raywalden.bsky.social

A fundamental design flaw in hospital monitors is that they beep in the room. Why? Patient can't sleep. Nurse doesn't react until patient calls desk. Just silence it in room and react to beeping at desk as appropriate. I'm on my second night of no sleep. Med peeps, please justify.

Spotted Friday night at a popular date spot on a date with an immacuately coiffed young lady. Yes, those are Garfield jammies.

Ironic that Klobuchar made an incorrect assumption about Schmitt's assumption. Per his confession in the hallway after, he assumed the basketball game reflected in emails was a pro game and deduced it to be the Hawks game. So he never had a team name to confuse. Lesson: verify facts before deducing.

The best literary parallel to Rump is the Mule character in Asimov's Foundation series. He is a mutant with the ability to control the others' emotions and turn enemies into followers. Interested only in pillage and destruction, he causes society to worsen, but people understand that only too late.

I just pushed back on a push poll. Seemed like an actual poll, but then questions started suggesting that electing the candidate I favor will lead to the downfall of civilization. Okay, so that's already well along the way, but the questions wouldn't let me properly assign blame. Hung up in middle.

Being an old-time sci-fi fan rather than a real-life techie, I wonder why the AI engineers can't program in Asimov's 3 laws of robotics. Instead they seem to assume we're stuck with Terminator rules.

I asked granddaughter in first year of college what her plan is for voting. She's registered at her parent's house but lives on campus in the next state. She said she and friends are driving in election day specifically to vote. Yay! I was all prepared to advise about voting options, but no need.

Update on Fox's demise. Our cams show 2 dogs chasing him off the porch, then trotting around the back from the side where I found him the next day. Also shows me asking him a few minutes earlier to come in because of the rain. My crying jags stopped after 2. Can't stop thinking about him.

After posting about the driver who cursed me for trying to courteously yield to him rather than use my right of way. I realized I got the curse wrong. Instead of calling me a "fuckhead," he called me "dumb fuck." No idea whether he knows it is spelled with a "b."

This turned out to be Fox's last pose. He went out last night and didn't show for breakfast. A neighbor spotted his body in our yard today. Best guess is a hawk got him. I'm taking him to the vet tomorrow to get a better sense of cause of death. For now, just sad.

Fox posing for his fans.

As I road trip through Tim Dorsey books I bought from various online sources, I came across one signed by the author. Woohoo!

I really wasn't inspired by the Xmas display already at Costco for weeks, but I've started a Xmas book--When Elves Attack, by Tim Dorsey--only because I am reading him in order and this is the next up. This is the 14th of 26. Enjoying every page of every book.

Call me old school, call me conservative, but what's wrong with the traditional system of putting something in a mailbox and the post office delivering it to the address shown, without federal bureaucrats telling the post office what gets delivered and what doesn't? Love letters, ballots, whatever.

Rosie O'Donnell's monologues about her family made me miss, again, Craig Ferguson, who wasn't afraid to go deep and go personal, and dark, and still find something funny.

Note to self: Fan fic idea, as spinoff from when I thought the neighbor killed our cat (but kinda don't think so now): In style of Tim Dorsey, what would Serge do? No, actually, that's obvious. Real question: How would Serge do it? Has to be appropriate to the offense. Involving a cougar?

Has his Orangeness explained why Democrats want to turn the US into "a hellhole of crime and filth," considering that we live here without walled estates and personal security? Oligarchs have those protections and announce they want to destroy democracy so they can rule through corporate fiefdoms.

I retract my last post conclusing my neighbor murdered our cat, based on his refusal to say whether he put down poison, etc. When I emailed the Humane Society to describe the facts and ask for advice, it gave it to him. He then said he put down repellant only. I choose to accept that. Still no cat.

RIP Stripes, presumably. We haven't seen him since our trip 2 weeks ago. The new neighbor complained last week about cats in his yard and said he put something in his yard. I asked today and he refuses to answer. Poison or repellent? "Don't have to tell you nothing bout no cats." So murder.

Spotted today at art studio open house.

Got the whole set now. Here they are on the shelf I cleared at my office (except the one I'm currently reading).

Revved after delivery of all but 4 of the Tim Dorsey books, with rest ordered and on the way. I am reading (and rereading several) in sequence. Advantage of lousy memory is all are fresh, with a few memorable scenes I recall.

This is Tood, name inspired by the DOJ typo on its leader's name, just before dashing off when I open the door to feed it and others on the porch.

I named one of the community cats "Tood," inspired by the DOJ typo in Blanche's name, but appropriate because said cat shows an attitude by keeping its distance.

Highlight of trip to Tacoma to visit family was ditching them, finding coffepot-shaped Bob's Java Jive with ceiling covered by dollar bills, having a Mai Tai made by very pregnant tatooed bartender, and singing Like A Rolling Stone on stage Nirvana played.

In reading Tim Dorsey novels from the first, I've come across 3 uses of "86" to mean ejecting from a bar or restaurant, all in books published in the early and mid 2000s. The ejected characters all walked away to engage in further plot twists. Somebody alert Comey's defense team.

Been marching in order through Tim Dorsey's Serge Storms books, though I've read several before. A fabulous journey, but the problem is finding cheap enough used copies without punishing shipping costs. Libby and Spotify audiobooks have only a few.

Serious question re transgender athletics: If sports are segregated because of natural average differences in athletic abilities relevant to the specific sport, what about being transgender calls for crossing over the gender barrier to participate? Looking for nuanced, science-based answers.

With the unitary executive principle now in place, does this mean Civil Service protections are now essentially vaporous? The only real protections are to oust all Republicans in this and the next election, replace them with Democrats sincere about independent agencies, and add to the Supreme Court

Waiting for the federal grand jury to indict me along with everybody else with a Bluesky account for conspiracy to assassinate the bloated orange gasbag because someone posted something wishing him harm.

Trump took the advice of the radical left in the 60s and early 70s: Declare victory in the war and get out.

Seems like a perfect opportunity for his flock to ignore the lame duck's quacking and swim off their own ways.

At least Nero was awake enough to fiddle.

Various ways to investigate the Good shooting: -- Minnesota indicts Ross based on abundant video and extradites, with subpoenas to feds to get the squelched evidence. -- Good's widow brings a wrongful death suit against Ross and his employer (based on pattern and practice) to get discovery.

A good start on the new year.

I am calling for all of the Epstein files to be released immediately without redaction to prove I am not implicated. I also demand that one of the new battleships be named for me. If a multi-draft dodger gets the whole class named after him, a non-veteran with a high draft number gets a boat.

So, DOJ released incomplete, unsearchable, and almost entirely redacted shit. Of course, they did. Who is going to enforce anything against them? They see us as Piggy's dick shape and feed us shit and keep us in the dark.

So, they'll release all the files in 2 weeks, eh? Code for never.

I don't know why I see what I see on by Bluesky feed. Do my choices create a left-leaning array? Are there others whose choices bring them mostly right-leaning posts? Or can you consistently post and like hard right and still get mostly leftish stuff displayed for you? How is Bluesky structured?

To elaborate on a comment I made that "Teapot Done was a drop in the kettle by comparison with the current corruption," the dismaying difference is that Teapot Dome was treated as a huge scandal when dug out, while Piggy's many open and obvious grifts are just shrugged off as expected of him.

An ever hopeful Bird starting to realize the neglectful humans still haven't refilled the feeder.

After listening to a public radio bit with people saying what effects would be of no more internet, I saw this in my office's copy room. We're ready.

I checked out a CD audiobook of a Carl Hiaason book, thought about where my portable CD player might be (and whether the batteries are corroded), and went to Best Buy. "I might be from the wrong century," I began, and asked if they have them. Maybe online, the clerk said. Yep, wrong century.

With hope of getting back in shape, I bought an electric bike to assist my peddling up the considerable hills on the way to work. Went great for a week, then rain, then the time change. Now the ride home would be mostly in the dark, and these old eyes may not see the potholes and cracks. Next year!

When I checked after midnight and saw a tie in inning 15, I thought maybe I need to pick a fave (the Cubs being out). How? Go with Canada because Trump is shitty to them? Or go with LA, because Trump actually is occupying it with troops. Boots on the ground point the way: Go Dodgers!

Another way to look at the frog resistance in Portland is that the aspiring monarchy is using the slow-boil approach to lull us into staying in the pot while they turn up the flames of fascism. Confronting the stormtroopers as inflated frogs is saying, "We won't be boiled!"

Prediction for the next 13 months: ICE and military will ramp up vastly in blue areas, to the point that it will seem normal. Then during early voting and election day, both will be heavily present near polling places in blue areas to sweep up or scare away anyone who looks like a Democratic voter.

Military officers told to lead troops in a war inside the US against the "enemy within" (i.e., people who disagree with Trump) must either violate their oaths and obey him or obey their oaths and resign, which diminishes the military's ability to fight foreign enemies. We lose either way.