believable? So, the more unbelievable it becomes the more believable it is? Where are they going with all this bullshit? It's funny how they state unequivocally that they're sure that other countries do not have the technology to create whatever it is that we think we're seeing. We know this how?
Part of it probably has to do with the fact that countries that might have the technology probably got their technical training in our country at institutions like M.I.T., etc.. If we're talking about the Chinese, whatever they have they more than likely stole from the United States. I suppose it's possible that they built on existing technologies stolen or otherwise to create these UFO's but I'm guessing we'd probably know that by now.
Before I go too far afield on this subject, I should say that it's probably a bit short-sighted of anyone to rule out life on other planets. Our planet is just a pee hole in the snow when it comes to the grand scheme created out of whole cloth by the big guy. In other words, what passes for intelligent life here on planet Earth may be, relatively speaking, child's play when you consider the exponential possibilities across the span of an infinite number of universes.
Is it too much to ask of our military to make sure that they provide better examples of what it is that they say they see in the skies? The recent film provided by the Navy looks like it was taken by the guy who shot the Zapruder film of the Kennedy assassination back in 1963. It was dark, grainy, and just ridiculous if you want the truth.
Had I been the captain on that ship and had a midshipman brought that film to me I would have told him in no uncertain terms that if he wanted to stay aboard my ship he best start by using better equipment and using it right. My god, man. This is 2021 for chrissakes. Where is my 8k footage? I ought to be able to read the serial numbers on these things using a 1000x magnification. If it says, "Made in China", then so be it.
Maybe we have to consider for a moment that these UFO's want to be seen and that's the only reason we have our sightings. If they're so sophisticated, they should be able to fly around undetected. Right? And if they're so damn futuristic and all-knowing, where is the little green man stepping out and making the following proclamation, "Take me to your leader." God help us if we hear that with Sleepy Joe in office. It would be an unmitigated disaster.
These last couple of nights I've made BLT's for dinner on focaccia bread that I bought at Trader Joe's earlier in the week. It's not the traditional bread one uses for BLT's but it was darn good nonetheless. It was a 12-inch loaf that I sliced down the middle and then placed under the broiler until the bread was warm and the top was a toasty brown. I debated buttering the bread before putting it under the broiler and ended up spreading it sparingly so as not to make things too soggy.
I bought some vegetarian turkey for the BLT's which we've had many times before and which I usually buy at Trader Joe's. It has a particular, but not unpleasant, taste to it. I even removed the veins in the leaves of the organic romaine that I used so as not to make the sandwich too crunchy. Doing that also kept the tomato slices from slipping and sliding once I slathered the lot of it with a "healthy" serving of mayonnaise.
Had I remembered to buy a can or two of tuna while shopping at Trader Joe's I would have also slapped together a nice rotini and tuna salad to go along with the BLT's. As it was, the sandwiches were more than enough to eat so the rotini salad would have been one dish too many. Maybe a few chips of some kind would have been nice but we're not big chip eaters although the missus likes to have a bag of Dorito's on hand from time to time.
I really need to work a little harder to make myself a list before I go shopping. There's nothing worse when you go food shopping than to return home only to discover that you've forgotten one or more items you had in mind to buy. If the store were only next door it wouldn't be an issue. And I'm a list kind of guy so there's really no excuse for not having one.
I've put one on my phone in the past and that has worked just fine. I'm not sure I have a preference. The missus tells me that I should have a standing list for certain stores I frequent and I'm inclined to agree with her. Then, I suppose, I could add or subtract from the standard list as needed. If I make a list on paper, I just need to be careful to empty my pockets of everything various and sundry before heading out to the store so that I'm not rifling through my pockets looking for the right piece of paper.
The Ev man just gave a call. He's wanting his mom to make him an appointment at the gym for this morning. He said something about not being able to access the site. He also said that he has something of a busy schedule today starting with the gym and ending with an afternoon visit with his doctor about something having to do with his sinuses. I'm not sure he knows what to do with himself half the time so I'm glad he's at least thinking about scheduling this, that, or the other thing, to fill his day.
He was over the other day and we went over how to check and refill his oil again. I need to buy a few quart sized bottles of oil for him to use rather than the five-gallon jugs that I buy just to save a few bucks. Putting oil in your car can be a messy business if you're not careful. The last thing you want is to go driving down the street leaving a massive cloud of burning oil in your wake. That's a bit of an exaggeration but not by much.
He seems to be staying on top of his gas fill-up's so that's good. We set up an account for him so he's now on his own when it comes to keeping his car topped off. You worry about your children letting the gas get too low in their car and finding themselves in some god forsaken place after dark the likes of which might scare the hell out of any mom or dad. If anything, I think he's over zealous about keeping his tank topped off so that's one less thing we get to worry about. Now, if I can just get him to throw away the trash in his car.
It's been a brutal week for the coins. I'm talking bitcoin, dogecoin, and all the rest. These crypto currencies have fallen by as much as 40-50% in the last week. They say crypto's are the currency of the future so there's that. Did you know that there are currently some 2000 plus crypto's out there? What are they based on? Is there an underlying value that you can even point to? I guess it's whatever they say it is or, maybe more to the point, it is whatever someone is willing to pay for it.
The financial guy I listen to on the radio says that they will all fall 90% or more when the next crash comes along. He says that you don't want to be the last one in before the crash. In other words, don't be buying at the highs. He also says that he wishes that he had maybe considered bitcoin early on since it's gone to the moon and who doesn't want to go to the moon. It was trading at $64k just a few weeks ago and dropped to maybe $32k earlier this week. Companies adding these currencies to their balance sheets as a hedge against inflation just got a bitch slap when the bottom dropped out so, if they needed a wake-up call, they just got one.
I am getting so tired of this so-called insurrection bullshit. You know, the day (January 6th, 2021) that will now go down in infamy as the day our government was almost taken down by a cadre of banner yielding, Trump supporting, insurrectionists. It was the modern day version of storming the Bastille, it was. Nonsense. Were they armed with weapons? No. Was security in the Capitol as tight as it could have been when the "insurrectionists" showed up? Probably not. The only person killed was a Trump supporter who was making her way into the chambers, or maybe a back room area somewhere, and she was summarily shot in the neck by someone the Capitol police have yet to identify.
Even worse is the fact that the government has identified and jailed a good number of these people who now sit in solitary confinement without having been charged with any crimes. What the fuck is this? Venezuela? Contrast that with the likes of Antifa and BLM who ravaged, looted, and set our cities on fire in 2020 and spent not a minute behind bars for their crimes. They were released as quickly as they were picked up only to go back to doing what they were doing time and time again. Just ask our current Vice President, Harris. She, along with her progressive brethren in the leftist community, bailed these bastards out of jail before they were even booked. Let that sink in.
What I'm getting tired of is the narrative being pushed by the leftist media that these so-called insurrectionists are anti-American and that every last damn one of them, including Trump himself, can never again assume power. It is a risk we cannot afford to take as a nation of laws. Our very democracy is at risk if the tyranny of the right is allowed to occupy the halls of power in our nation's capitol. You know what they say. They say that the left accuses the right of everything that they are guilty of doing themselves. It's so true.
The constant demonization of Trump supporters is the hill the democrats have chosen to die on. Maybe that shouldn't surprise anyone. Their handmaidens in the leftist media spew the propaganda and twist and turn events day in and day out to shape news to reinforce their message that democrats are good and republicans are evil. This is where we are in the year 2021.
Even more blatant is the power grab democrats are now making by sending monthly checks from the government to every family in the country based on the number of children they have in their household. Their gambit is that no one will vote against "free money" when Election Day rolls around. They may be right.
It may be the one arrow the democrats have left in their quiver to continue the stranglehold they have had on certain communities of color since the beginning of time. Communities of color that were drifting to the right when Trump's policies bore both fruit and promise during his four years as president. Can't have that. No sireee, Bob. Get back on the damn plantation!
Israel is in the news over the weekend for bombing a building in Gaza that has housed Associated Press (AP) personnel for the past 15 years. It just so happens that Palestinian leadership also occupied the building, hence the notice by Israel. Israel put the AP on notice that they were going to light up (bomb them back to the Stone Age) the building amidst growing tensions between Israeli and the Palestinians after the Palestinians fired some 1500 rockets into Israel injuring and killing some Israeli's. Here's what I say to the AP: You sleep with dogs, you get fleas.
I have no vested interest one way or another in the outcome of the conflict although you might find me pulling for the Israeli's given that they are clear underdogs at least in terms of the numbers where their population is concerned. That is to say that they're surrounded by people who want to kill them. They are an island of democracy in a sea of madness, really. It's probably important to add here that I believe that Israel has the right to exist. And for those who have genocide on the brain, they need to cease and desist.
Tensions in the Mideast were lessening during the years Trump was in office because his administration worked hard to form coalitions between Israel and her neighbors. That all went into the proverbial dumpster not even 100 days into the Biden Administration. I don't know how and when the left went so wrong with their hatred for Israel, and maybe the Jewish people more specifically, but they wear it on their sleeves these days and it's not now, and never will be, a good look.
You've got that clown car and rabid anti-semite of a Senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders, calling for the defunding of Israel in the wake of all the turmoil. You also have those four Jew haters in Congress that the left affectionately refers to as "The Squad." Their virulent hatred for everything Jewish is on full display and they make no bones about it. When hasn't Bernie and the Squad, and other monsters of their ilk, wanted to see Israel and her people cast into the sea? How is it that Jews like Bernie Sanders hate the Jewish people and the State of Israel? Is this some sort of self loathing? It's sick, I tell you.
You really have to wonder who is providing the Palestinians with the rockets and associated armaments that they are using against Israel. If you're thinking the Iranians, then you're probably right. If you're thinking the Biden Administration, you're also right since they began funding the Palestinians straight away after Trump had put a stop to it. It's tantamount to throwing gasoline on a fire and the good people of Israel, whose lives are now at even greater risk than ever before, have the idiot in the White House to thank.
The missus ordered me a new bike helmet a few days back and it arrived yesterday. She's a beauty! It fits well and I'm happy to have it. My old helmet was about as beat up and worn out as a bike helmet can be after years of use. It stopped mattering to me a long time ago that the outer shell had cracked and had ultimately detached from the underlying styrofoam frame.
They were both black in color so nothing seemed particularly amiss and I felt no less safe truth be told. I let the missus convince me, yes I did, that the outer plastic shell was an important part of the protection scheme and I was better off with it than without it. It's never been about having a fashion accessory on my head. Not that I think anyone would even notice riding day in and day out as I do. Nonetheless, it's nice to have a new helmet with all the usual bells and whistles again. Here's a hat tip to the missus.
Have you been following the latest balderdash about UFO's in the news? What is that all about? The latest footage shows an object of questionable size and shape hovering above the surface of the ocean and then it dips into the ocean and disappears. In a separate account, some Navy sod comes on and says that there are numerous accounts of underwater incidents where these so called unidentified objects are clocked at speeds unimaginable knowing what we know today about the physics of underwater travel. Wut?
They also say that these UFO's have been seen around the globe and, more specifically, in and around military installations. It's almost like it's not enough just to have an occasional sighting. They need to embellish the story to do what? Make it more believable? So, the more unbelievable it becomes the more believable it is? Where are they going with all this bullshit? It's funny how they state unequivocally that they're sure that other countries do not have the technology to create whatever it is that we think we're seeing. We know this how?
Part of it probably has to do with the fact that countries that might have the technology probably got their technical training in our country at institutions like M.I.T., etc.. If we're talking about the Chinese, whatever they have they more than likely stole from the United States. I suppose it's possible that they built on existing technologies stolen or otherwise to create these UFO's but I'm guessing we'd probably know that by now.
Before I go too far afield on this subject, I should say that it's probably a bit short-sighted of anyone to rule out life on other planets. Our planet is just a pee hole in the snow when it comes to the grand scheme created out of whole cloth by the big guy. In other words, what passes for intelligent life here on planet Earth may be, relatively speaking, child's play when you consider the exponential possibilities across the span of an infinite number of universes.
Is it too much to ask of our military to make sure that they provide better examples of what it is that they say they see in the skies? The recent film provided by the Navy looks like it was taken by the guy who shot the Zapruder film of the Kennedy assassination back in 1963. It was dark, grainy, and just ridiculous if you want the truth.
Had I been the captain on that ship and had a midshipman brought that film to me I would have told him in no uncertain terms that if he wanted to stay aboard my ship he best start by using better equipment and using it right. My god, man. This is 2021 for chrissakes. Where is my 8k footage? I ought to be able to read the serial numbers on these things using a 1000x magnification. If it says, "Made in China", then so be it.
Maybe we have to consider for a moment that these UFO's want to be seen and that's the only reason we have our sightings. If they're so sophisticated, they should be able to fly around undetected. Right? And if they're so damn futuristic and all-knowing, where is the little green man stepping out and making the following proclamation, "Take me to your leader." God help us if we hear that with Sleepy Joe in office. It would be an unmitigated disaster.
These last couple of nights I've made BLT's for dinner on focaccia bread that I bought at Trader Joe's earlier in the week. It's not the traditional bread one uses for BLT's but it was darn good nonetheless. It was a 12-inch loaf that I sliced down the middle and then placed under the broiler until the bread was warm and the top was a toasty brown. I debated buttering the bread before putting it under the broiler and ended up spreading it sparingly so as not to make things too soggy.
I bought some vegetarian turkey for the BLT's which we've had many times before and which I usually buy at Trader Joe's. It has a particular, but not unpleasant, taste to it. I even removed the veins in the leaves of the organic romaine that I used so as not to make the sandwich too crunchy. Doing that also kept the tomato slices from slipping and sliding once I slathered the lot of it with a "healthy" serving of mayonnaise.
Had I remembered to buy a can or two of tuna while shopping at Trader Joe's I would have also slapped together a nice rotini and tuna salad to go along with the BLT's. As it was, the sandwiches were more than enough to eat so the rotini salad would have been one dish too many. Maybe a few chips of some kind would have been nice but we're not big chip eaters although the missus likes to have a bag of Dorito's on hand from time to time.
I really need to work a little harder to make myself a list before I go shopping. There's nothing worse when you go food shopping than to return home only to discover that you've forgotten one or more items you had in mind to buy. If the store were only next door it wouldn't be an issue. And I'm a list kind of guy so there's really no excuse for not having one.
I've put one on my phone in the past and that has worked just fine. I'm not sure I have a preference. The missus tells me that I should have a standing list for certain stores I frequent and I'm inclined to agree with her. Then, I suppose, I could add or subtract from the standard list as needed. If I make a list on paper, I just need to be careful to empty my pockets of everything various and sundry before heading out to the store so that I'm not rifling through my pockets looking for the right piece of paper.
The Ev man just gave a call. He's wanting his mom to make him an appointment at the gym for this morning. He said something about not being able to access the site. He also said that he has something of a busy schedule today starting with the gym and ending with an afternoon visit with his doctor about something having to do with his sinuses. I'm not sure he knows what to do with himself half the time so I'm glad he's at least thinking about scheduling this, that, or the other thing, to fill his day.
He was over the other day and we went over how to check and refill his oil again. I need to buy a few quart sized bottles of oil for him to use rather than the five-gallon jugs that I buy just to save a few bucks. Putting oil in your car can be a messy business if you're not careful. The last thing you want is to go driving down the street leaving a massive cloud of burning oil in your wake. That's a bit of an exaggeration but not by much.
He seems to be staying on top of his gas fill-up's so that's good. We set up an account for him so he's now on his own when it comes to keeping his car topped off. You worry about your children letting the gas get too low in their car and finding themselves in some god forsaken place after dark the likes of which might scare the hell out of any mom or dad. If anything, I think he's over zealous about keeping his tank topped off so that's one less thing we get to worry about. Now, if I can just get him to throw away the trash in his car.
It's been a brutal week for the coins. I'm talking bitcoin, dogecoin, and all the rest. These crypto currencies have fallen by as much as 40-50% in the last week. They say crypto's are the currency of the future so there's that. Did you know that there are currently some 2000 plus crypto's out there? What are they based on? Is there an underlying value that you can even point to? I guess it's whatever they say it is or, maybe more to the point, it is whatever someone is willing to pay for it.
The financial guy I listen to on the radio says that they will all fall 90% or more when the next crash comes along. He says that you don't want to be the last one in before the crash. In other words, don't be buying at the highs. He also says that he wishes that he had maybe considered bitcoin early on since it's gone to the moon and who doesn't want to go to the moon. It was trading at $64k just a few weeks ago and dropped to maybe $32k earlier this week. Companies adding these currencies to their balance sheets as a hedge against inflation just got a bitch slap when the bottom dropped out so, if they needed a wake-up call, they just got one.
I am getting so tired of this so-called insurrection bullshit. You know, the day (January 6th, 2021) that will now go down in infamy as the day our government was almost taken down by a cadre of banner yielding, Trump supporting, insurrectionists. It was the modern day version of storming the Bastille, it was. Nonsense. Were they armed with weapons? No. Was security in the Capitol as tight as it could have been when the "insurrectionists" showed up? Probably not. The only person killed was a Trump supporter who was making her way into the chambers, or maybe a back room area somewhere, and she was summarily shot in the neck by someone the Capitol police have yet to identify.
Even worse is the fact that the government has identified and jailed a good number of these people who now sit in solitary confinement without having been charged with any crimes. What the fuck is this? Venezuela? Contrast that with the likes of Antifa and BLM who ravaged, looted, and set our cities on fire in 2020 and spent not a minute behind bars for their crimes. They were released as quickly as they were picked up only to go back to doing what they were doing time and time again. Just ask our current Vice President, Harris. She, along with her progressive brethren in the leftist community, bailed these bastards out of jail before they were even booked. Let that sink in.
What I'm getting tired of is the narrative being pushed by the leftist media that these so-called insurrectionists are anti-American and that every last damn one of them, including Trump himself, can never again assume power. It is a risk we cannot afford to take as a nation of laws. Our very democracy is at risk if the tyranny of the right is allowed to occupy the halls of power in our nation's capitol. You know what they say. They say that the left accuses the right of everything that they are guilty of doing themselves. It's so true.
The constant demonization of Trump supporters is the hill the democrats have chosen to die on. Maybe that shouldn't surprise anyone. Their handmaidens in the leftist media spew the propaganda and twist and turn events day in and day out to shape news to reinforce their message that democrats are good and republicans are evil. This is where we are in the year 2021.
Even more blatant is the power grab democrats are now making by sending monthly checks from the government to every family in the country based on the number of children they have in their household. Their gambit is that no one will vote against "free money" when Election Day rolls around. They may be right.
It may be the one arrow the democrats have left in their quiver to continue the stranglehold they have had on certain communities of color since the beginning of time. Communities of color that were drifting to the right when Trump's policies bore both fruit and promise during his four years as president. Can't have that. No sireee, Bob. Get back on the damn plantation!