Happy Birthday to Me

Books, a toy, and more books. Could it be that passing the 250 pound mark triggered the arrival of the toy? Funny, I know I'm chubby, but I don't feel like 250 pounds. I mean people who weigh 250 pounds are BIG. I've got to do something about this.

Crime Dramas

We used to watch the television series Law & Order. You may know there are several flavors: the straight up vanilla Law & Order, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and, my favorite Law & Order: Criminal Intent with Goren and Eames. In these shows you generally start with a crime and then the cops interview several "persons of interest". Some of these "persons" appear to be straight arrows, but there are usually a couple who give you some little indication that they are not quite on the up and up. Your mission, Jim, should you choose to accept it, is to figure out which one of these characters is the guilty party. Sometimes it is more obvious than others.

Last fall we watched the series The Killing: Who Killed Rosie Larsen on Netflix. This is a little different. It starts with a crime, but we go through the entire season (13 episodes!) without finding out who dun it. The big difference though was the lack of clues. You see a character in one episode and they appear to honest, upright, law abiding citizens. Nothing in what they say or do, or how they say things gives you any indication that this is not the case. None of those subtle little indicators that we used to get in Law & Order. And then a little while later, maybe the same episode, maybe a later episode, you find out that they were lying through their teeth, so naturally you think they are guilty, but then even later you find out that whatever they were lying about has got nothing to do with case, or maybe it does . . . You see how this goes, they keep giving you clues, but never any proof. They just keep leaving you twisting in the wind.

We started watched Damages with Glenn Close this week, and it's following the same format as The Killing, one crime and then endless complications. In episode 6 Glenn Close has a bit of advice for her young protege which is "don't trust anybody". That would be good advice for the audience as well. Who knows what kind of switch-a-roos the writers are going to pull? Both Glenn Close's character and Ted Danson's character both start out as being good guys, but in short order are shown to be manipulative shit-heads. Looks like the fiance might be scumbag as well, but maybe not, maybe the other woman is crazy, or a hired assassin or maybe she is his long lost step sister from the war. Stay tuned for tomorrow's episode!

Battery Terminals

I cleaned the battery terminals on my truck today. First time I have done that since I don't know when. When I was a kid it was one of those fix-or-repair-daily kinda chores: buy a dollar's worth of gas, check the oil (it was always low), and scrape the crude off the battery terminals. The truck is 13 years old and on its' third battery. Back in olden times batteries died slow lingering deaths, kind of like cancer. You could do things to prolong their life like add water, put them on the charger, clean the terminals, or even replace the cable ends. But about 20 years ago or so something changed and a battery's demise became a matter of sudden death, like a heart attack. One moment it's fine and the next time you get in and turn the key it's dead. You can play around, get a jump, charge it, go through the motions, but it's not going to help. Face it, Jim, it's dead. Money might have something to do with it as well. Back in the good old days a battery cost a couple of days wages, so if you could get even another week or two out of a battery that was significant. Nowadays a battery costs, hmmm, well, they still cost a chunk of change, but it's more like half a day's wages. Or maybe it's just that I spent so much time fiddling with batteries that I just don't care any more. It's dead, Jim, get a new one.

Yesterday my truck was acting cranky. Normally you turn the key, the starter turns the engine over and it starts pretty much instantly. Yesterday it was cranking kind of slow and it actually took a couple of seconds to catch. Today was even worse. I had to give it some gas and keep the RPM's up around two grand to keep it running. This isn't right. Last time I had the hood open (when I got back from Denver I thought I should probably check the oil. 110K miles and the oil level is fine. I was shocked) I noticed that there was a bunch of corrosion around the positive battery terminal. Well, perhaps time has finally caught up with it. So I cleaned the terminals and drove to Cornelius to drop off a load of old computer stuff and now it seems fine.

Valuable! Arrggg! How can you forsake me?

Computer Drive Connection, Cornelius, Oregon
Computer Recycling

Quote of the Day

Why The UK Has No Lunar Programme

See, when the U.S. went to the to Moon, we could ground our electrical equipment and everything was tickety-boo. But the Brits? ...Let me put it as nicely as I can: on this planet, British electronic gear has to be Earthed.

Stolen entire from Roberta X.

Bumper Sticker of the Day

Yes, I realize it's not really a sticker, it was painted on the back of a dump truck that belongs to a paving company. I like the sentiment. Maybe it should be a bumper sticker.

"They" who?

This was on a card that came in the mail the other day. It's from Obama and the Democrats. I'm trying to figure out what they are trying to say. Who is making progress? Who is stopping progress? Who is "they"? The Democrats? Or the Republicans? I'm so confused.

Quote of the Day

I don't like the sound of that law, "dealing while in possession of a handgun". I would rather see a law against "dealing while brandishing a weapon". If the perp hadn't pulled a weapon, it wasn't part of the crime. Just like having a checkbook and pen on you doesn't make you guilty of trying to write bad checks. Even if you have a whole carton of "mightier than the sword" pen ink refills in the back seat, in plain sight. - Brad K. in a comment on Tam's blog.

". . . a whole carton of refills . . .". OMG! Did you see what he had in the back seat of his car! He's got enough ink to write a friggin' book! Run and hide! He might write something, er, subversive, er, seditious, er, bad!

Presupposing of course that dealing is a crime. Well, dealing in certain prohibited substances is. You could argue that it shouldn't be a crime, but you'll have a long row to hoe to convince enough people to get that changed. Being as it is illegal is one good reason to carry a gun, I mean if someone tries to steal your stock, who are you going to complain to? The police? Your local capo, maybe, if you have one, but it's more likely he'll blame you for allowing yourself to get ripped off because you weren't carrying a gun. If dealing in these substances wasn't prohibited, he would have no more reason to carry a gun than, say, your average wrong-side-of-the-tracks convenience store owner.

Of course, in this case, he might have been carrying a gun because of his day job. Ain't that a bitch?

I knew a guy in Texas who spent several years working for the government because of a similar incident (carrying a gun while dealing, not being a corrections officer while dealing). He eventually straightened up and flew right, but then he was a little smarter than the average bear. In his case he might have avoided indentured servitude if he hadn't been carrying. Might have gotten ripped off, but that's generally better than going away.