Giovanni's

Tundra Repair

My gang gets together for lunch every Tuesday. Today we were going to Giovanni's but IAman makes an excuse for not coming:

I’m busy with Tundra coils-over-shocks.  Can’t do lunch today.

You all are welcome to come over and commiserate with me. 

Again it was easy, except for the one inaccessible nut, that finally gave into a nut splitter.

Motorcycle

How many downshifts?
Lukas Höllbacher #72

Tamara de Lempicka

Young Woman in Green (1927–30) - Tamara de Lempicka

Variety reviews a Broadway musical about Tamara de Lempicka, a Art-Deco painter from Poland. Never heard of her, so I look her up and this image is the first one that pops up. Kind of reminds of old heroic, communist paintings, but that may just be due to the prevailing style of the time.

Fight

From ZeroHedge:

Renato Moicano and Joe Rogan

"Read Ludwig von Mises, Motherf**kers!" - Brazilian UFC Fighter's Victory Speech Pumps Austrian Economics by Tyler Durden

While the Middle East wobbled on the precipice of World War III on Saturday, a Brazilian UFC fighter gave us hope by using his victory speech to deliver an emphatic endorsement of Austrian economics, Ludwig von Mises, the First Amendment and gun rights. 

Renato Moicano's televised speech came after he pulled off a comeback win over Jalin Turner at Las Vegas. Joe Rogan joined him in the ring to discuss the fight, but Moicano had other priorities, and proceeded to drop a profanity-peppered liberty bomb on the T-Mobile Arena crowd and a worldwide audience:  

“I’m a huge advocate of the First Amendment. Today, of course I want the $300k bonus but they not going to give [it to me] because somebody say, 'hey, this is fucking Disney, you cannot curse'…so I’m not going to do my speech, but...

First off all I love America. I love the Constitution. I love the First Amendment. I want to carry all the fucking guns. I love private property. And let me tell you something: If you care about your fucking country, read Ludwig von Mises and the six lessons of the Austrian economic school, motherfuckers!”

By "six lessons of the Austrian economic school," Moicano was referring to a concise, 106-page Ludwig von Mises book, "Economic Policy: Thoughts for Today and Tomorrow." Among the best-selling Mises works, it's broken into six sections: Capitalism, Socialism, Interventionism, Inflation, Foreign Investment, and Policies and Ideas. (The Brazilian version's title translates to "The Six Lessons.") 

The lessons are transcribed from a series of lectures Mises delivered at the University of Buenos Aires in 1959. Per the book's description, "Mises had urged Argentina to turn from dictatorship and socialism toward full liberty, so there is a special urgency behind the cool logic employed here. The book's continued popularity is due to its clarity of exposition on the ways in which economic policy affects everyone."

I like his attitude, and I'm surprised hear a fighter talking about economics, but I'm not sure widespread knowledge of economics is going to help. What we need is Congress to quit spending money like drunken sailors. And maybe a few entrepreneurs who can put a million people to work doing something productive.

Beetlejuice

Watch the Opening Number From Beetlejuice on Broadway - "The Whole Being Dead Thing"
Playbill

To the ancient Egyptians, Betelgeuse was the mythical god of the underworld. So we've taken the name and given it a new spelling that people like me can pronounce. Then they took that name and made a movie with Michael Keaton. Then they made a musical and my wife and I went to see it at Keller Auditorium last night in downtown Portland.

The show was full of flashing lights and people singing songs that I had never heard, using words I couldn't understand. I think the next time we go I need to read the lyrics beforehand. There were some funny bits, the lead actor was energetic, and Lydia, the young girl, has quite a voice.

Driving home, we're in the center lane of highway 26 and the car in front of me stops. WTF!?! Going into Portland it's often creepy crawly from the top of Sylvan down to 405, but going the other way traffic is usually free flowing. So why is this guy stopping in the middle of the highway? Turns out that we were about five cars back from a car that was stopped. Engine failure? Heart attack? Freak out? I have no idea. Fortunately, traffic was light so I was able to pull out and go around without getting clobbered.

Thinking about this, I realized the problem might be due the extreme reliability of automobiles. Back in the good old days, there was always a distinct possibility of your car breaking down. If that happened, you were supposed to pull off of the road onto the shoulder. But these days, cars hardly ever break down. Oh, stuff breaks all the time, but it usually doesn't stop from going on. I can't remember the last time I saw a car broke down on the side of the road. I mean I've seen them, but it's like once a year, not every blinking week. So because cars are so reliable, people have forgotten what you are supposed to do if it stops. Or maybe they quit teaching that. 

Anyway, I think the car was broken because it was just sitting there and there wasn't any of that jerking around that you get with a pissed off brake checker.

Sunshine

From Pill Hill:

Mt. St. Helens (left) and Mt. Adams (center)
Marquam Bridge front center

Mt. Hood
Ross Island Bridge (left) and South Waterfront

NPR Political Apparatchiks

The Free Press has a story:

I’ve Been at NPR for 25 Years. Here’s How We Lost America’s Trust. by Uri Berliner

It's a fine story, Uri goes through a long list of stories that NPR (National Public Radio) screwed up in recent years. Okay, but why? Near as I can make out the place was infected with TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome).

The fish rots from the head, so who was in charge of this place?

Wikipedia has a list of CEOs:

List of presidents/CEOs

• Donald Quayle (1970–1973)
• Lee Frischknecht (1973–1977)
• Frank Mankiewicz (1977–1983)
• Douglas J. Bennet (1983–1993)
• Delano Lewis (1993–1998)
• Kevin Klose (1998–2008)
• Vivian Schiller (2009–2011)
• Gary Knell (2011–2013)
• Paul Haaga (2013–2014)
• Jarl Mohn (2014–2019)
• John F. Lansing (2019–present)

Funny, Wikipedia has a page about all of them except the last one: John F. Lansing. Actually he's not last, Katherine Maher was appointed as new CEO in January.

Lansing was a big wheel at USAGM (U.S. Agency for Global Media). Apparently retired now. Mahler is a Biden appointee, so I expect she is just as worthless as Biden, well, except for pumping out more hard left bullshit.

Via The Shekel