Category: The Voices in My Head

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Lotsa FUD* Goin’ On. . .

*Fear, Uncertainly, and Doubt

With the national election only days away, the FUD is strong in the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind, social media, and just out and about “on the street.” I see/hear talk about nuclear war with Russia, a “feddle gummint” crackdown on dissenters–including fear that “they” will be “shooting us down in the street,” and so on.

Well, I’m glad to live where I do. Yeh, there’s some of that FUD floating around here in America’s Third World County™, but while “they” can try “shooting us down in the street,” it wouldn’t fly here, where firearms outnumber citizens by at least six to one, retired military are in very high ratio to the rest of the county population, we have very nearly Afganistan-like terrain (with even better cover most of the year, nearly as many cave systems/square mile, many of which are on no one’s maps or records–because PRIVATE, and excellent backwoods trails and waterways for transport), and the local National Guard unit would _definitely_ be on the side of the citizens. Heck, my neighbors and I could probably outgun the local LEOs, not that we’d need to if a “feddle gummint they” started trying to push in. Again: would side with citizens, like the local NatGuard unit.

“Red Dawn” was bush league by comparison to Third World County™ standards.

And then there’s the prevalent attitude: “Let them come.”

BTW, the county was almost precisely balanced between Repugnicant stalwarts and Ron Paulistas in the last prexy election, with nearly as many Paulista write-ins as votes for Romney. Neither Dhimmicrp vote counted for much at all.)

Oh, where is “America’s Third World County™”? Nowhere near my IP address. . . 🙂

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A Note About Book Blurbs

If you read a book blurb that includes comments like,

“absolutely suspenseful” and “an ending you’ll never see coming!”

. . . just know that the normative translation into words reflecting reality for those phrases is “utterly boring” and “entirely predictable.”

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A Musing: Driving

I’ve observed changes* in my driving over the past couple of decades–maybe “few” would be more like–mostly for the better.

For one thing, I’m more conservative in my driving now than in previous decades. Part of that–a large part–is due to conscious changes to my habitual driving behaviors. For example, while I never had my first car (1953 Chevy Bel Air, 6 cylinder, 3 on the column manual transmission) above 110 mph (to my knowledge; the speedometer pegged at 110 😉 ), I did, of olden days *heh*, regularly and habitually travel at whatever speeds I thought I could handle in whatever vehicle I was driving. . . without getting caught. Yeh, I did get a speeding ticket one time, but that’s a long story.

Now, I habitually travel at posted speeds, only exceeding the speed limits for passing, or when keeping to the posted speed would seriously impede traffic, or a few times when I zone out, as it were, and do not maintain conscious control of my lead foot.

And “more conservative”? Yeh, I just noticed this morning that a turn-off on a 55 mph-posted highway that has a 25 mph posted “recommended speed” cautionary sign that I used to take at the posted 55, I now, apparently, have a “new normal” 45 mph turn-off speed. *shrugs* That one seems to have happened all on its own.

Or perhaps it was just an effect of a coffee deficiency. *shrugs* It felt “right” though.

Some old patterns remain, of course, and some older things I was taught when I first started driving are reasserting themselves, or I have decided they are worthwhile patterns to re-engage. For example, I do still have problems with some slowly-moving roadblocks. Oh, I don’t so much mind slowing down for horse-drawn carriages or farm or road maintenance equipment that are occasional “slowly-moving roadblocks,” and especially the school buses on two lane roads and highways here in America’s Third World County™, but folks who cannot even manage a double nickel on roads that were originally designed and built for faster travel, simply because “Hills! Curves! Scary!” or other mental handicaps really irk me.

And it does take some serious self-control, still, to not answer some asshat’s high beams with the same.

But overall, less agressive driving is my new norm. The old “one car length for every 10 mph when following another car” does make passing “slow-moving roadblocks” a bit more challenging when on two-lane highways, but it’s my renewed norm, and, in fact, on some roads here in America’s Third World County™ where I know I can expect some “slowly-moving roadblocks,” I tend to drive even more conservatively than my ancient “Driver’s Ed” instructions dictated.

But more gripes still abound. The aforementioned “slowly-moving roadblocks,” folks who think the ONLY setting for their headlights is high beam, wanderers (“Hey, doofus! Find your lane and stay in it! That double yellow line before that blind hill/corner is there for a reason. I don’t want to have to avoid your head-on collision with someone in oncoming traffic!” *sigh*), people performing a “GHETTO STOP” on two lane highways (in 55 or 60 mph posted speeds) having conversations between their cars blocking the highway, etc., have convinced me that Lovely Daughter’s dream of taking the cars away from 80% of the drivers on the road is a worthy dream. *heh*

Other things: I used to find cruise control to be useful. No longer, not even on Interstate highway driving. I find it a barrier between me and the road. I want to have to think about what I’m doing a bit more than just pointing the car in this direction or that.

All our current vehicles have automatic transmissions. I really miss manual transmission driving. The engagement factor, again. I may address that lack sometime in the coming year. . . or not. Something to think about.

I simply cannot understand folks who apparently drive no further ahead of themselves than their noses. IMO, folks who do not “drive” at least a quarter mile ahead of their own position (while maintaining observation to everything between their position and the distance they drive ahead) should have automatic “dope slap” mechanisms installed in their head rests. Really. Continue reading “A Musing: Driving”

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Power and Corruption

A small war of words between Lord Acton and Frank Herbert:

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.” ~Sir John Dalberg-Acton

“All governments suffer a recurring problem: it is not that power corrupts, but that it is magnetic to the corruptible.” ~ Frank Herbert, Dune.

My own take, in brief:

Actually, it is both. Most folks can be corrupted by the ability to exercise power over others. For some, it is after the fact: they seek power because they are corrupt; for others it is a very small step; for still others it is a process that proceeds at snail’s pace, so that the longer they exercise power–even intending that exercise to be for the good of their charges–the more corrupt they become.

A minor example of this is parenthood. A parent exercises just power in raising their children within sensible boundaries so that they can lead (generally) happy, productive, and safe lives (within whatever areas are under their control). That authority/power should phase out as the children achieve maturity. It is when children either eschew the responsibilities of maturity and continue to rely on their parents for support or when parents continue to exert controlling “influence” over their grown children that the process–and the individuals involved–either become corrupt or reveal their corrupt nature.

And so with government: exercising controlling power over a supposedly free people is corrupt and illegitimate. Those who want to be a part of that control are corrupt to begin with. Those who become a part of that process with the goal of ameliorating the effects of such illegitimate power inevitably either become corrupt themselves or are purged by the system.

(Long version: The Revolt of the Masses (Ortega) and Suicide of the West (Burnham), et al)

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“Based on a True Story”

Whenever I see “based on a true story” hitched to any sort of media presentation, I understand that the “based” part simply means, “Something happened. One or more elements of what happened may appear in the following presentation. . . or may not.”

Of course, this makes such media presentations “truer” than a typical “news” story, so there’s that. . .

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From News of the “You’re Kidding Me, Right?” File

Looks like someone is trying to hold a “Baptist healing service”. . .

One of the most amusing things I’ve seen recently in a product description was for a $300 buffalo-hide “fleece-lined duffle bag.” Supposedly, “New Zealand lambs’ fleece lining will help keep breakables safe when traveling.” Yeh, pull the other one. One would need an adamantium case lined with several inches of viscoelastic foam to even come close to keeping breakables safe from baggage handlers, let alone TSA goons.

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Ah! Those Dumb, Cheesy 80s Shows. . .

Sadly, even the naive cheesiness of most 80s TV shows is revealed today as simple “dumbitudinousness.”

McGyvver’s ingenious “inventions” are just as unworkable and stupid today as they were then. For me, McGyver was always moderately enjoyable as an exercise of my “suspension of disbelief muscle.” Things really, really do NOT work “that” way (whatever way most of his improvisational devices were supposed to work). . . *heh*

Star Trek TNG is still as dumb as it was then, though it lacks even the appeal of any serious cheesiness.

Etc.

The one 80s show that holds up even today is The Greatest American Hero. It’s just as dumb and cheesy today as it was then. Culp at least gave it a wee bit of (cheesy, of course) campiness. Oh, and it did have the picturesque (though lackluster acting of) Connie Selleca. There’s that. G-rated pinup girl for The Greatest American Hero.

But. . . there’s not much else that I find appealing about 80s shows today. In that, they share my evaluation of almost all contemporary TV shows: Stupid, without even the appeal of mockable cheesiness.

Too bad the Rockford Files stopped in 1980. If it had not, I’d have an 80s show to watch for something other than mockable stupidity or cheesiness.

Maybe I should only watch movies on our TV. Oh, wait. Stupid movies, too.

Oh, well. Perhaps I’m not meant to own a TV? No, wait. There are still good movies to watch, just not many made nowadays. Some Bruce Campbell “B” (or “C”) movies for camp. Archived copies of “Matilda,” “Johnny English,” etc. IOW, real classics. *heh*

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What?!? When Does THAT Happen?

Feeling a wee bit ambivalent. Disconcerted but thankful. Ins paid a larger percentage of ER bill for my Wonder Woman’s broken arm) than it promised to pay (on policy). How often does that happen?

(*scratches head and says to self* Don’t rock the boat, bubba.)

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Talking to the Dead

I have fun reading book blurbs of books I’ll never read. Take a recent blurb about a “cozy paranormal mystery” featuring two young women, “One a baker, the other a mortician’s assistant, and both blessed (or cursed) with the gift of talking to the dead. . . ”

OK, even leaving aside the stupidity of the supposed “gift/curse,” methinks the blurb writer should go back to Remedial Blurb Writing 101. ANYONE can talk TO the dead, or pretend to (or delude themselves into thinking they are). I’d not expect any real two way conversations, but imagining one is talking TO dead people is something many folks do. Not me, but others seem to do so.

But, if I were dead and just hanging around (although I rank that as happening somewhere around the Twelfth of Never), I wouldn’t stand for being talked to by some flesh puppet. Nope. Wanna talk to me? Buh-bye!

More seriously, what’s the appeal of necromancy, eh? I mean, #gagamaggot.

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Warning Shots

Always fire a warning shot. There are two main camps on the subject of warning shots: in the air and into the ground. I demur. The best warning shot is center of mass. It conserves ammo and definitely gets the message across with little chance of misunderstanding. (Center of mass warning shots also minimize collateral damage.)

One should always continue offering proper warning shots until an aggressor’s off switch is fully engaged, although, if the aggressor’s off switch is not located near his center of mass, a polite tap-to-the-head warning shot might be required. Oh, be ultra polite and make it two.