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Flexible use of a multi-purpose tool by a cow

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JA Westerberg: RSS never tracked you. Email never throttled you. Blogs never begged for dopamine. The old web wasn’t perfect. But it was yours.

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konnaire: Everybody thinks 'https://' stands for 'hypertext transfer protocol secure' but it actually stands for 'head to this place, sucka' followed by a colon and two laser sounds

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Finally got around to (beginning) to take care of that tree. Great googamooga! Wood is hard!

First cut. Just to the left of the upright tree in the middle in the pic. Started off with a chainsaw. Neither Stacy nor I had ever used one before. We got it stuck after getting 3/4 of the way through. Got it unstuck. Tried again. Got it stuck. Couldn't get it unstuck. For the rest of the first cut we were used a 1.25 pound single bit ax and a metal claw hammer. Et voilà!

Second cut was where the tree's trunk broke. It's about eight feet up there. Could just barely reach it with the chainsaw. I'm sure the form I was using broke some chainsaw rules of etiquette. Paul Bunyan would've been so disappointed. Chainsaw worked again for a bit then stopped. Couldn't get it going. Used the 1.25 pound ax a bit. then, while Stacy tried to fix the chainsaw, I decided to rock the trunk back and forth vigorously over and over and over again until it finally dropped. Yay!

Third cut. Just to the right of the upright tree in the middle from the pic. We couldn't get the chainsaw working. Thought we'd give the ax and the hammer a bit of a workout. When one of us was too tired to continue the other would jump in and give 'er. After about an hour we got through it. Yippee!

Still have to trim the branches and move the small(ish) middle section we cut. Hopefully the chainsaw will work today. If not? Axes and claw hammers it is. Also if not? We owe the guy we borrowed it from $450 to replace it. Drat.

No deer offered to help. Lazy bastards.

Two takeaways. 1) That little ax is a humdinger. I can't wait to get it resharpened and chop something else. 2) Sawdust, like sand, gets everywhere.

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Previous business: the ax we used on the tree was actually a hatchet...this hatchet. So much fun!

We've been watching the Olympics. Also so much fun! Get the entire world together and celebrate the pinnacle of human physical achievement! When Stacy and I started dating we both worked second shift. We'd finish up, hang out at Barnes & Noble until it closed, go for a walk around one of the lakes, get home, make dinner, and watch the Olympics.

Good times.

It's nice to remember the good times, but while it may have been good times for us, it wasn't good times for a lot of people.

Which, when it comes down to it, seems to be the human condition.

For instance: the IOC. Yay putting on the Olympics, but? The IOC sucks. (1)(2)(3)

And it isn't just the IOC with the Olympics. Cities do uncool things to get and put on the Olympics. (1)(2)(3)

And it isn't just the Olympics. FIFA sucks. (1)(2)(3)

Frankly, it seems like most every powerful, governing institution has its problems.

And has had for a long time.

But back to the Olympics. We get this great spectacle, and it's so wonderful, but there's this dark side to it - graft, and death, and unconscionable acts and we ignore it all for our own good time.

Which says a lot about us.

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Panama Playlists

I found the real Spotify accounts of celebrities, politicians, and journalists. Many use their real names. With a little investigating, I could say with near-certainty: yep, this is that person.

Evidently JD Vance likes Backstreet Boys and Bieber, Karoline Leavitt is into Beyonce and Cyndi Lauper, Mike Johson likes Chris Isaak and Enya, and Pam Bondi likes Nelly and Foreigner.

(via lol)

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Waymo DDOS

"The plan?" he wrote in his post. "At dusk, 50 people went to San Francisco's longest dead-end street and all ordered a Waymo at the same time."

(via lol)

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American Time Use Survey (ATUS), ongoing government study since 2003 in which Bureau of Labor Statistics calls random households and asks one person to document what they did yesterday day down to the minute. Site where you can see what americans are doing right now!

(via lol)

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Carpathia received Titanic’s distress signal at 12:20am, April 15th, 1912. She was 58 miles away, a distance that absolutely could not be covered in less than four hours.

At 12:20am April 15th, 1912, there was a miracle on the North Atlantic. And it happened because a group of humans, some of them strangers, many of them only passengers on a small and unimpressive steam liner, looked at each other and decided: I cannot live with myself if I do anything less.

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Valentine's Day. Trip down to the Holly Theatre in Medford, OR to see the world premiere of Ernie & Emma starring, produced by, written by, and directed by Bruce Campbell.

Holly Theatre:

...the Holly was the first grand movie palace in Southern Oregon built for “talking pictures." ... Construction on the Holly Theatre began just weeks after the 1929 stock market crash that led to the Great Depression. The Holly opened its doors on August 29, 1930 ... The Holly closed its doors in 1986 at a time when changes in the movie industry forced many downtown, single-screen theaters to shutter. To prevent the theater from being torn down, the Art Alfinito family purchased the building in the mid-1990s. The Holly was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1998 ... In 2011, the JPR Foundation, the non-profit organization dedicated to supporting Southern Oregon’s NPR affiliate, Jefferson Public Radio, purchased the Holly with the goal of saving this important local landmark and creating a new cultural venue for the region. ... With 1,008 seats, it is the largest indoor performing arts venue between Eugene, OR and Redding, CA

Four hour drive down to Medford (after a 1.5 hour drive in the other direction for Stacy's skating lessons). Stacy fell at the end of practice. Her wrist and elbow were giving her problems, but she wanted to go to the premiere, so of course we did. After we got back from the trip I finally convinced her to go to the clinic - turns out she had a hairline fracture of the radial neck of her elbow and a sprained wrist.

Tough cookie.

The show was sold out. Bruce Campbell and Ida Gearon introduced the movie. They stated they met on a movie, Mindwarp, where he was acting and she was a costume designer. They got married on Valentine's Day 35 years ago to the day. He also gave a shout out to those of us in the peanut gallery.

The movie was nifty. Some nice laughs. Some heartstrings tugged. Some amazing Oregon scenery (including the Oregon Bigfoot Trap maintained by the U.S. Forest Service).

After the show we went to dinner at an IHOP. It's a thing we do, trying to find a good IHOP in PNW. We struck out when we lived in Washington. We continue to strike out in Oregon. We did find a good one in Boise. The Medford IHOP featured a waitperson working FOH all by themself, singing under their breath, and smiling at all the Valentine's Day couples.

The next day we toured Medford (lots of turkeys) and made our way to Jacksonville (oddly beautiful and completely gentrified). On the way home we viewed elk (though we don't need to leave the house to see elk) and enjoyed the views driving up the coast.

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Big wave action and snow on Cascade Head.

caveat lector