Mwahahahaha!

Hey, 40% evil isn’t that bad.  I just need to tighten a few things up so that I can get a majority of evil here at Casa de Oso!

H/T to Borepatch and Pissed!

I’ve been slowly progressing in coming back from surgery, but I’m still taking liquid opiates to control the pain.  A little less each day, but it’s enough to make me a little foggy at times, and naps are my friends.

I had planned on taking this time when I’m home alone for a few days to catch up on all of the non-family, non-Irish Woman movies and TV that I’ve been putting off.  I’ve tried re-watching Firefly, BattleStar Galactica, Star Trek, and a few movies on Netflix.

But I just can’t keep my mind on anything with a plot.  I start to drift just as things get interesting, even during a 40 minute Firefly episode.  Very frustrating when you come back to reality and find that you’ve missed the climax of an episode, especially when you do it more than once.

So I’ve been watching Futurama, Bugs Bunny, and a few other things.  Guess I’ll just have to wait a little while longer before I go on that non-stop BSG marathon so that I can finally figure out just what the heck that show was about.

Sigh.

While hanging out with the good people of the GunBlogger Conspiracy today, Dixie mentioned that she was getting a new puppy today.  I mentioned that I had shown BooBoo Marko’s pictures of his new puppies, and that he is now pestering me to get him that puppy.  Not a dog, but that exact puppy.  The boy loves hotdogs, and I told him it was a weiner dog, so in his mind, it’s a puppy made of hotdogs and that’s gotta be awesome.

During our discussion, we started talking about names for dachshunds, and Dixie wins the Internetz for her idea:

dixie: I have the perfect name
dixie: Boo’s Kloos
SCI-FI: …
Vic_Tokyo: HAHAHAHAHAHHAHA
DaddyBear: yeah, not gonna happen dixie
SCI-FI : I liked Kaiser
DaddyBear: but that is genius

Unfortunately, as much as we like to indulge Boo, I don’t think we’ll be driving to New England for a dog anytime soon.  But that would be the perfect name.

Chase Bank is really having a bad week.


First, they had one of their customers arrested after he tried to cash a check that Chase sent him because they thought it was fake.  Through a comedy of incompetence, Chase kept both the check and the money that backs it, the man lost his car after it was impounded and auctioned, and subsequently he lost his job.  He’s of course gotten himself a lawyer, and I hope that the next few Chase branches that are opened are named “Ikenna Njoku’s Big Building With Money”.


Next, Chase somehow decided that one of their customers in Florida had died, sent a condolence letter to her family, and reported her passing on to the credit bureaus.  Even after the lady reported the error to Chase, her credit report still says she’s dead, which is apparently causing issues.  Again, she’s lawyered up, and I hope she’s successful enough that the headquarters of Chase is renamed to “Wrenella Pierre Memorial Bank and Trust”.


If I were Chase, I’d shut down all of the offices for a day or two, get everyone together, and remind them of Rule Number One:  “Don’t Be F…ing Stupid!”.  When a customer comes to you with a check from your own bloody bank, you cash it.  Maybe you make them put the money into an account if it’s large and you want to be sure it’s not a fake, but you accept your own bloody check.  Next, you don’t unilaterally declare your customers dead.  When you think that one of your precious customers has passed away, you inquire with the family, then have them do the paperwork and such to take care of accounts.  And when you do screw up and mark one of your customers as deceased and they call you on it, you don’t go home until everyone you’ve told about this has been told about the new information and corrects their records.


Come on guys, we gave you billions of dollars to keep the doors open.  You could at least try to act like a responsible adult.

Just read Marko’s post about Jay’s post about Weerd’s post about Sean’s post about a man who was shot by muggers after he had given up his wallet.  Weerd, Jay, and Marko all discuss whether or not it is morally right to use lethal force in order to protect property.  I thought I’d ring in with my two cents.

Irish Woman and I came into the adult world with literally the clothes on our backs.  Everything we have, with the exception of a very small number of things she’s gathered that belonged to her parents, we have earned the money for and bought ourselves.  There is nothing in our home that I can look at and not think of what I had to do in order to earn it.   While I’m not emotionally attached to much of it, if someone was to take it from us, it would require further toil to replace it.  Yes, like most Americans, we have a lot of luxury goods, but we also have a lot of things that we need in order to get through every day.  All of these things are subject to theft, and thieves are subject to how I feel about protecting our property.

Add to that the propensity that I’ve started to notice among thieves to not leave witnesses behind, and you should start to understand my attitude.  I cannot with 100% certainty say how I will handle a thief who just wants to grab the TV and run, but I can’t say that I wouldn’t use a gun to stop him.  All bets are off if I feel that the thief, in addition to taking or destroying property, is presenting a threat to one of us, and that’s going to be a reptilian brain instinctual, irrational decision.  Not a lot of space there for the “Well, he looks like he’s just grabbing the laptop/wallet/TV.  Guess I’ll just call the police.” kind of decision making.  My only word of advice there is this:  Don’t startle a man with a family to protect.  He might mistake your intentions and make your mama sad.

I once heard someone say that if a stereo isn’t worth killing for, then it shouldn’t be worth risking dying for.  Maybe instead of billboards along I-65 for gun turn-ins and mentoring volunteers, some of the organizations that do outreach to ‘at-risk youths’ should remind them of that.

I’m home.  Not feeling too bad.  Had to spend an extra night in the hospital for pain management, but that’s under control.

It’s been 25 years this month since I last saw you.  You and my mother had been apart for three years, and that was the first time you spent any time with us.  My brothers and sisters and I spent a weekend at Grandma’s, and you came over for one afternoon.  You gave us some money and sent us to the arcade so you could visit with your mother.  Since then there hasn’t been a peep.

In all that time, I’ve grown up, had children, travelled the world, and become a better man than you could ever hope to be.  My children never wonder if they’re loved, and they never feel forgotten or unwanted.  They have never had to worry about where they will sleep, or where the next meal will come from.  They have never had to line up for a spanking when I come home from work, and they have never heard “I know you did something to deserve this.” come from my lips.  Even though I was a complete moron when it came to marriage as a young man, I never took it out on them.  They always knew that they came first in all things.

My children know you exist, but will never meet you.  You will never be Grandpa to them.  Other, better men have lined up to do that.  You will never take them fishing or hunting.  They will never wake up in your home for Christmas.  You have become and will forever remain just a name on our family tree.

So I hope you enjoy your birthday next month, father.  I also hope you have many more without me and my children.

The Family, 1977

I’m alive. Lots of good meds and great staff to keep me comfortable.

– Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Fox News is reporting on a little piece of technology that is aiding a small police force in Mississippi:  clip-on video cameras.  Basically, a police officer activates the camera when he is interacting with the public, and it documents both his actions and the actions of those he is speaking with from very close to his perspective.

For police, this gives evidence of anything a suspect does or says during such things as traffic stops, serving warrants, or arrests.  It also protects them against false charges of being unprofessional and abusive.  This would be especially useful when used in conjunction with dashcams, and provides a record when the officer is away from his cruiser.

For those who interact with the police, it gives them a recording of those interactions.  If a policeman is out of line, his own recording will hang him.

The current technology has a removable memory chip that is used to store any video taken.  My guess is that an officer activates it when he or she is doing something with the public, and turns in the memory chip at the end of their shift.  I would improve on this in two ways.  First, the camera should be on for the duration of the officer being on duty, with no way for the officer to turn it off without physically destroying it.  The camera should have enough battery and memory capacity for 24 hours without recharging or emptying the storage chip.  Second, the camera should use mobile broadband to stream the audio and a lower resolution version of the video to a central location in addition to using local storage.  This will take care of situations where there are technical issues with the memory chip, as has been seen with dashcams where the tapes stop working just in time to record a traffic stop where the police are accused of abuse.

I could see this being used not only by beat cops, but by all government officials that are in positions where a record of all of their actions would come in handy, including military personnel walking patrols, prison guards, and TSA agents.  If a TSA blue-glove knows that he, along with all of his co-workers, is recording the pat down of a 95 year old grandmother, with no way for him to tamper with it, maybe a little more professionalism and common sense will start to sprout.

Well, it’s only taken 34 years since the first time a doctor said they should come out, but I’m finally having my tonsils removed.  By the time you read this, I’ll be under the knife.

I’m not going to be posting for a couple of days, but I’ll be back.  Some of my first posts after surgery may be a little…. muddled.  Hey, my doctor promises to keep me ‘comfortable’ for the first week or two after I come home.  If I piss anyone off, just drop me a note and I’ll do an edit/delete once I’m back in my right mind.

Or maybe I’ll take the best of these, publish them, and be the next Hunter S. Thompson.  Man made an entire career writing about what happens when you’re stoned.

Anyway, I’ll see you guys in a couple of days.