Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

The revolution will be supervised.

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

I really should read my own blog.

DeSantis transforms Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

He really is that stupid.

After roe, women are no longer free.

A consequence of cucumbers

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

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Open Thread

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Not much going on.  Nice quiet evening at work babysitting Windows 7 roll-outs.  It’s a pretty evening outside and the weather has been nice in OKC the last couple of days.  The new house is coming along fine.  We hope to have it complete in about two or three weeks, weather permitting.  I’ve been working evenings the last three weeks, so that’s why you haven’t seen me around except the occasional comment.  Not that you all missed me.
So let’s have a nice shiny new open thread, just because I can.

Reader Interactions

132Comments

  2. 2.

    scav

    mmmm, new thread smell and a bit of an echo still. windows wide open and noisy birds + sirens here.

  3. 3.

    gbear

    Just about to head out for a scooter ride. It’s supposed to snow in MN again tomorrow.

  8. 8.

    Redshirt

    I like Windows 7. It’s the best non-server Windows OS ever!

    Windows 8 is full on hate, however. Shades of Vista, but for shade here read: crushing lead curtains of fail.

  9. 9.

    Redshirt

    @JPL: F that! This pisses me off unreasonably. Where do they get the gumption – THE GUMPTION – in naming storms?! Who gave them the right?!

    This is the first year the Weather Channel’s been pulling this crap, right?

    Oh wait, the wind gust outside has a name now. I call it: Joe.

  11. 11.

    TaMara (BHF)

    Can I share some really good news? My 2 1/2 year old cousin was diagnosed suddenly with a brain tumor last Wednesday (they were looking at his lower intestines because of his symptoms, still not sure what prompted the brain scan).

    He had surgery the next day (15 hours)where they removed a lemon sized tumor, and a portion of his brain.

    Then the wait began for the pathology. By Monday it was in – no cancer, no chemo, no radiation, no horrible tumor that would come back again and again.

    In the words of the Doc – if you have to have a brain tumor, this is the type to have.

    Meanwhile little one is teasing his nurses, asking for his favorite movies and recovering pretty well, considering…

  12. 12.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    I am glad I only did six years in the Navy:

    Tens of thousands of sailors in Hampton Roads would deploy more often — but also, defense officials say, on a more predictable schedule — under a plan the Navy hopes to launch by the end of next year.

    Under current operations, aircraft carrier crews spend months training for a single deployment that’s billed to last six to seven months. But global demands often extend those cruises to eight or nine months, said Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Navy’s chief of information.

    [C]rews would go through one pre-deployment workup period to prepare for two seven-month deployments, with seven months at home in between cruises.

    Instead of being gone for one 6month cruise in 32 months, sailors would instead be gone for two 7 month cruises in 36 months. This would hopefully end the 8-10 month actual cruises that are happening right now.

  20. 20.

    Mnemosyne

    It’s only Tuesday and I swear I’ve spent a total of about two hours at my desk at work. Just meetings and projects and running around and insanity.

    I have some of this in the fridge at home, but not quite sure I’m ready to crack one open. I may see how tomorrow goes.

  21. 21.

    gravie

    Having an argument on Facebook with a stranger who claims that Kermit Gosnell is a typical abortion provider.

  22. 22.

    Mnemosyne

    @TaMara (BHF):

    Phew! I’m sure the whole “cutting out part of his brain” thing freaked his parents out, but kids can recover really well from things like that if they get the right therapy — their little brains just re-route the connections.

  24. 24.

    Mustang Bobby

    Getting ready to head out before dawn tomorrow for Independence, Kansas (via DFW and TUL) for the 32nd William Inge Theatre Festival. For you non-theatre people, Inge wrote “Picnic,” “Bus Stop,” “Come Back, Little Sheba,” “Dark at the Top of the Stairs,” and the film “Splendor in the Grass.” This is my 22nd trip to the festival; it’s my way of keeping in touch with my secret identity as a theatre scholar: I’m presenting a paper at the scholar’s conference. (And it’s done! Well, mostly….)

  25. 25.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @gravie: Tell them, yes, he was a typical abortion provider back before Roe v. Wade. Legalizing abortion eliminated people like him.

  28. 28.

    Soonergrunt

    @efgoldman: See, I deal with that by donating money and time to opposing them any chance I can.
    It doesn’t mean that much, I suppose, but I’m not responsible for inflicting them on the country, so I don’t feel guilt or shame about them.

  30. 30.

    Brother Machine Gun of Desirable Mindfulness (fka AWS)

    Note to students: When you are asking about extra credit on the day of the final exam: IT’S TOO LATE!

    thanks.

  31. 31.

    raven

    @efgoldman: Duh, yea, there was a big hole in the train schedule so I rented overlapping cars and got a 5:40 flight. The organizers told us we’ll be having a luncheon after the ceremony. It will be 45 years to the day that the unit got called up.

  32. 32.

    JPL

    @gravie: Well he will be typical if state laws keep making it more difficult for females to get affordable access to clinics. He is typical of the fifties.

  33. 33.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @raven: I had NCOs who would do the same thing if the came back from a field exercise unexpectedly. As one of them phrased it, “I trust my wife completely, but, if I am wrong and I walk in on something, someone will be dead and someone else will be in jail. And I don’t want to be either of them.”

  34. 34.

    raven

    @Soonergrunt: Hey, Army question. With the wide use of Guard units deployed in this cluster-fuck, how common is it to have RA troops in NG units?

  36. 36.

    PurpleGirl

    From Paint Your Wagon

    Away out here they got a name
    For rain and wind and fire
    The rain is Tess, the fire Joe,
    And they call the wind Maria

  44. 44.

    Yutsano

    Nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. Probably the biggest interview in my career tomorrow morning at 6:30 PM. I’m trying not to feel it but oh man…

    Oh and my cat is missing. :(

  47. 47.

    JPL

    They called the repub primary in MA for Gomez, the navy seal who said that the President used the killing of Osama for political reasons. Markey has been ahead but has not been called yet.
    Where are the MA folks, who can tell us what this means.

  49. 49.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @raven: Hey, this guy was whip-smart E-7 who kept my ass out of a lot of trouble by being careful and double-checking things.

  50. 50.

    lamh35

    Wow, there is such a thing as over-reacting. This kid has NEVER been in trouble before and is actually a really good student. Now she’s been expelled for basically doing what most of us did in Chemistry class back in the day. I get the idea behind “no tolerance” policies, but damn expelling this woman seems like an extreme reaction.

    Teen arrested, expelled for ‘science project gone bad’

  51. 51.

    JPL

    @Yutsano: My first thought was don’t worry, you’ll do fine; then I saw that the cat was missing and panicked.. After a deep breath, I decided you’ll do fine.

  52. 52.

    raven

    @Omnes Omnibus: I wasn’t questioning it. Hell, our first shirt saved my ass when we got busted smoking herb on top of a bunker. He ran us over the coals but, I always believed, didn’t read us our rights so they didn’t 15 or summary our sorry asses.

  56. 56.

    Soonergrunt

    @raven: Well, of course RA soldiers transitioning to civilian life who still have part of their 8-yr commitment frequently join NG units, so you run into all types. I met a guy who maintained Trident nuclear missiles on ballistic missile submarines, who had joined the Infantry in a National Guard company.
    As for assigning RA Soldiers to NG units? The Army experimented with that back in the 1990s. It didn’t work well. The AD Soldiers couldn’t get used to the more laid back lifestyle in the pre-9/11 Guard. So, they ended up creating the training divisions–Units that have a divisional structure that are loaded down with mid-career officers and senior NCOS, and they provide training cadre to National Guard and Army Reserve units that are prepping for deployments.

  57. 57.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @efgoldman:

    Fifty-nine years ago tomorrow, I arrived in Regina, Saskatchewan in a blizzard. First of May.

    I understand parts of Saskatchewan got 20″ (8+ cm) of snow today.

  58. 58.

    PsiFighter37

    @lamh35: Someone tell Mittens that if people have more kids, he needs to pay more in taxes for early Pre-K, Head Start, and S-CHIP.

    Bet he’ll change his tune real quick on that point.

  60. 60.

    PurpleGirl

    @raven: I don’t know. I was remembering the words and checked with the Google. I thought the song came from Oklahoma, but it was Paint Your Wagon. I have a picture in my mind of the song being sung by Howard Keele (spelling?).

  62. 62.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @lamh35: Well, if she’d only brought a gun instead…well, except for the fact that she’s black.

    Disclaimer: I think the school overreacted, I don’t think she was arrested for being black.

  66. 66.

    raven

    @Soonergrunt: Yea, I didn’t have any guard commitment when I ets’d due to the two “deployments” but there were a few of us RA’s who got transferred into the guard units in country. Rhode Island is going to honor the unit in a couple of weeks and, since I’m going for the reunion, I’m going to stay for the ceremony. I checked with the organizers to make sure it was Kosher and they feel that being in the unit is the only qualification. It’s something that won’t come along again so I figure wtf, do it.

  69. 69.

    Yutsano

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I understand parts of Saskatchewan got 20″ (8+ cm) of snow today.

    Well, 20 inches is definitely more than 8 centimetres, but I think the plus doesn’t quite give you enough cover there. :)

  70. 70.

    Schlemizel

    @Belafon (formerly anonevent):

    Jumping off this & the others that commented about “home life” while deployed.

    I did gig with a former CPO and he told stories about going to sea. Every time he would lecture his crew not to get married, not to make arrangements that left a woman with control of your stuff or your money and every time they came back he spent weeks counselling guys through their divorce/bankruptcy/assault charges. He said that became a bigger part of his work than his shipboard duties for long stretches.

    He would tell guys the stories of what he had to deal with and how easy it was to avoid every time before they left. But still come home to the same mess every time.

  77. 77.

    raven

    @Gin & Tonic: Yea, it sounds nice. I was once in a group that visited Max Cleland in the Georgia Statehouse and then there was this little visit we made to the US Congress in April, 71.

  82. 82.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @TaMara (BHF):

    Oh. What a horror, and what a relief.

    Your nephew probably won’t even remember it when he’s older, except for the family stories.

    So glad about the happy outcome.

  84. 84.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Neutron Flux: No, I did my time and got out a while ago. I was not meant to be a sailor. Even though the Navy has to pay bonuses to get nukes in, I still feel like I took up a spot for someone who probably wanted to be there.

    ETA: Now, I’m a software developer.

  85. 85.

    NotMax

    @PurpleGirl

    Howard Keel was in every other musical on stage and film for a long time, so easy to mentally plug him into that one.

    Too, he was the lead in “Day of the Triffids.”

    Shame, really, that that one wasn’t ever redone as a musical.

  88. 88.

    geg6

    I am having some major oral surgery Thursday and I have more than a little trepidation about it now that it is about to happen. And it’s only step one in a process that, if I decide to go all the way, will take about three years and up to 30K to accomplish. As it is right now, I have to pay over 2K out of pocket just for this first procedure (actually, procedures). Everyone think I have this great insurance because I work for such a big state university, but my dental coverage only pays out 1K per year and my health insurance refuses to cover the anesthetic. And I’ve already spent out most of my HSA with the preparations and have just enough left to pay for the antibiotics and pain meds I’ll need afterward. The whole thing totally sucks. I’m getting depressed just thinking about it, but I can’t stop thinking about it.

    I have always been proud of being half British (my dad’s parents both immigrated from England) and now I’m cursing the horrible tooth genes that were a by-product of my limey heritage.

  90. 90.

    max

    @Hill Dweller: The Boston Globe’s twitter account says Markey wins the Dem primary.

    YAY! A few dollars in donations well spent.

    max
    [‘Onward to kicking the fuck out of this Gomez guy!’]

  91. 91.

    Gravenstone

    I think we’ve decided to skip right over spring this year. Today it was 80. This time last week, I finally managed to bid adieu to the last stubborn bit of snow in my yard. I do not look forward to what the actual summer promises.

  92. 92.

    Mike E

    @Redshirt: I’m playing windows bingo: I’m trying to install an old HP S20 photosmart scanner on my win7 laptop; it was designed to run on win95/98; I downloaded virtual box to create a winXP VM; the scanner theoretically runs on xp updated software; and, as you would guess, lead curtains of cascading fail so far.

    I am not cut out for BJ server drama and maintenance, clearly. Alas.

  94. 94.

    Linnaeus

    @efgoldman:

    Broons don’t start until tomorrow night. Consensus is, if they somehow beat Toronto (not a sure thing at all) they’ll be gone in the second round.

    Wings start tonight against Anaheim. I don’t see them winning that one, but I think it will go 6 or 7 games. While I’m waiting for that game, I’ll check out St. Louis – LA and Chicago – Minnesota.

  95. 95.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @Schlemizel: The Marines may be the most physically demanding of the branches, but losing 6+ months of your life at a time to me would have no other comparison (note, I managed to avoid that while I was in: The carrier i was assigned to was under construction and testing most of the time I was on it.). The Navy has the highest rate of turnover because of this.

  96. 96.

    PurpleGirl

    Yeah, being born in 1951, by the early 60s I was watching all these movies on the TV. I probably do get the singers/actors mixed u p. When I check the Google I try to. For the lyrics this time, I took the time to check them.

  98. 98.

    Gravenstone

    @TaMara (BHF): Excellent news and best wishes to the little guy! I’m very sensitive about brain tumors because I lost my younger sister to post-operative complications following removal of hers. It’s always heartening to me to see someone else have such a quality treatment outcome instead. Especially someone so young.

  99. 99.

    rikyrah

    @lamh35:

    Wow, there is such a thing as over-reacting. This kid has NEVER been in trouble before and is actually a really good student. Now she’s been expelled for basically doing what most of us did in Chemistry class back in the day. I get the idea behind “no tolerance” policies, but damn expelling this woman seems like an extreme reaction.

    I simply don’t believe this would have happened if she were White.

  103. 103.

    PurpleGirl

    @geg6: I’m sure everything will go well. I had some extensive dental work done within the last year too. I’ve been waiting to continue with the rest of it, just tired of seeing dentists (my regular doctor and the specialist).

  105. 105.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @raven: LOL. Weren’t you in Vietnam?

    The only argument I have on that is sailors do that even when there’s no conflict. There’s a reason the Navy stood for “Never again volunteer yourself”.

  107. 107.

    Redshirt

    @Mr Stagger Lee: LOL. Yesterday was great, since not only was Tim Tebow unceremoniously dumped, and then repeatedly insulted (The CFL Montreal Alouettes said he come up to Canada and take a backup role – LOL!), but ESPN couldn’t properly devote ALL DAY to it due to Jason Collins’ announcement.

    Poetry.

  108. 108.

    Yutsano

    @efgoldman: University of California Santa Cruz Banana Slugs. Or the Evergreen State College Geoducks. Let’s hear it for invertebrate mascots!

  109. 109.

    johnny aquitard

    @lamh35: Yeah Mitt. Easy to say when you’ve got inherited wealth, political connections and a job if you want one. Which you had at age 21. Unlike 99% of college grads.

    Most of those kids he was pontificating to are gonna graduate broke, massively in debt, and struggle to find a job that can pay the rent and student loan payments.

    Considering the man made millions by destroying other peoples’ job and thereby limiting their options in life that go with that loss, he’s got a lot of nerve.

    Dude is exactly what most thought he was: one smarmy clueless asshole.

  110. 110.

    raven

    @efgoldman: It was weird, there was the Blue House Raid and the Pueblo and they call 66-69 the DMZ War. Living conditions in the late 50’s were probably really primitive. We lived in Quonset Huts when we weren’t in the field and they were hot as hell and freezing depending on the season. I lived in a tent in the Nam and had it no where near as bad as the bush bunnies.

  111. 111.

    NotMax

    @Yutsano

    This has nothing to do with anything on this thread, but it disappeared into moderation several days ago when offered as info kind of, sort of in relation to your mention of Elvis on a thread then:

    At all familiar with the Star Trek: Phase II project*?

    Labor of intense love (and some impressive CGI) by aficionados of the original series, using material from Roddenberry’s proposed reboot for TV of Star Trek.

    The reason I bring it up is that one of the main producers (who also played James T. Kirk for 2 ‘seasons’ – new actor for upcoming season three) is a professional Elvis impersonator.

    Even taking into account budgetary limitations for a non-profit enterprise (no pun intended), his use of the Elvis wig for Kirk in the first several episodes is a bit – jarring.

    *available here

  112. 112.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    @raven: My dad did most of a year in Vietnam in 68-69. He developed epilepsy there, which we now believe is PTSD related, though they wouldn’t have diagnosed it that way back then.

    I don’t want to get into a “my service was worse than yours,” because I could easily be beat. I’ll just say it sucked for me, and it sucks for the carrier groups right now.

    One of the good things is that ships now have internet connections (subs excluded). At least they can stay in contact with families more often.

  113. 113.

    Gravenstone

    @lamh35: Once again, “zero tolerance = zero thought”. I’d be curious to know what chemicals she combined, but the description sounds rather innocuous. That effect could be generated by something as simple as bicarb/acid or dry ice/water.

    Christ, I cleared out my HS science class one day when I generated a nice cloud of nitrogen dioxide. That little misstep didn’t even earn me a chat with the Principal, let alone a formal punishment.

  114. 114.

    geg6

    @efgoldman:

    Pens start tomorrow, too. Sadly, looks like Sid won’t be quite ready to play yet. But, damn, my team is looking good going into the playoffs. I can only hope they keep up the good work.

    LET’S GO PENS!

  115. 115.

    Yutsano

    @NotMax: Maybe I got banned and no one bothered to tell me. I haven’t even messed with Special Timmeh in awhile.

    That looks intriguing. Maybe I’ll check it out when I get home if I’m not nervous as hell. I have to get up super early too.

  116. 116.

    Mike in NC

    @johnny aquitard:

    Most of those kids he was pontificating to are gonna graduate broke, massively in debt, and struggle to find a job that can pay the rent and student loan payments.

    Good old Mitt the Shit will just advise them to borrow $25K from mom and dad to start their own business. Pretty simple, really!

  119. 119.

    NotMax

    @Yutsano

    The acting is uneven at best, but the series grows on one.

    Plus the 2-parter (also a Roddenberry script) finally puts the stake into the heart of the ‘no gays on Trek’ lament.

    Link I gave is to a page where free downloadable files are, so can download and watch it at leisure.

  120. 120.

    Mike E

    @Redshirt: Oh, I’m good. The virtual environment within my Compaq presario is, to quote Jodi Foster, 5×5. I can always do a restore if things get too hinky.

    This was brought on by a neighbor who found a box of my late landlady’s travel slides; I offered to use his scanner to digitize the lot (and my photo archives, also). Too.

  122. 122.

    NotMax

    @NotMax

    Reason I’m not linking to your comments, Yutsano, is that that, oddly, is what is sending my comments into the aetherworld.

    Just happened again.

  123. 123.

    Soonergrunt

    @raven: I hate that bastard.
    @SiubhanDuinne: Well, it was blindingly obvious. I debated it for about three seconds and then said “if you don’t, you’ll hate yourself later.”

  124. 124.

    geg6

    @PurpleGirl:

    I have great faith in my dentist, surgeon and anesthetist, but I’m really pissed about how much I’m paying for all this. My dental insurance used to be fantastic and it now sucks donkey balls. And no one will let me make payments; it’s all got to be paid up front or be forced to take out a loan (which I absolutely refuse to do). A bunch of teeth are coming out and he’s also doing a bone graft in anticpation of eventually getting implants. But it will take at least a year and, more likely, two before I can even think about the implants. And I have no idea how I’d come up with the cash to do them. In the meantime, I’ll be wearing partials. If I can adjust to them, I may just stick with them and save my money.

  126. 126.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @geg6:

    You doing implants? About a decade ago I had full mouth extraction and then something like six or seven surgical procedures over a period of 13 months to install the screws and teeth. Cost me close to $75,000 all told, out of pocket.

    I wish you all the best, on both the dental and financial fronts.

  127. 127.

    Gravenstone

    @efgoldman: Oh, I’ve got plenty of bitterness. But that’s no reason to ever have others endure the wrenching pain my family had to face. She was brain dead within 72 hours of the diagnosis, and it was nearly an additional week before we could discontinue life support and let her go. Any time I see someone else manage to beat that bastard brain cancer, I see it as a great big “Fuck You” to the Reaper.

  128. 128.

    TaMara (BHF)

    @raven: They’re in Ohio, I want to say they’re in Cleveland for this, but I’m not positive. I had to go back and look up the name of the tumor, it’s juvenile pilocytic astrocytoma.

    Things look good so far, 4 days post-op and he’s starting art therapy and PT tomorrow.

    And thanks for the thoughts everyone. Seriously, I don’t know how his parents are still standing upright. I walked around all weekend just pissed off at the world. Can’t imagine what they went through and are still going through.

  130. 130.

    scav

    @TaMara (BHF): They’re stressed, but if what my parents went through is any indication, it may be worse for them after the business of getting through the operation is over. My parents every so often beat themselves up for years for not catching my tumor until it was big enough to be be killing me. Another benign one, also luckily roundish and so easier to remove without major damage (partial deafness just because it was wedged in there scarring stuff). All in all, not so bad except having to reassure them that things like this happen, they’re not terrible people for not thinking of it earlier, the kid’s not irredeemably broken, yes it was scary, but this is an age where the kid’s alive and eating jello and getting antsy. Kid not Dead. Good Parents. Two positives, over and above the round, benign, not-reoccurring trifecta.

  131. 131.

    catpal

    @gravie: I respond with this artice about another BAD doctor in PA who basically killed an 18 year old girl — but is still licensed DR. in PA –

    Richard Glunk, the plastic surgeon who recently lost his appeal of a $20 million medical-malpractice verdict that involved the death of a Delaware County teenager, is still offering free consultations for liposuction and other procedures.
    –
    But Glunk’s ability to nip or tuck might be curbed for a couple of months because of allegations that he tried to bribe a Hasidic rabbi who is on the state Board of Medicine.
    –
    The state Board of Medicine sided with Glunk in those cases, with Isaacson recusing himself. But a Philadelphia jury awarded Fledderman’s parents $20.5 million in damages, and the two other liposuction patients settled their lawsuits out of court. No criminal charges were filed.

    another Bad PA Doctor

    so PA has quite a few BAD doctors like Gosnell — that the PA Board of Medicine ignores — and continues to let practice Bad Medicine.

  132. 132.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Mike E: Is the S20 the one with the SCSI interface? If so VMs aren’t going to cut it as virtualising oddball interfaces is not their strongest point. If you want to keep the S20 working (and as far as I know there’s modern nothing out there that works like it apart from the Fujitsu Scansnap) then you’d be best getting hold of an old PC and put XP or 98SE on it just to run the scanner.

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