Girl From The North Country

The song of the day is Girl From The North Country first released on the 1963 album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan by music icon Bob Dylan. This video is an excerpt from the 2012 motion picture Silver Linings Playbook starring Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence with Robert De Niro, Jacki Weaver, and Chris Tucker. This rendition of the song features Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, who were not only good musicians but were also good friends who had great appreciation for each other's talent. Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence are excellent actors and the movie Silver Linings Playbook is well worth viewing (in this blogger's humble opinion).

Tempting Fate

I used to work for a mobile robotics company. The company made mobile robots that could propel themselves forward or backward and could turn on a dime. Each robot weighed about 300 pounds and could easily drive up a steep ramp while carrying a 300 pound load. They had power to spare.

Knowing this, the designers were careful. Each robot had two bumpers. One bumper was in the direction of travel when the robot was going forward and the other bumper was "behind" the robot; in other words, it was in the direction of travel when the robot was driving backward. Were the robot to run into something, the bumper would activate an Emergency Stop. Surrounding the robot were large red buttons labeled "E-STOP" (Emergency Stop). It was impossible for the robot to move by itself without human commands for it to move. An onboard Drive Computer had to be fed a path program and then the path program had to be executed by the Drive Computer before the robot could move. Furthermore, the Motor Amplifier which fed power to the drive and steer motors would not function without the Drive Computer having been  installed in the robot. There were safety features on top of safety features. I am, of course, talking about a robot that was completely assembled. I am not talking about a robot that was partially assembled or which had some safety features disabled in order to perform certain tests. 

We went overboard on making the robot safe. Nevertheless...

One day someone went into a cubicle where a robot was parked. He wanted to drive the robot to another location. So he switched on the key (like you would do in a car) to begin the process of moving the robot. When he switched on the key, the robot instantly became the Beast From Hell. It went forward, backward, sideways, this way, that way, yonder way. It crashed into the cubicle walls, chairs, file cabinets, and everything else in the cubicle. Somehow he (or someone) managed to turn off the robot and stop its rampage. There was no signifcant damage and no one was injured. But it was a memorable moment. 

So what happened? As already mentioned, the robot was controlled by an onboard Drive Computer, and that Drive Computer received its instructions from a computer chip called a PROM (Programmable Read Only Memory). This particular robot had a Drive Computer but it did not have a PROM. Therefore, the Drive Computer raced from one empty memory location to the next empty memory location. Without getting overly technical, this racing through empty memory was BAD. It triggered all kinds of random instructions to the Motor Amplifers that controlled the Drive and Steer motors. The robot literally lost its mind. 

Moral? You can't be too careful! Even if you think you're being very careful, Nature, Fate, Destiny—call it what you will—will find a way to bite you on the ass. And this brings me to another incident. 

There was a teenage couple. The young man wanted to be famous on YouTube. So he asked his girlfriend to shoot him in the chest with a pistol. He held a 1.5 inch thick book in front of his chest. He believed the book would stop the bullet. She didn't want to shoot the gun, but he persuaded her that it was safe and nothing bad would happen. He was wrong. The couple's 3 year old son and nearly 30 onlookers watched as the bullet passed through the book, entered the young man's chest, and killed him.

The girlfriend was pregnant with the couple's second child. Both children lost their father. Their mother served jail time, then home confinement, and can never own a firearm or profit from her story.

We've all tempted Fate now and then, especially in our younger years. You got away with it. I got away with it. Lots of people got away with it. But some people did not. Think before you act. If this stunt goes well, what will I gain? If this stunt goes very bad, what will I lose?

Just like my story about the crazy robot, it's when you think you've covered all your bets that Fate steps in and shows you what can go wrong.

The Longest Night

Today, on Friday, December 22, at 3:27AM GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) the winter solstice occurred. That was in Greenwich, England. Here, where I live, in central Virginia, USA, the winter solstice occurred yesterday at 10:27PM. "So what?" you ask. So this:

The night of the winter solstice is the longest night of the year. Beginning today, our nights will grow shorter and our days will grow longer. On a solstice, one of the earth's poles reaches its maximum tilt away from the sun. This happens twice a year, in June and December. If it's winter where you live, you experience the winter solstice, with the longest night and shortest day, at this time of the year. If it's summer where you live, you experience the summer solstice, with the longest day and shortest night, at this time of the year.

Nights are cold here, so the longest night means I burn the most heating oil. In fact, I can hear the boiler in the basement running right at this moment, burning a gallon of fuel oil per hour. When I recently filled up the oil tank, they put in about 300 gallons for the low, low price of $4.40 per gallon. I have to fill the tank twice each winter. If it sounds expensive, let me tell you about the annual event called "maintenance" which involves cleaning out soot, replacing the fuel nozzle, replacing the fuel filter, and adjusting the spacing of the ignition rod tips. I may have omitted a few items.

Nuria just came in. She's been out with Carmen, one of her girl friends. Nuria brought me lunch. It's Mexican food. There was rice and black beans. There was a dish with strips of sauteed green Bell pepper and white onion, and strips of grilled chicken and beef. There were several sauces, including green hot sauce that I have eaten with oriental meals. There was more, including soft tacos, or perhaps they were tortillas; I'm not sure what they were.  Here's a bonus fact: the Aztecs and other Nahuatl speakers called tortillas tlaxcalli. Regardless, it was a lot of food. I was able to eat about half of it. 

The shopping centers are crazy busy now. You wouldn't want to go near one. I can't even imagine what Saturday and Sunday will be like. But I suspect that some people actually thrive on all the busy-ness happening at this time of the year. More power to them, but don't make me a part of it.

The Clonazepam Case

I've been having a lot of insomnia lately, so my doctor prescribed a drug called clonazepam (brand name: Klonopin). The prescription was sent to the Walmart pharmacy by electronic magic and when it was ready I went to the pharmacy to pick it up.

I've had problems with Walmart before. See my post titled Walmart Fail and tell me if it makes any sense to you. But this time, my problem was with Walmart's drugstore.

I've been buying prescription drugs from Walmart Pharmacy for about twenty years and I've never had a problem—until this past Friday. They phoned me to let me know my clonazepam was ready to be picked up. So I drove to the pharmacy and went in. There was no line so I was first in line and a young black man waited on me. I told him my name and he checked his computer and he said he needed to see ID. I said, "What ID?" 

He repeated, "I need to see your ID!"

And I repeated, "What ID?"

We went back and forth.

You see, I have lots of IDs in my wallet. I have my drivers license, my social security card, my Medicare Health Insurance ID card, my Anthem Medicare supplement ID card, my Humana Rx plan ID card (it even says member ID on the card!). Because I was buying medicine, I thought that maybe they wanted to see my Humana ID card, or possibly my Medicare ID card. I wasn't sure. That's why I asked, "What ID?" But the young black man kept repeating, "I need to see your ID!" It was a stalemate. He stared at me and I stared back at him. Then he turned away and said something to another clerk, to the effect of "I don't want to wait on this guy. You wait on him."

So another clerk stepped forward. This clerk was a young white fellow, thin and somewhat taller than me. He said, "I need to see your driver's license." Now we were getting somewhere.

As I pulled out my wallet, I asked the fellow, "Why do you need to see my driver's license?"

"Because this drug is a schedule one drug, so I have to check your identity."

"Schedule one?" I thought. "Wow, that's really up there."

The clerk scrutinized my license and handed it back. I paid, and he pointed to an older gentleman at the end of the counter. I walked over to him and he handed me my purchase with a smile. This was the first person at the pharmacy that had greeted me with a smile. I thanked him and went to my Jeep and drove home.

I got on my computer and entered the DEA's website and looked up schedule one. This is what the DEA website said:

Schedule I drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Some examples of Schedule I drugs are: heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy), methaqualone, and peyote.

Holy cow! Do I really want to take this medicine? It has no accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Is clonazepam really a schedule 1 drug, like the Walmart pharmacy clerk said, or are the Walmart clerks just trying to play a joke on an old man? No, Walmart clerks would never do that. I'd better play it safe and dump these pills into my kitchen garbage can. I don't want to swallow anything as dangerous as the drugs that the DEA lists for schedule one.

Then, I decided to see what the DEA said about clonazepam. Here is what the DEA said:

Schedule IV

Schedule IV drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with a low potential for abuse and low risk of dependence. Some examples of Schedule IV drugs are: Xanax, Soma, Darvon, Darvocet, Valium, Ativan, Talwin, Ambien, Tramadol.

Another section of the DEA website said:

Schedule IV Controlled Substances

Substances in this schedule have a low potential for abuse relative to substances in Schedule III.

Examples of Schedule IV substances include: alprazolam (Xanax®), carisoprodol (Soma®), clonazepam (Klonopin®), clorazepate (Tranxene®), diazepam (Valium®), lorazepam (Ativan®), midazolam (Versed®), temazepam (Restoril®), and triazolam (Halcion®).

Hmm.The DEA says that clonazepam has a low potential for abuse relative to Schedule 3. There is also a Schedule 5 that contains addictive things like ice cream sandwiches and pumpkin pie, which I will admit can be quite addictive and probably more so than clonazepam. But still, the Feds haven't outlawed ice cream and pie. Yet. But give them time.

Now, what to do about Walmart. Should I let them get away with telling people that a relatively harmless drug is the next thing to heroin? Or should I go to the drugstore and waste my time discussing this with a manager? 

(Heavy thoughts in progress. Please wait.) 

Okay, I think I'll see if a manager wants to listen to me. Better yet, I'll publish this now, and if I make any progress with a Walmart manager, I'll return and post his comments and actions. It's only fair.

---

It's the next day. Acutally, it's three days later, because the first two days were rainy. I went to Walmart Pharmacy at 9AM and talked with an employee named Michael about what happened. I tried to tell the story as accurately as I could and not to make myself out as the "injured party" seeking justice. 

As Michael described it, when picking up a "scheduled drug", one does have to show a driver's license. But he said that someone could pick up the drug for me, in which case she would show her driver's license. It doesn't have to be me who picks up the drug, the government just wants to be able to track who is picking up the medicine so that the same person can't go from pharmacy to pharmacy with the same (bogus) prescription and purchase large quantities of the drug. The incident shouldn't have happened, but I did what I could to square things away and get some understanding, and that's all I can do without having a time machine.

Lessons

One day you will die, and after you die you will know the Truth. The Truth, or a part of it, is that this life is like a motion picture for your soul—the inner you that is truly you. Living a life is like going to the theater and watching a play, or going to the cinema and watching a film, or going to the library and reading a good book that was written by a wise person. Living a life teaches you lessons; it gives you things to think about. If you read a very good book, you may decide to be a better person than you were before you read the book. You may try harder, think deeper, forgive quicker, than before you read the book, watched the movie, experienced the play.

Why is this? The purpose of your life and my life is to make us better people and better souls. Your soul is the real you. The real you is not the earthly body you happen to inhabit for a few years. In your previous life, you inhabited a different body and played out a different story. In your next life you will inhabit another body and you will play out another story. But all your lives, all your stories, will be lived and experienced so that gradually you become less imperfect. Each life you live brings you a bit closer to perfection. That is the direction in which you are headed. It is the direction in which all of us are headed, even though many of us may be far from our destinations.

The world has evil people, but it also has people who would give their life to save yours. They would do that because God gives them an instinct to do the right thing, and so they offer their help, and possibly their life, without hesitation.

One day you will die and then, will you pass to a higher level and learn the next lesson? Or will you have to repeat this lesson until you get it right? You must learn the lessons you are given before you pass on to more advanced lessons. 

These words won't be understood or believed by everyone. They are intended for those who will understand. If you understand these words, then they were intended for you.

Plumbing Job

I have a plumbing leak. It's probably been leaking for years, but I just found out about it. The leak only occurs while someone is running water in the bath or shower, so while I lived alone I never discovered it, but now that I have Nuria in the house, it was inevitable that one of us would be taking a shower while the other was in the basement. And that—the basement—is where the leak becomes visible. It's already rotted a board in the bathroom subfloor, which is the basement ceiling. Fortunately, that particular board is not load-bearing. Still, the leak must be fixed because there could be unseen damage occurring inside the wall.

I called a plumbing company. The company informed me ahead of time that if the plumber came out and I decided to not give them the repair job, there would a 99 dollar fee for coming to my house. Okay, fair enough, I guess, although there are plumbing companies that advertise "free estimates".

So the plumber came to my house and looked at the situation and he told me that he needs to make an access hole in the bedroom wall behind the bathroom shower faucets. Okay, I think, make the hole in the wall and I'll get an access panel from Home Depot to cover the hole. But suddenly there's a problem.

My house is old, and the walls are made of what I call plasterboard, which might not be the correct name. It's similar to drywall except it is made of plaster instead of gypsum. The plaster is sandwiched between two layers of thick paper. The plasterboard is fastened to wall studs (or ceiling joists) and then painted.

So to investigate the leak, the plumber decided he must cut a hole in the bedroom wall behind the bathroom shower faucets in order to diagnose the problem. But that presents a new problem, because it is his company's policy that they do not cut holes in plasterboard. So the plumber says I need to get someone to cut a hole in the wall, then he will return and work on the leak. And he says I must pay him the $99 fee for coming out to my house and not getting the job. 

Wait, what? I want him to do the job. He's the one who is saying "No, we won't do the job." Why would I pay him $99 for refusing to do the job? Is he deranged? I said to him, "Let me talk to your manager."

So the plumber goes to his truck and phones his manager. He comes back to my front door and tells me, "I talked to my manager and he says that, because you're a previous customer, we'll waive the ninety nine dollar cancelation fee this time."

That's damn nice of them. I didn't cancel the job. They refused to do the job. There's a big difference.

Meanwhile, the leak continues to leak whenever the shower is used. I'm also beginning to think that I don't need to cut a hole in the bedroom wall behind the tub faucets. I have a 3-knob tub faucet, and the center knob is the diverter knob. I'm thinking that probably the diverter is leaking and what I should do is replace the washers and O-rings in the diverter and in the hot and cold valves, too. I think that diverter valve is the likely location of the leak, and I'm surprised that the plumber didn't think the same thing.

And did I mention that the plumber told me that a replacement valve assembly would cost a thousand dollars (their price)! This is something that sells for fifty to a hundred dollars at Home Depot. 

Maybe the plumber did me a favor by refusing to do the job. What I do know is that repairs on an old house always end up more complicated and more expensive than one would expect.

Christmas Countdown

It is night. I just went outside to see how the lights on our house look. Nuria did the decorating. The lights look, well, colorful. We have lights in each of our front windows, lights in a wreath on our front door. and lights in the yard. I took a photo but it was just very ordinary looking. There are some things that the human eye is so much better able to see than a camera can capture—especially a cellphone camera at night.

My neighbors are keeping up with me. The Egyptians next door have strings of flashing lights entwined within the shrubs in front of their house. Most Egyptians are Muslim, but maybe these are Christian or atheist, or just Muslims who want to blend into the neighborhood. I don't know them well. I've tried talking to the man of the house, but, frankly, I can understand only about half of his words, at best. I don't do well with foreign accents. I once had a co-worker who was Vietnamese, and I never understood a single word that he spoke to me. Not one. Guess what he did while he was in the refugee camp waiting to come to America. He taught English. Seriously.

One of the houses across the street has no lights yet, and that surprises me. The family is Guatemalan, and I thought that most Central Americans are Catholic. Maybe they're simply late getting their lights on display, or maybe they're just like I was before Nuria moved in with me. Before Nuria, I didn't decorate or celebrate Christmas. For me, it was a day for other people to celebrate—people who had families. 

I live in a neighborhood that is becoming international. Egyptians neighbors, Guatamalan neigbors, and of course, my Costa Rican housemate. Come to think of it, my last pet was a German Shepherd. I feel so cosmopolitan.

Nuria just came home. The Christmas lights are lit, inside and outside, and a fire is burnng in the fireplace insert. The insert's fan is blowing out heated air, and there is a faint but distinctive scent of burning wood in the air. I took a photo but you cannot get the full effect from a photo. You can't feel the stove's warm air, you can't hear the hum of the fan that blows that air through the hollow spaces inside the walls of the stove. 

Oh, where did I get the firewood, you ask? My neighbor had two trees (note I said had) in his backyard and the branches overhung my yard. In autumn the trees would drop their huge leaves into my backyard, and due to wind currents, the leaves would always end up in my basement stairwell and block the drain at the bottom. I spent half of the fall sweeping and bagging leaves blown into my basement stairwell. One day I grabbed my chainsaw and walked over to a tree and cut it down. Then I cut down the other tree. I cut the limbs into short pieces to fit in my stove. Nuria and I cleaned up the small limbs and the leaves. My neighbor hasn't said anything about it. 

By the time the fire goes out, it will be time to go to bed. Winter is cold and somewhat forbidding with its bare trees and its animals in hibernation. But there are some upsides to winter. Snow is pretty to watch when it's falling, there is no lawn mowing, and we have some things to look forward to: colorful leaves, sweater weather, apple pies, pumpkin pies, pecan pies, mulled wine, Thanksgiving, Halloween, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, New Year's Day, and of course, the promise of Spring.

Scams Pt. 2

'Tis the season to try to scam people out of their hard-earned dollars. And criminals are trying.

A few weeks ago I received an email from an anonymous source. The sender of the email claimed to have hacked into my computer and turned on my video camera and was now in possession of a compromising video of me. And the blackmailer wanted money or else they would distribute the video to everyone on my email list—thus, in their own dirty mind, embarrassing me. Funnily enough, my email client (Thunderbird) automatically sent that email to my Junk folder instead of my Inbox.

This week, I received an email purporting to be from the IRS. Instead of wanting money, they wanted to give me a refund for overpaying my federal tax. All I had to do to receive the refund was to click on a button on the page. 

Right. And where is the button going to take me? What malware will it activate?

The email was signed "IRS". Not "Internal Revenue Service". Just "IRS". When did the IRS start using just their initials to sign their official correspondence?

I know that my email address has been posted on the "dark web". The dark web is a part of the Internet that is private, anonymous, and is used for legal and illegal activity. So it doesn't surprise me to receive scam emails.

I also recently received a phone call from a man who spoke with a strong Indian (the country) accent. He said he was with a U.S. government agency. That's when I ended the call. 

If you're suspicious of an email, it's best not to open it. But even if you do open it, it is unlikely that your computer will get a virus or malware just by opening an email. Almost all viruses are activated when you download an attachment or click a link in an email. In addition to emails, we must be vigilant about phone calls, instant messages, and text messages. 

Happy Holidays, and be safe.

Dire Straits

I discovered the rock band Dire Straits in 1986. Some people are just discovering the band today.

The song of the day is Sultans of Swing from the 1978 album Sultans of Swing by British rock band Dire Straits. The band was formed by Mark Knopfler, David Knopfler, John Illsley, and Pick Withers.

Phil Collins

The song of the day is In The Air Tonight from the 1981 album Face Value by English singer, drummer, songwriter, record producer and actor Phil Collins.

Scams Pt. 1

It is evening. The phone rings. I reach for it and answer it: "You're on speaker." A female voice (a recording) informs me that my Amazon account has been hacked and someone has made a fifteen hundred dollar purchase. In order to cancel this purchase, I must call their Help line at once, and she gives me a phone number to call.

I hang up. This is clearly a scam. For one thing, I don't have an Amazon account. I've never bought anything from Amazon. For another thing, I wouldn't trust an unknown voice on the phone that tells me to call a phone number. If I think I may have been scammed, I will go to the company's website and look for their help number. That way I can be assured that I am getting a real company number and not simply calling a scammer chat room.

It is unfortunately the season for being extra careful, not extra gullible. Watch out for online scammers. Think before you make a call. Ask, does this make sense? Is there a better way to handle this possible issue? You might want to check out some websites that teach you how to identify scammers. There are a number of such sites. Just google "how to spot online scammers."

If someone tells you that an unknown person has made a purchase in your name, go online and check your credit cards. Check your checking account. Has a purchase been made? Has a credit card been charged? Take care, people. And have a nice holiday.

Thanksgiving 2023

It's Thanksgiving Day in my part of the world. It's a beautiful fall day, too. Witness looking through my front window:

Nuria has cooked dinner for her and me and the two guests she invited over. There's going to be turkey and stuffing...
and green bean casserole...
and ham and pineapple with cloves and powdered sugar...
and apple salad with walnuts...
and deviled eggs...
and pumpkin pie and pecan pie.

I'm glad she invited guests because that's a lot of goodies for just her and me. Even with our two guests, we'll be eating leftovers for a week. I hope our guests will leave with some of the leftovers. We'll insist they do that.

In the olden days, when it was just me, I would make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I would stand in the kitchen while I ate it and ask, "What's all the fuss about?" 

Just kidding. Actually, I've blogged several times about Thanksgiving Day, and I was more likely to eat chili with onion, pepper, and tomato as the main course. Why does it have to be turkey?

But Nuria has gone a long way in domesticating me. I told an old friend about our Thanksgiving dinner plans and he replied, "Tell Nuria she has done the impossible in civilizing you!"

I'm surprised, too, but Nuria can be tenacious if she wants to be. 

A Life Lesson

Today I watched the movie Secondhand Lions for the second time. It's a good movie from 2003. It stars Michael Caine, Robert Duval, and a young Haley Joel Osment. The story was written by Tim McCanlies. During the movie, Robert Duval's character, Hub, was teaching a life lesson to Haley Osment's character, Walter. For young Walter, it was an important lesson. It was a lesson that most of us are usually not taught but, rather, come to realize at some point in our lifetime. True or not, it's an important lesson. Do you remember learning, or realizing, this lesson?

Walter: Those stories about Africa, about you ... they're true, aren't they?

Hub: Doesn't matter. If you want to believe in something, then believe in it. Just because something isn't true, that's no reason you can't believe in it.

Sometimes, the things that may or may not be true are the things that a man needs to believe in the most:

That people are basically good.

That honor, courage, and virtue mean everything.

That power and money, money and power mean nothing.

That good always triumphs over evil.

And I want you to remember this: that true love ... true love never dies.

Remember that, boy. Remember that.

Doesn't matter if it's true or not. 

You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in.

—Secondhand Lions

Interesting Times

How old are you? There's chronological age—your age by the calendar. There's biological age—your age at a cellular level, at a genetic level. There's mental age, there's emotional age. These ages often don't agree.

What have you achieved that will be of lasting importance? Some people want to make a lot of money. That is their life's goal. But what good is that goal? What does it accomplish? For a while, money allows you to buy more expensive toys than the average person, but you often cannot buy the things that are most important. You can't buy happiness. You can't buy love. You can't buy knowledge. You can't buy maturity. You can't buy good health—the certainty of freedom from illness. All the really important things are beyond buying.

What have you accomplished? You've spent your life getting to where you are now. What can you show the world for your decades of existence? Do you have plans to make yourself better tomorrow than you are today, better next year than you are this year? How will you do that?

Jonas Salk invented a vaccine to prevent people from getting polio. He helped millions of people, but he didn't invent that vaccine by thinking "what's in it for me?" He invented it and he declined to patent it, because he wanted the vaccine to be inexpensive and available to everyone. By virtually giving away his invention, he lost, by some estimates, seven billion dollars. He did that because of altruism: a concern for the well-being of others. That is a human quality that is becoming increasingly rare in today's society.

In many ways, we are going in the wrong direction today. What happens when people go in the wrong direction for a prolonged time? They get lost. What happens when a society becomes lost? The result is societal collapse: the loss of cultural identity and social complexity as an adaptive system, the downfall of government, and the rise of violence. 

Look at America's history and then look at American society today. We're not the same country. People believe things today that would have been laughed at fifty years ago, sixty years ago, seventy years ago. National elections can be stolen. We never went to the Moon. The earth is not round, it's flat. Vaccines don't work.

In addition to false beliefs, there are other signs. Political systems become dysfunctional. Systems put in place to prevent loss of life collapse when needed.

I read an abstract of a paper written by Parker Crutchfield at Western Michigan University that began, "The collapse of society is inevitable, even if it is in the distant future. When it collapses, it is likely to do so within the lifetimes of some people. These people will have matured in pre-collapse society, experience collapse, and then live the remainder of their lives in the post-collapse world."

I agree with Mr. Crutchfield's assessment. I think we are seeing it in present-day America.

There is a Chinese curse that says, "May you live in interesting times."

I think we are there.

Speed Kills

I was browsing the Internet and I found an advertisement for a Ford Raptor truck for sale by a local dealership. The ad featured this image of the truck:

The dealership was asking $147,085 for the truck. I blinked, too. Witness the below portion of the ad:

I read a few specs on the truck. It has the same size engine as my old Jeep and about the same mpg. It has 4WD, my Jeep has 4WD. The Raptor wins easily in the horsepower department. But then, it's supercharged and my old Jeep breathes regular air, so no contest.

I continued browsing and right away I stumbled upon this video, below. The same kind of truck hit the side of a tanker truck.

Careless driver? Love speed? Pay $150g AND YOUR LIFE! 

Don't let that driver die for nothing. Learn from his mistake.

Windows Finale

In my previous two posts I discussed getting new windows for my home. In Window Whirl I wrote these words:

"The installers also took down my front awnings and disposed of them. I'm left with some paint around the perimeter of where the awings used to be located, thanks to a fast and sloppy paint job a number of years ago."

With the awnings gone, I decided I would try to remove the paint, so Nuria and I went to Home Depot. I bought a gallon of Citristrip paint stripper, an acid scrub brush, latex gloves (should've been nylon because paint stripper can dissolve latex), a pack of three 9 inch paint rollers, a roller stick, and an 11 inch paint roller pan. 

The next day, while Nuria worked, I rolled paint stripper onto the long-dried paint on the bricks. When Nuria came home, I scrubbed it and she handled the garden hose, rinsing off any dissolved paint that came off the bricks. After it dried, it looked a little better, but not a lot better.

The next day around noon, I went outside and took another go at the task. I applied a generous coating of paint stripper all around the front windows. I let it work for a few hours. By now, Nuria was home, so we went out and began trying to remove more paint. Nuria used the hose and I used the scrubber pole. I was close to the house and looking upward, when something happened. I lost my balance and began tilting to my right. I brought my gaze down and twisted my body in the direction I was falling. I managed to take a few steps instead of falling, but I was running toward a brick wall. I put out my right hand to stop myself from hitting the wall, and instead of hitting the wall I bounced off, thanks to my extended right arm, and fell into a bush.

A broken limb in the bush gouged my back in several places. I also sustained a laceration to my right arm. When I stood up, Nuria pulled up the back of my shirt and said, "You have to get into the house." I thought it was no big deal, but Nuria insisted. 

"I'm okay."

"No, you're not. You're bleeding. You have to go inside now." 

Nuria was quite firm, so I knew I had done some damage to myself. I went inside the house and pulled off my shirt. I walked to the bathroom. In the mirror I could see streaks of blood running down my back. I also had an abrasion on my arm that was already swollen.

Nuria patched me up with various bandages and gauze pads. At least, I could put my shirt on without getting blood on it. That was my main concern. It was a shirt Nuria had given me and I didn't want it to get ruined. Somehow, there was not a drop of blood on the shirt, despite streaks of blood on my back. My right arm had an abrasion with streaks of skin missing but it wasn't bleeding. It was scraped and puffy, as if there were a lump under my skin. 

After Nuria patched me up, we went outside to finish the job. Just as we finished, a man driving a pickup truck with a large freezer in the truck bed stopped in front of our house. He shouted at us, so we walked to his truck.

He was making deliveries of meat (like Omaha steaks, but maybe a different brand). He had a customer who didn't take the order, so he wanted to get rid of it rather than drive thirty miles to get the frozen meat back to the company's freezer. He showed us his wares. Various cuts of steak, burgers, chicken, etc. He said it was a $400 package and he would sell it for $178. Nuria buys Omaha steaks, and she inspected everything and said the price was good, so we loaded our freezer with meat. We had to remove all the cuts of meat from the boxes they came in, in order to make all the meat fit into our refrigerator's freezer compartment. 

That night I slept okay, except for my usual insomnia. After a couple hours in bed, I got up and took a melatonin tablet and drank two glasses of wine and went back to bed. I was able to sleep. I wasn't in pain, even when I lay on my injured back, though I don't spend much time in bed on my back. I'm a side-sleeper these days.

Today, I went outside and looked at the result of our work removing paint. White paint was still visible on the bricks, though there was some improvement. I've decided that I've removed as much paint as I'm going to remove. The rest will have to be removed by God when the next big tornado comes through town.

It's a beautiful, sunny fall day. I'm going to open the front windows and the back patio door and allow fresh air inside. An ancient oak tree across the street is shedding its yellowed leaves, and with every breeze they come tumbling down in the sunlight like a resplendent torrent of gold. This is the most beautiful season of the year for those humans who live in this part of the country. I have family in the Tampa—St. Pete area of Florida, and Florida has a nice climate year-round. But I would get tired of it always being sunny and warm, or sunny and hot, except when hurricanes are passing through. I enjoy having four distinct seasons. New windows that can open (unlike my old painted-shut windows) will allow me to enjoy autumn's nice temperatures.

Maybe I'll drive to the river later and take some photos. I'll wait for Nuria to get home from work, of course. She loves getting into the Jeep and going somewhere, anywhere. And today is a good day to go somewhere, anywhere.

Window Whirl

It's Friday, 6PM. This post is a follow-up to yesterday's post titled Windows Prep. Today is Friday. The window installers arrived at 9AM. The outside temperature was about 30°F. Soon, the inside temperature was the same as the outside temperature, because all my windows had been removed from the first floor. The installers went about their business and by about 3PM I had ten new windows. I like them, but I'm not going to use the old Venetian blinds with them, so Nuria and I will have to pick out some suitable curtains. 

I think there were six installers but I could never count more than five at a time. There was one woman and five men. Three were from Peru, two (including the woman) were from Honduras, and one was from Mexico. None of the men spoke English, but the woman was fairly fluent in English. They wasted no time cutting out the old casement windows and installing the double hung windows. 

Both sashes on the new windows slide up and down and can tilt inward toward the room. There is a screen that can slide from the bottom window to the top window. The installation looks nice. The installers also took down my front awnings and disposed of them. I'm left with some paint around the perimeter of where the awings used to be located, thanks to a fast and sloppy paint job a number of years ago. Not by me, in case that is what you were thinking.

The installers told us that they (the installers, not the windows) work all year unless it is snowing. Nuria spoke with them and told me that one of the installers has been in the US for fourteen years and still cannot speak English. He probably doesn't want to take the time to learn it, or he really doesn't have the time. Or perhaps he tried and found it too difficult and gave up on learning it. Some people seem to learn a foreign language easily and quickly, while others just never get it. I tried to learn Spanish in high school. I spent two years studying and learned how to pronounce the Spanish word for "no." It's pronounced "¡no!" in case you were wondering.

I hope you have a nice weekend. It's going to be 70°F here in central Virginia. 

Windows Prep

It's 9:35PM Thursday night. The temperature is 31°F according to the National Weather Service, and 40°F according to Accuweather. I'll do an average and say it's 35°F.

I am getting new windows for the downstairs tomorrow. I've prepared as best as I can. I've moved furniture around, taken down Venetian blinds, and taken down curtains. I don't think I will replace the blinds. They're a real b*tch to install into my window openings. I'd rather have curtains. I already have curtain rods installed. So, I'll install curtains and see how that goes. If it's necessary, I can install blinds later.

The window installers said they would be here between 8AM and 11AM. They're going to remove all of my downstairs windows. The temperature at 8AM is forecast to be 27°F. Hello! And with no windows, I won't be running the heat.

As of now, the only room that still has Venetian blinds is my bedroom. Nuria and I will get up around 5:30AM to finish getting the rooms ready. There's not much left to do. I'll take down the blinds from my two bedroom windows and take down curtains from one window. We'll do a walkaround to make sure there is no furniture in the way of the window installers. With the forecast morning temperature, I have to believe the installers will hold off coming here for a couple of hours, at least.

If the installation goes well, the house should be more comfortable and cheaper to heat and cool. The current windows are single-glazed, meaning one thin pane of glass in each of eight steel frames in each of the ten windows. Single-glazed and a steel casement window frame: you couldn't make heat conduction through a window any easier. Of course, when this house was built, fuel oil was 25 cents a gallon.

The new windows are vinyl with double panes. The glass panes are low-e (low-emissivity) which is produced by a microscopic coating on the glass. Between the panes there is argon gas which helps to block infrared (heat) energy from entering or escaping the house through the windows. 

Naturally, I'll post a followup letting you know why this blog post was wildly optimistic.

Evening Trip

Nothing much going on here. This past Thursday I was on the 'net and I happened across an advert for a "pumpkin fair" in the nearby city of Hopewell. Little did I know that Thursday, October 26, was National Pumpkin Day. I didn't know there was even such a thing as a National Pumpkin Day. So I called to Nuria and told her we were driving to Hopewell to attend a street fair. She was, of course, up for it. She's up for anything that gets her out of the house for a while.

I used Waze to get us there, which I think took a route that was not the shortest but had the least traffic. So maybe the route we took was the shortest in time if not in miles. I parked and we walked around the streets looking at the vendors and their wares. There were the obligatory pumpkins, of course. There was a man singing and strumming a guitar. There were all the kinds of odds and ends that you would expect at a food fair.

We wandered to the end of Library Street. (It's named Library Street because along one side of the street, the entire block is taken up by the Appomattox Regional Library.) This was our view:

This is the intersection of Library Street with Appomattox Street. >>
This is a historical part of Virginia. Some parts were settled in the early 1600s. We were not far from City Point, which played a significant role during the Civil War. City Point was the Union advance supply depot, situated deep in the heart of the Confederacy, only 20 miles from the Southern capital of Richmond. From the end of June 1864 to May 1865, City Point provided all supplies necessary to support the 125,000 men and 65,000 animals of General Ulysses S. Grant's Army.

We walked across Appomattox Street and found ourselves looking at a gently sloping hillside that ended in a large, level park, and then the slope resumed down to the Appomattox River. Or maybe the James River. The river we could see was actually where the Appomattox flows into the James, so which river we were looking at was not exactly clear. It was really a confluence of the two rivers.

A road looped around to a parking area near a young children's playground. Beyong the trees, we could see water. So we continued forward.

Nuria on the path ahead of me. >>

The river is easy to see, although in the photo it blends with the sky so you can't tell exactly where the far shore is located. There are some amenities, like places to sit and have shelter from sun or rain, or just rest your legs.

Waterfowl in the river. >>

This is a nice place to sit and think of nothing important.

As evening approached, we walked back to Library Street and around the corner to my old but faithful Jeep and fired it up. We stopped halfway home to buy a couple of What-a-Burgers and fries, and we continued home to consume them. The evening trip was pleasant.

Cosmic Chess

I learned to play chess when I was a young teenager. Every afternoon when I got home from school, a friend would stop by my house and we would play chess.

I mention this daily chess game because I've come to believe that we humans are also involved in a kind of chess game during our lifetimes on earth. Except, we aren't the players. We are the chess pieces. We are the kings and queens and bishops and knights and rooks. And mostly, just as on a chessboard, we are the pawns. 

Our ethereal chessmasters pluck us from our current position and plop us down into another square on the board. It happens all the time. You're in an automobile wreck. Your house catches fire. Your friend gets sick and dies. You win a lottery. You discover your spouse is cheating on you. You're sent to a battle zone. You make a new friend. Your bus rolls over on a curve. You get a deadly cancer. On and on and on. 

We don't control where on the chessboard the cosmic chessmaster places us. All we control is our reaction to our new situation. Is it anger? Is it depression? Is it hopelessness? Is it acceptance? Is it forgiveness?

The more games we play, the better we become at playing this cosmic chess. If you keep your eyes and ears tuned for it, you can pick up clues from others who have gone a little further than you have gone. You may not get answers, but you can get clues—pointers—to where the answers may be found. In the meanwhile, as you search for answers to difficult questions, your best guide might be found in the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

True Life

What if we have it all wrong? We tell ourselves that after our life on earth is finished, our souls go to an "afterlife." Good souls go to a good place called Heaven and bad souls go to a bad place called Hell. All very neat and tidy.

But any thinking person knows it's not neat and tidy. Humans are born into all kinds of circumstances, some good and some bad. We encounter very different experiences. We are born with different temperaments which influence our reactions to the things we experience. Some of us are exposed to temptations that others do not experience. Some die at age one while others die at age one hundred. "Life isn't fair," is a well-known aphorism. Given all those things, how can a just God send each of us to eternal bliss in Heaven or to eternal suffering in Hell? Any thinking person knows that it can't be that simple.

But here is where we might have it wrong: suppose life on earth is the afterlife. This is where our souls come to get an education. Our true home is on the "other side," the place we think of as death. Only, it's not death. It's our true home. We depart from it periodically to come to earth (or some other dimension) in order to get an education. We spend time as mortal beings and we learn important things about ourselves and about others, then we return home. Our bodies die, but we do not die. We live on and on and on. What we call death is the door to true life.

Why do we have to leave Paradise to live on earth? Because we can't learn anything by living in Paradise. We have no wants, no needs. That's why it's called Paradise. In order to grow and develop as spiritual beings, we must leave Paradise periodically and live in a place where existence is not perfect. That is how we learn and grow.

So, we're all attending school here on Earth. We have our challenges, our difficult situations. But we learn and we grow. And we do it again and again until we get it right. We have different challenges because we are learning different lessons, and because some of us are young spirits and some of us are old spirits, and no doubt there are other reasons, too.

Do your best to learn from every lesson. Try to be fair to every person you encounter.. Have compassion for others, even those who don't appear to deserve it. As a wise person said, "Before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes."

Nuria at Work

My lady friend Nuria went to work at Macy's this morning. It was her third day of work after two days of training. Nuria works in the fine jewelry department. And she's gettin' it done! She's making sales, using the computer and all-around knocking it out of the ball park. And today, the General Manager came to see her. He told her, "I wanted to meet you because I've heard good things about you." 

Nuria said, "Really? This is only my third day at work here."

But the GM wanted to meet Nuria because word gets around and she's already impressed people. That does not surprise me. You have to know Nuria to understand why it didn't surprise me. She pays attention and learns quickly. She's a hard worker and a dedicated employee. There are so many people who want a job just so they can earn some money. Nuria is retired and doesn't need money, so she works for the enjoyment of helping others. The money she earns is icing on the cake.

If every employee in America was like Nuria, the US economy would be kicking the world's ass. Pardon my French, but it's true. She's home now and running around the house doing who know's what. She just emptied the trash can beside my desk, so I know she's going to take out the trash.

Tomorrow she has the day off from work, and she's taking a trip with her senior center friends. I have it in my appointment scheduler: James Monroe Highland Tour. 

James Monroe was the fifth president of the United States and the last of the founding fathers. Highland was his home near Charlottesville, Virginia. It was also called Ash Lawn. It's one of those places that history buffs love. Regardless, I'm sure it will be an interesting trip for Nuria and her friends.

But who's going to make my lunch? What's that—you think I'm going to make it. Sure. I feel Whopper Time coming on. Okay, maybe Whopper Junior time. Oh, I know. A quick trip to Walmart to pick up one of their pre-made salads and a bottle of wine. See you on the flip side. (For you young'uns who don't know what the "flip side" is, ask your grandpa.)

Magna Carta

The song of the day is 1969's Airport Song by Englsh progressive folk/rock band Magna Carta. In 2019 the group announced their final concert, after 50 years.

Home Repairs Pt 2

Followup from this morning's post:

The window guy came and gave me an estimate. I wanted to replace 11 windows, including the window that contains the air conditioner, but that was a no-go. Window World can't make a window that will hold the air conditioner, no way no how, as they say. So I ordered 10 windows. Nick the window guy says the air conditioner is too tall to fit a window opening because the lower sash won't open high enough and there's not much that can be done about that, except to buy a new, shorter a/c unit, and the unit I have now is just four years old, so no. Not going to replace it. Still, a lot of cold air can leak through that window, through and around the a/c, and I need to do something about it.

The awnings on the front of the house have to come down, and I'm not going to pay to re-install them onto the house. Anyway, I may not need the awnings. The new windows are double-pane "low-e" windows with argon gas inside them, so they don't transmit much heat through the glass. They should be a lot better at keeping heat inside the house in winter than the old single-pane casement windows.

Total damages so far: $8294 for ten windows. They'll take down the awnings and dispose of them. I'll take down the Venetian blinds and probably won't put them back up. I have curtains on the inside walls and I can close the curtains at night for privacy. The curtains I have now don't close all the way, so I'll have to buy new curtains.

I have a feeling that I'm just getting started on this money-spending adventure. Already this year I've paid for a new sliding patio door ($2430) and a new electric garage door ($1895). This adventure reminds me of that 1986 movie named The Money Pit, with Tom Hanks and Shelly Long. Yes, it was about a home they bought.

I just happened to think: will these improvements make the real estate tax I pay twice a year go up? I mean, will it go up more than it usually goes up when I do nothing to improve the house? That would be just perfect.

Home Repairs

Nuria and I had some excitement in bed last night. No, not that kind of excitement. Get your mind out of the gutter!

Nuria and I were lying in the bed, in complete darkness except for the flickering light from the electric firelogs, when suddenly a noise like the firing of a gun startled us. 

For a few seconds, neither of us moved. Then I got up and walked around the bed to the window. One of the half dozen small panes in the window had a hole about 5 to 6 inches in diameter. It looked (and had sounded like) someone fired a gun through the window.

I knew what had happened. My brick house was built 77 years ago, and during its lifetime the house has settled—just a little, and a little bit unevenly. This has caused enormous stress to build up on the casement windows. The frames are made of steel and will deform a little bit under sufficient stress. However, glass is very inflexible, so when the stress became too great, it shattered. 

There were pieces of broken glass below the broken pane, both inside and outside the window. Nuria and I rushed to cut out a piece of cardboard, wrap it in plastic, and tape it over the broken part of the window. (You can see it in the photo. That pane is one of eight in the window.) The cardboard stopped the gush of cold air pouring into the house. We went back to bed, but I couldn't sleep and finally got out of bed and went to my computer. I looked up the website for Window World and placed a request for an estimate. It's time to get all the downstairs windows replaced.

I followed up my midnight request with an 8AM call to Window World and made an appointment for 3PM today. I have a dental appointment scheduled for this morning so I requested an afternoon appointment with the window guy.

Nuria is at work, but she will get off at 1PM today. She seems to love her job, although being on her feet all day is tiring. She'll be here this afternoon to,  no doubt, ask a few questions of the window salesman. It's going to be a sunny week, with a chance for showers Friday. Replacement windows are usually made to order, so I doubt they can replace the windows this week. 

So far these last few months, I've replaced the big garage door and a patio door on the house. Why not replace all the first floor windows? I have a feeling that I will have to replace all the Venetian blinds, too. I can hardly wait to see what's going to break next.

Paradise

God did not throw humans out of Paradise. Humans threw themselves out of Paradise. How can we return? Ah, but had we the answer, who would listen?

---

This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people..."

Walt Whitman

Moncrieff

The song of the day is 2022's Warm by Irish singer Moncrieff (Chris Breheny).

Stuff

Yesterday, Nuria and I went to the Walmart pharmacy and got our covid and flu shots. The pharmacist shot both of us in the left arm. It didn't hurt, at least not significantly. We got the shots at 11AM. By bedtime, we were both feeling pretty ragged.

I had to get up early today to prepare for a doctor appointment at 8:45AM. I stayed in bed as long as I could, and at 7AM I dragged myself out of bed to take a shower. I was really wobbly. I felt like death warmed over. This is the last time I will get both shots on the same day. Both Nuria and I really felt like crap. 

I need a new headset to use with my PC, so after visiting the Walmart pharmacy to get the shots I went to the electronics section of the store and bought a Bluetooth (cordless) headset. I came home and spent two hours trying to make it work. I had no trouble pairing it wth my PC, and it connected, but it did not show up in the list of audio devices on my PC so I could not get it to work. I took it back to Walmart this morning.

Nuria wants to work and has been accepted to start a job at Macy's on Friday morning. One snag: US Customs and Immigration sent her work permit to her lawyers in Chicago instead of to Nuria in Virginia. All of her other documentation has been sent to Nuria with copies to her lawyers, but somehow the work permit went astray. She called the lawyers and asked them to forward the permit to her by Fedex next day. They said they did, but they were lying. As Nuria discovered, they've only created a label for it. After 24 hours the work permit is still at the law firm. Meanwhile, Nuria was supposed to start work on Friday but she just got a call from Macy's saying that they will expect her to start work on Thursday. As I type this, it is Wednesday. She won't have her work permit on Thursday. She does have a copy of the card, and that may be enough for now. We can only cross our fingers.

Breakfast for me was an Atkins bar. Lunch was two fried eggs and a pork sausage patty. Total calories so far today: 540. I'll have a light dinner. And yet I've ceased losing weight. In fact, I'm gaining back the weight I lost, even though I'm eating a starvation diet. I guess if I quit eating althogether, I would resume my weight loss. But that doesn't feel like a healthy way to go. Dieting sucks.

It's quarter past 3PM. I think the effects of the vaccines will wear off tonight or tomorrow. I hope your day is going better. And get vaccinated.

Calm Down

The song of the day is 2022's Calm Down by Nigerian rapper, singer, and songwriter Rema (Divine Ikubor) featuring American singer and actress Selena Marie Gomez. A behind-the-scenes video can be viewed here.

Rod McKuen

I was looking at Google Maps. I wanted to know the name of the bridge connecting San Francisco with Oakland. I have driven across that bridge in times long past. It's a segment of I-80 now, but it wasn't always. When I drove across it, it was just called the San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge. On the east end of the bridge I-80 connects with I-880, while on the west end of the bridge, I-80 blends into US-101. Halfway across the bay there is an exit from the Bay Bridge down to Treasure Island.

My attention wandered to the north end of San Francisco. That is also the terminus for the southern end of the Golden Gate Bridge. When I traveled that bridge, I paid a toll to use it. I wondered if the toll booths were still there.

Just beyond the north end of the Golden Gate bridge , US-101 skirts past Sausalito. That was the stomping ground of poet Rod McKuen. The critics didn't like his poems, but I and millions of others did. McKuen wrote music, too. "Stanyon Street" was the name of a poem and a song, in addition to being the name of a street in San Francisco. I bought several of his books, though I don't know what became of them. I would never have thrown them away, but life has a way of robbing you of things that you want to keep.

I discovered McKuen through a nurse in a hospital where I was a patient for three weeks. That was in '70 or '71. She loaned me one of her McKuen books, and I liked it enough to buy several of his books. Maybe it was the era, the age, or my own age. Maybe, and I think this is the reality, it was the zeitgeist of the late '60s and early '70s. McKuen tapped into that generational mood.

Rod McKuen died in January, 2015. He was 81.

And the nurse? I dated her a few times, but she was twenty-one and in love with a man of forty-five years. Our dates were fun, at least for me, but I knew there was no future in a relationship with her. So I let her slide into my history, and she lives there along with Rod McKuen's poems and my trips to San Francisco and memories of the Embarcadero and Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf.

Nuria's Job

Nuria, my domestic partner, has been organizing our home, which is a polite way of saying "making my stuff disappear." But that's okay, I like being able to see the top of my desk. She also has put Halloween decorations on the front of our house. She's really "into" these holiday things. And speaking of "holiday things"...

She's also decided that she wants a job, so she applied for employment with the local Macy's store. But I'm starting at the end of the story.

First, Nuria had to get permission to have a job from US Customs and Immigration Service, because her permanent resident card hasn't been issued yet. She applied for permission to work in January, 2023. She received permission from USCIS two weeks ago in late September, 2023.

Nuria wants a temporary job for the holiday season. She does have an impressive resume, and she took three letters of recommendation to her job interview, which impressed the interviewer, who told her no one brings letters of recommendation anymore.

Her resume impressed me, too, and my own resume includes designing missile guidance systems as well as electronics for self-navigating mobile robots.

Here is a portion of Nuria's resume or, as she titled it, her CURRICULUM VITAE (a document that is usually used for applying for positions in academia, but why not call it that?)

STUDIES:

PRIMARY: 6TH GRADE. / 1958-1964

SECONDARY: 11TH GRADE (HIGH SCHOOL CERTIFICATE) /1965-1970

AMERICAN BUSINESS ACADEMY: BILINGUAL SECRETARY/1971-1973

INGLEWOOD ADULT SCHOOL: HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA /1974-1976 ( L. A. , USA)

ADDITIONAL COURSES:

MUTUAL ALAJUELA: HUMAN RELATIONS AND COMMUNICATION/1976

LEOPOLDO BARRIONUEVO: THE SECRETARY AND HER SUPPORT/1989

LEOPOLDO BARRIONUEVO: THE PROFESSIONAL MODERN SECRETARY/1990

INSTITUTO LATINOAMERICANO DE IDIOMAS: GENERAL INTERNET, EXCEL FOR WINDOWS, AMBIENTE WINDOWS, WORD FOR WINDOWS/1996

INSTITUTO UNIVERSAL DE IDIOMAS: DELTA AIRLINES ADVANCED ENGLISH COURSE/2000

GALILEO UNIVERSITY: BASIC GALILEO PROGRAM, FLIGHT RESERVATION FARES/2001

PATRICK HENRY HIGH SCHOOL: ESL CLASS/2002-2003 (ROANOKE, VA, USA)

ROANOKE CITY PUBLIC SCHOOLS: READING AND WRITING ESL COURSES/2003 (ROANOKE, VA, USA) 2002-2003

BB&T UNIVERSITY: CERTIFIED TELLER COURSE/2008

TIME WARNER CABLE: CUSTOMER CARE/2010  

WORK EXPERIENCE:

• I WORKED AS BILINGUAL SECRETARY AT THE JUAN SANTAMARIA AIRPORT FOR ONE YEAR. COSTA RICA
• I WORKED WITH MUTUAL ALAJUELA, FINANCIAL INSTITUTION FOR 25 YEARS AS SECRETARY, CREDIT AGENT, COLLECTION AGENT, MORTGAGE AGENT, TELLER. COSTA RICA
• I WORKED WITH INDUSTRIAS DE CONFECCION POLIANDY, AN APPAREL COMPANY, AS BILINGUAL ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT FOR 5 YEARS. COSTA RICA
• I WORKED WITH TIME’S SQUARE TRAVEL AGENCY AS ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT FOR 2 YEARS. COSTA RICA
• I MOVED TO ROANOKE, VA AND I WORKED CLEANING AND ORGANIZING HOUSES, ALSO HELPING ELDERS WITH DOCTOR APPOINTMENTS, GROCERY SHOPPING AND BABY SITTER. USA
• I WORKED AS SENIOR TELLER AND CLIENT SERVICE WITH BB&T BANK. I WAS ALSO IN CHARGE OF THE CASH VAULT AND BALANCING BRANCH LOG BOOKS FOR 3 YEARS. USA
• I MOVED BACK TO COSTA RICA WHERE I WORKED WITH CONVERGY’S FOR TIME WARNER CABLE FOR ONE YEAR.
• I WORKED FOR FISCHEL A PHARMACY FOR ALMOST 3 YEARS AS CLIENT SERVICE AND SALES.
• I WORKED FOR OPTICAS ALVAREZ, OPTICAL SHOP, SETTING APPOINTMENTS, CUSTOMER SERVICE, SALES, MARKETING, VISITING COMPANIES AND SIGNING CONTRACTS FOR 5 YEARS.

AWARDS:

• LITERACY VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA - ROANOKE VA/VOLUNTEER OF THE YEAR/2003, ROANOKE, VA
• LITERACY VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA - ROANOKE VA/ SARAH RUBUSH AWARD/2004, ROANOKE, VA ENGLISH WRITING AWARD/REFLECTIONS WRITING CONTEST/2003, ROANOKE, VA

Nuria was offered a job at the interview. She starts October 13th.  Macy's pays a starting salary of $16/hour. 

If I decide to get a job, any kind of job, I'm going to let Nuria write my resume.

Lunch at Olive Garden

It is 3:45PM. Nuria and I just returned from a late lunch at Olive Garden. I ate soup and salad. Nuria ate chicken scampi and part of my salad. We both drank tea. The check was $48.24 including gratuity. I remember when you could eat a pretty good dinner for that amount. 

A dollar in year 2000 had the same purchasing power as $1.82 had in August, 2023. To put it another way, your money is worth 55% of what it was worth in January, 2000. I hope you have your money in a high-yield saving account, though the best ones are paying only 5% now (October 2023). That will barely keep up with inflation, although the inflation rate has been coming down in the months since June 2022 when the annual inflation rate peaked at 9.1%. 

But I'm stating what everyone knows and there's nothing to be done about it, so why complain? But it has to be worrisome to retirees who are depending on their savings plus social security to get them through the month. It's a good thing I'm independently wealthy, with millions of dollars in cash and bonds stuffed into my mattress. And Nuria thinks it's just a lumpy mattress that we sleep on.

Correction: Nuria sleeps. I lie in bed awake until I get up and watch some YouTube. Last night I went to bed at 10PM, and I got up at midnight and went to my PC and watched YouTube videos until 2AM, then I returned to bed. I was wide awake so I got back up and returned to bed at 4AM. At that point I was tired enough to finally drift off to sleep. My circadian rhythm is screwed up. I can sleep, just not at night.

If lunch at Olive Garden sounds good, here's what I ate: Soup, Salad, and Breadsticks. The soup was Pasta e Fagioli (there are four kinds of soup you can order) and the salad was the house salad. It is served with garlic breadsticks. All of it was quite delicious! Soup and Salad and Breadsticks is a lunch item and is served until 3PM.

I thought the ice tea was overly strong which gave it a slightly bitter flavor, but the small amount of ice in the glass soon melted and diluted the tea enough to make it okay. It was just tea sweetened with Sweet 'n' Low, so one can say only so much about it.

Nuria's entree was Chicken Scampi. She ate some of my salad which made her full before she had eaten all of her entree. So we brought home the leftover salad and chicken scampi. We'll have those leftovers for dinner tonight. Nuria said there will be enough leftovers for both of us. I asked her, "Uh, have you seen the size of my stomach lately?" There may be enough leftover food for her, but I have my doubts that the leftovers will satisfy both of us.

If I'm writing about my lunch, you know I have nothing to write about. But if I have to write about nothing, at least I try my best to make the "nothing" sound interesting. And with photos.

Trace Adkins

The song of the day is The Wayfaring Stranger performed by country music singer and actor Trace Adkins. The well-known American folk and gospel song likely originated in the early 19th century and has been recorded by many artists.

Woodpecker

This is a reminder of how dangerous electricity can be. Don't be like this woodpecker. And no, I don't know if this video has been edited for effects.

Modern Speech

How times have changed.

There is a hospital in my area called Central State Hospital. It is a hospital for people who are ... how shall I put this? ... not quite right in the head. But in 1870 when the hospital opened, it was not called Central State Hospital. It was called the Central Lunatic Asylum. And no one had a problem with that name.

"Hey Joe, what are you doing today?"

"I'm going to visit my father. He's in the lunatic asylum."

"Oh, I didn't know that your dad is insane."

"He's not insane! He's merely a lunatic."

I'd better stop now before I offend more people than I already have. But I do approve of not calling people lunatics. It just doesn't sound like a medical diagnosis. It sounds more like an angry insult. 

"You're a lunatic!"

"Oh yeah? Well, you're a crazy person!"

Yes, times have changed. This whole asylum/hospital issue reminds me of the days when people of sub-Saharan ancestry were called Negroes instead of the more modern "melatonin-enhanced humanoids."

Oh, did I say "sub-Saharan?" I meant to say African Transition Zone. "Sub-Saharan" sounds so racist. Don't you think?

Digital Signatures

Do you remember the talented and prolific singer Prince? Sure you do. In the '90s (1993, I think) Prince changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol. This was his name:

Many people probably remember that name change. But not many people know that this writer also changed his name.

When I read what Prince had done, I decided to change my name into an unpronounceable symbol. If Prince can do it, why not me?

This is the symbol I created:

(The difficult-to-read text below the symbol says, "The engineer formerly known as Wayne.")

Prince's symbol is a mashup of the gender symbols for man and woman. My symbol is a mashup, too, but of what, I've long forgotten. The symbol is still on my PC. I think it was created at about the same time Prince created his. I've been through several PCs since then, yet I still have the symbol on my hard drive. Even more amazing, I was able to locate it.

My mashup symbol was brought to mind by an experience I had today while trying to e-sign a document. To be technical, there are electronic signatures and there are digital signatures. Electronic signatures are simpler and less secure. Your digital signature doesn't have to look like a handwritten signature. It embeds information into your document that proves your document could only have been created by you. If you do a Google search for "digital signature" you'll find that a lot of companies are offering the ability to e-sign documents.

I guess there's a need for that kind of thing. But I've lived a long, long time without needing it.

The Screen Door Confusion

My house had an old, metal sliding patio door (and a sliding screen door) on the back of the house. The door was old and I had to replace it. I bought a new patio door from Home Depot.

The installers came out to replace the old patio door, and they did. But the new screen door had two holes in it—two punctures. They installed it as a temporary door but they said they'd return and replace it.

They didn't return.

I called Home Depot and I was told they would order a new door for me. Time passed and one day Home Depot called and said that they could not order a warranty replacement. They said I had to do that, and that I had to do it right away because there was only one and a half days left in the warranty. I went online with the door manufacturer (Jeld-Wen) and filled out a form to get a replacement.

Home Depot called me a week later and told me Jeld-Wen had declined to replace the door, but they (Home Depot) had another door and they would bring it to my house and install it.

They brought the door but it was too tall and didn't fit the opening, so they left. They took both the original door and the replacement door when they left.

They repaired the screen on the original door and brought it back, but they couldn't install it because of a bad roller on the door. The roller would not retract into the door as it was supposed to do. The installer left and took the door with him.

The installer returned a day or two later with the original door—the one that had been re-screened. This time, he was able to get it installed. That was on September 3.

On September 19, I received a call from Jeld-Wen, the door manufacturer. I was told that the replacement door would arrive the next day. I told the person on the phone that I no longer needed the replacement door because the original door had been repaired and installed. The caller thanked me and said that the order for the replacement door would be canceled.

On September 20, the replacement door was delivered to my house.

So now I have two screen doors. One is installed and the other is wrapped in cardboard. What should I do? 

Should I call Jeld-Wen? Should I call Home Depot? I recalled the old adage, "Let sleeping dogs lie." I've been on this merry-go-round one too many times. I'll put the replacement door in my garage. If Home Depot or Jeld-Wen can figure this out, they're welcome to come to my house and get the door.

Meanwhile, I'll hang onto that replacement door because I have a feeling that the flimsy screen door they installed is just not going to last all that long. Of course, if I have a backup screen door, the screen door they installed will probably last forever. 

Because, as we all know, that is how reality works.

Little Light On My Mantel

<< This is my front yard at night. And this isn't all. If you stood in the street and faced my house, there would be several more glowing orbs along the front of the house. 

This is Nuria's doing. She bought the lights and stuck them in the ground. The sun charges them during the day and then they shine all night. 

The photo doesn't do them justice. They look much prettier and more eye-catching when you see them in person. They glow with an intensity and crispness that doesn't come across in a photo. 

I was using my string trimmer tool near the lights and I accidentally destroyed one of them. So I picked up the little solar-light thingy and put it in my pocket. Then I went to the garage and looked for a glass. I found a yellow-colored glass with white lines painted on the outside. Perfect.

I put the solar-light thingy on my front porch and let it sit for a few hours in sunlight. When I brought it into the house, the slightly yellowish LED turned on, powered by the solar-charged battery inside the doodad. I put it into the yellow glass and put the now-glowing glass on the fireplace mantel. It glowed for hours. It looks like this at night.

It's really difficult to see what the glass looks like in the photo, so I took a flash picture of it (below). You can still see the glowing doodad inside of the glass, but now you can see the design on the glass, which I think looks kinda pretty. 

I don't think Nuria has much use for it, but I like it, so it sits on my mantel, glowing its little heart out every night. It's like a nightlight. When your eyes are dark-adapted, you can see fairly well by it's little light. 

So the heart of the small plastic flower lives on, resting on my fireplace mantel and casting its light into the darkness every night. Gosh, it's almost poetic.