My proudest acheivement gift-wise is that I just shucked a whole shitwad of pecans for my next door neighbor’s gift basket. The pecans fell off of her tree that hangs over our fence. This has turned my fingernails black. This basket also includes California pistachios, Godiva assorted truffles, chocolate chip cookies and kumquats. The kumquats are from my yard.
Hahah! I love the “demand a refund” from the flea market. Happy Holidays. Lucky Spazmo.

Anybody get any super awesome Christmas gifts for anybody?  I got Spazmo a bunch of junk. He’s going to hate it. He’ll probably take it right back to the flea market I found it at and demand a refund.

Another manager’s employees came to me and asked me to intervene on their behalf, as their manager is an asshole and they want somebody to tell him.  Not in those words.

I’m not sure it’s advisable to intervene, but I probably will, for kicks. Also, it’s flattering, and I love flattery.

I don’t do it very often anymore, but many people do. I have a friend in Duluth who buys custom studded tires and gets his kicks riding around on frozen lakes. many people in downtown Minneapolis commute by bike every workday. Most of them buy their tires from local bike shops. If you google ‘studded bicycle tires’ you can view some of the designs available.

Can you bike in the snow?

Okay then, definitely sorority initiation.
There’s one day in winter here when you’ll see guys in their late 20’s, they’ve all got that Young Banker Haircut, RayBan sunglasses held on with Croakies, navy blue blazers with club ties, standing on a downtown street corner doing something absurd. There might be two young society gents per block, going on for seven or eight blocks. One year they each had a brick on a leash. Another year, they had all spray painted their banker shoes silver, and for the next several years you could see the spray painted outlines of their banker shoes on the sidewalk. Once they were all told wear a sunflower in their lapel and hand out yesterday’s newspaper to anyone who would stop. One year they were wearing morning coats (at six in the evening! I ask you!). I’m pretty sure it was a Mardi Gras Society inititation thing. John Steinbeck said if you ever see somebody doing something that doesn’t make any sense, they’re probably praying, but maybe he didn’t know about southern society initiation rites.

Wow! We are getting snow! Almost a 1/4”! But temps are forecast for the upper 30s on Saturday, so it will all melt before the holiday.

12-21-2012

Happy Solstice!

Maximum Axial Tilt!!

Earth’s northern celestial pole to the Sun

23° 26’

Hang on tight

Solstice! Hokay.
This morning (it’s foggy, raining lightly), at the busiest interchange in town, at the absolute peak of morning rush hour, there was a young woman standing on the roadside holding a large brown cardboard sign. The lettering was neat, so you could actually read it and it said “Do you know what will happen December 21, 2012?”
Well who the hell could know? I don’t even have calendars for next year yet. I’ve got little appointment cards clipped to my current calendar, I’m just baffled by what could be so noteworthy that you’d stand in the rain about it. Some kind of Winterfest Solstice concert? That daffy apocolypse guy? Sorority initiation?
Maybe the solstice explains something about it, like at the equinox you can stand an egg on it’s head, maybe at the solstice you can stand a woman outside in the rain.

I just noticed that some ‘Cooler’ posts have an indented left margin, some don’t. Hmmmmmmmmmmm

Happy Solstice!

Thanks! Good advice about the debt thing. I’m not completely debt free, but working toward it. My policy is I’m going to give a child *this amount* of money, and what she does with it is up to them. They are old enough that I don’t feel like I have to host a whang dang doodle for them. Caterers and florists are not a part of my natural landscape. If they decide to put it toward a car or a kiln or VIP tickets to Bonnaroo, so much the better. I won’t have to buy a mother of the bride dress.

Unlike the central plains, where the snow is piling up, we have had mild, dry weather this autumn. We are about totally snowless.

Congratulations there Balderdash! I hope your daughter finds peace and happiness. Saving up a bit for a celebration of life with close friends and family seems like a sensible idea. However, I would refrain from going into debt trying to impress those who do not matter.

Also, my youngest child just announced her engagement!!! It’s good news. He’s a great guy, and she’s got her batchelor’s degree. I’m thinking about opening one of those ING orange accounts to set $ aside for her wedding festivities.  Any insight from you smart people?

I have a friend who says every year about the solstice, “the days grow longer and the cold grows strong.” I haven’t thought of a small meaningful gift for her, even though she’s very meaningful to me.

As the kids have grown, we have taken a more traditional view of the winter solstice and the rebirth of the sun. Friends and family gathering for meals, stories, and merriment. No trees, no lights, no decorations. And small, meaningful gifts.

Well, that’s an “Aw Shit” moment to be sure, but to err is human right?

Holidays here are in full swing (as in, I wish I were, from my neck in a noose)—I wish we could excise December from the calendar. And the first half of January.

So, tree pics or it didn’t happen!

I enjoyed it.

Just finished decorating the tree. It looks like teh AWESOME. How’s everybody’s holidays going?

Last night was the management party. Previously the same day, I effed up royally by emailing confidential documents to EVERYBODY IN THE OFFICE. Thus last night we stayed home. Argh.

GS I guess our sophmoric jail rape humour killed the Cooler.

Will he be getting 14”?

His seat will be filled.

Blago just got 14 years at his sentencing hearing

Will he be getting 14”?

Yeah, that was sweet!

And he’s such a pretty boy too…

Blago just got 14 years at his sentencing hearing.

BTW, thanks for the advice on the music files. I just need to wait until late Saturday., when I have a night off.

Ok, MediCal works in CA, but what about other states? Do we have MediNevada? Or MediNewYorkState? Sure, I could just bing it, but I’m curious for input.

In an effort to shrink the State budget and eliminate the deficit, Minnesota cut the living shit out of the state sponsored medical programs. This means that people who are under employed, unemployed, or have lost their medical coverage at work because of the poor economy must endure “hospitality” services. The cost of these are passed on to the patients with cash or medical coverage. So in reality, we have no tax increase, but must subsidize health care through higher premiums & co-pays. A system that pushes more people over the edge.

Do you want to keep the music on the portable drive, or have it moved to the new system? If the latter, you should be able to go to iTunes preferences “advanced” and select “Keep iTunes Media organized” and “Copy files to iTunes media folder when adding to library.”

Then, drag the folder with your tunes to the “Music” sidebar, and your media should all come across.

Sounds like a sweet ‘puter: and I’m not just saying that because my brother works for AMD. Hey, he never bought a Mac when I was with Apple, so…

Anyway, apologies for being absent the last few days: been busy with Medicare and MediCal and all that nonsense. I should be OK by Thursday. Meanwhile, if you submit a link I’ll get to it in the morning. Kinda promise.

BTW: Ok, MediCal works in CA, but what about other states? Do we have MediNevada? Or MediNewYorkState? Sure, I could just bing it, but I’m curious for input.

So here I am at 3:34 in the morning. Spent the last 6 hours setting up the new HP, and trying to get iTunes to recognize 20 gigs of music from the old box off of the back-up portable drive. Step 2 will be to try a direct transfer by network.

But we are sporting a quad core AMD with 8 gigs, a tera, and 23” HD monitor.

I think we have a meta-tag of NSFW somewhere: but it may just be that McAfee thinks we say dirty words and so on, so their “link advisor” ranks us up there with amputee porn.

That is pretty damn wonderful ToP. If only I was still working, I’d have that in the office window.

I guess that should have a NSFW tag

source of poster below

http://goodfuckingdesignadvice.com

Also some good f***ing design advice

For LP:

http://youtu.be/IkOQw96cfyE

I will look, GS!  Dimmer, glad to see you back, no worries.

Had my review today. I live another day and keep my job. My employee is so disappointed.

I didn’t, but then again I’ve not been looking for it. I’ll try tomorrow. Thanks!

Has anybody else noticed that Jupiter is rising with insane brilliance this week? Just look to the eastern sky an hour after the sun fully sets.

Sorry I’ve not been here. Dimmer is solely responsible for keeping fat jerry alive

… and a quick “Aw shit” from me for not being around the past couple of weeks. Partially due to AT&T fuck---err, “upgrading” our DSL line to uverse, partly for other reasons (I had a project I really, really wanted to get done: it didn’t get done).

SEXY

suweet video, Gloveshot.

I am all for red shoes. I have yet to work up the nerve, but at some point in my life I WILL own a pair of red cowboy boots. I know it’s not for everybody, but it’s just something I have to do.

Bono should get on your nerves, or else you are six feet under.

Yesterday we went to get new tires put on the car and came back with loads of shoes. Spazmo’s oxfords are the, well, flyest as they used to say, but I did buy a pair of shiny red shoes that will be hard to miss.

South African chicken dinner commercial via The World.

If you have a desire to build your Christmas Tree, check this out.

The VH1 is on the television, and I have to say that Bono gets on most of my nerves. Also, Ozzie Osborne has remarkable mobility in his upper spine. Good for you, you old goat.

Such a gorgeous day today. I ate satsumas straight off the tree, hung out with some really eccentric dogs, horses and people, and didn’t get within 5 miles of a Walmart. I’d like more of this, please.

What time of day do they line up for pamphlets up there?  Given the choice, I think I’d like a new purse or some earrings. If you stand still long enough, someone will walk up and give you religeous trac
ts for free. This has never happened with purses or earrings.

Time to load up on those great and titillating “how to prevent your teens from getting any!” books that my dad used to stockpile.

None of the other stores in the area (mostly women’s fashion) had anybody standing outside the doors except the Christian bookstore, which had about 50-60 people standing outside the door. It just struck me as odd.

Christian bookstore Black Friday sounds awesome. Fighting over books. I’m thinking maybe even a video game franchise.