Coo-coo pants!
Argh! My blog, it is broken!
I updated to the newest WordPress (mistake!) and now the latest posts dingus in the sidebar shows random posts.
Check it out! Refresh the page for more blasts from the past!
This is bad news because I built this blog 15 years ago using a potent combination of ignorance and brute force, and I have NO idea how it works.
Worse, the new version totally changed my post editor thingie. IT LOOKS DIFFERENT, Y’ALL! I was kicking around the web trying to find out how to change it back, and it turns out they made this change in 2019.
That’s how long it’s been since I’ve updated my WordPress.
Given what happened when I did, do you wonder why?
August 4, 2022 — 6:27 pm
Comments: 10
Beans!
One night last week, I woke up in the middle of the night with a stinking headache. Hasn’t happened to me in years and years.
It occurred to me next day – my boss has been away for a week. I usually go down to the coffee house on the corner and get us both a good, strong cup of joe every morning, but on my own I haven’t bothered.
Man, I didn’t think I got caffeine withdrawal. I’ve been caffeinating like nobody’s business ever since.
So.
We did our weekly supermarket run today. We hit two different stores and both were unusually badly stocked. That’s probably down to Monday and poor planning, but I’m getting jumpy. All this gloomy prognostication is getting to me.
Are you seeing shortages (yet)?
August 1, 2022 — 7:41 pm
Comments: 20
Ladies and gentlemen, the most expensive TV series ever made
This is a still from the Twitter trailer for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power coming this September from Amazon. The cost of the first season alone was $462 million. There is speculation that the entire series could cost a cool billion dollars.
Hahaha…like it will survive its first season.
The actual fandom is going to hate this thing, and if you’re not trying to appeal to the fandom, what exactly are you doing? You think Star Wars nerds are fussy about canon? Hoo boy! LOTR aficionados are like Medieval abbots.
I hate it, I’m not a super fan and all I saw was a one-minute trailer.
It’s not just the random race-swapping; the whole production is horribly tone deaf. The wise and beautiful Galadriel of the Tolkien books appears as some kind of sword-slinging action hero. Young Sauron is a dead ringer for Eminem, without the aura of menace. The CGI is good in places and bad in others but, point is, there’s way too much of it.
I hope it costs so much money even Bezos winces.
We have a winner! HottyTottyGirl takes the dick with Tony Dow. In a thrilling first for the Dead Pool, Dow was erroneously declared dead a few hours prematurely, giving our girl an open goal for a sneaky pick.
Back here? Tomorrow? 6 WBT? Dead Pool 155! You betcha!
July 28, 2022 — 7:18 pm
Comments: 11
Twitter is weird
Holy cow – look at the likes on this thing! It was a question, for goodnessakes! My saucy quips and pearls of wisdom never get this kind of support.
It was a reply to a tweet of that old clip of Jacinda Ardern saying, “We will continue to be your single source of truth. Unless you hear it from us it is not the truth” and I was sincerely curious about the answer. I got lots of them.
I have to admit to the shallowness of a weasel: part of my visceral dislike of that clip has to do with her looks and her accent. I can’t reasonably expect New Zealanders to have the same reaction.
I gather she was popular when first elected. She held informal Q&A sessions and was generally approachable. The words “kindness” and “empathy” appeared a number of times. Her popularity is starting(!) to sag.
And, naturally, there were a number of kiwis who said they hated her guts.
The most interesting one to me was the person who said 40% support her, 40% oppose her and the other 20% mess it up for everyone. I wonder how many countries that ratio applies to!
Worth clicking the link if you’re interested.
July 27, 2022 — 5:35 pm
Comments: 4
Peaceful
The Summer fetes are upon us, after two dry years. Some of our favorites didn’t make it – though a couple of those died before the lockdown.
We went to two on Saturday. We knew most everyone at the first one and no-one at the second. I’m happy to say, it was absolutely 100% the old normal. People were hugging and shaking hands, there were no masks. I pointed it out to Uncle B and he was startled that he hadn’t even noticed.
It’s just so easy to fall back into that groove. If they try to lock us down again this Fall, they may have a time of it.
This pretty little church is in the village of Stone cum Ebony. We took a detour down a shady country lane to see it. We’ve never visited this one before – it’s kind of a trek for us – but we weren’t disappointed. English churches are left unlocked, even the very remote ones, so we could go inside and sit in the quiet for a while.
If you haven’t heard, blogosphere giant Dave in Texas died last Wednesday. He was once a major co-blogger at Ace of Spades and longtime member of the merry band at Innocent Bystanders.
I only Twitter knew him, but he was always a ray of fucking sunshine (it says so right in his bio). He was posting dog pictures the day before he died.
Internet bereavements are strange, aren’t they?
July 25, 2022 — 7:11 pm
Comments: 5
‘Member this guy?
This is Popo, the one rooster I managed to give away. I visited him yesterday afternoon. Her girls didn’t like him any my girls did…until she got a new hen.
That’s right – Popo the sex pest finally has a girlfriend!
I’m going to a party, y’all. Back late. You have a good weekend and I’ll see you on the other side.
July 22, 2022 — 4:39 pm
Comments: 5
Teasels in training
Teasels are spikey plants beloved of dried flower arrangers. I have only ever seen them fully dried, but on our nature walk the other day, we saw some when they were still clad in purple flower petals. They look like thistles (they’re not). Pretty things.
They’re called teasels because they were once used to tease the nap of woollen cloth. Wikipedia tells me they aren’t native to the US, where they are regarded as an invasive species.
Why am I babbling about teasels? I have spent my day writing short (but hopefully not terse) emails. Do you know what happens when you send a work email to several hundred English people? At least a hundred of the buggers write chatty emails back, like you were writing just to them…
July 21, 2022 — 7:48 pm
Comments: 6
I’m in!
They finally opened Truth Social outside the US. Well, to the UK, anyway. I’m not sure about other countries.
Yes, it’s a Twitter clone. It’s so close, in fact, I think Twitter might have a valid infringement case. Except the checkmarks are red, not blue. So there’s that.
You really have to follow a couple of hundred accounts on any site to get a good info stream going, but I’ve found a hundred worthy follows already (mostly names I knew from elsewhere) and it’s gaining steam.
The general IQ of comments is on the low side, as you might expect from a new social media site made up of rejects from other social media sites. They allow trolling, which is good. I mean, I mute idiots, but I hate sites that are ban-happy and build the bubble for you.
Honestly, it’s better than I expected. Not too buggy, moves fast. If you’re on there, let me know – though I get the impression most of you all are not social media ninnies.
The question is – do I go for my red checkmark?
Yes, it was hot today. No, I do not believe that sheds and cars spontaneously combusted. I do not believe all the fires in London today are perfectly natural consequences of hot weather. And as I sit here, comes the front of thunderstorms that will blow it all away. It’s in the seventies for the foreseeable.
Two days in the nineties and they lose their minds.
July 19, 2022 — 7:15 pm
Comments: 9
Dark!
The power is out! I am pecking this out on my phone, my only link to the civilised world.
Actually, I’m not. I’m using speech to text because I am lazy – which works remarkably well except every time I say comma, it types karma.
No doubt they will find some way to blame the power outage on the heat. It’s 90 something today. The news is claiming that cars and garden sheds are spontaneously bursting into flame and the tarmac at the airport has melted.
You never heard such hand-wavy bullshit.
July 18, 2022 — 6:03 pm
Comments: 14
Terrarium!
We’ve had this old, empty terrarium kicking around for years. Uncle B’s mum gave it to him. I’ve always wanted to plant it up, the problem is…I have a purple thumb.
That’s what my mother told me, anyway: everything I touch dies. That’s not really fair – someone used my cucumbers to put out a greenhouse fire. They were doing fine before that. After the incident, I lost the will to horticulture.
Plucking up my courage, I decided to give it a shot. Looking into it, though, you need a little of a lot of things – soil, gravel, charcoal. I gave up and bought a terrarium kit on Etsy.
I think Uncle B, talented plantsman and keen gardener, is a little disgusted with me. You pay *way* over the odds for everything when you do it this way. But I had it all parceled out for me, just right – see above – including four nice little plants.
And moss! I love moss.
I’ve planted everything up. When everything settles in, I’ll take an ‘after’ picture for you. Unless it all dies…then you’ll never hear a word about it again.
Tomorrow. Six WBT. DEAD POOL ROUND 154.
July 14, 2022 — 4:28 pm
Comments: 11