2548 My world is a compost heap.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

George Orwell: The past belongs to those who control the present.

--------------------------

I never actually made a decision whether to go to the concert or not, but it is now 11:55 am, and I didn't dress and get out the door a half hour ago, so I guess I'm not going. And I'm not upset about my having lost track of time, despite having been up at 7, so I guess that's ok by me. Shrug.

--------------------

We've had so much rain this summer - well, not so much in quantity, more like constant drizzle then clouds so the prior drizzle didn't dry up before the next starts - anyway, so much that the ground is constantly moist. I opened the front door on the first sunny day in ages, a few days ago, and was struck by the smell.

Everything on the forest floor is rotting. Leaves and twigs and branches that take years to decompose are all rotting all at once. It's a deep, dark brown, loamy smell, with overtones of garbage pail and mold.

I have, or had, no strong allergies. Spring pollen irritates my sinuses, but not enough to call it an allergy. But I think maybe I may be allergic to mold. I've had sinus headaches and a slightly sore throat for a few weeks now (that high curtain at the top back of the throat, on either side of the uvula - is that where my tonsils are?), and a lot of back-of-the-throat phlegm that has me coughing every time I leave the house.

It feels a lot like April 1999, when the house in Highland was flooded by a burst hot water pipe, which also filled the house with steam, and by the time we discovered it there was mold everywhere including the ceilings, and actual toadstools and mushrooms growing on the carpets. I had this same feeling in my throat during the several weeks it took me to sort and decide what of the contents could be cleaned and saved and what had to be discarded. (The house, by the way, was gutted, leaving only the exterior studs and floor joists, which had to be washed with bleach.)

On the upside, I've heard that the wild mushroom crop this year is spectacular.
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2547 Illusion

Friday, August 14, 2009

On abstract art: The subject is limited, and there's no emotional connection.

-----------------------------

It's interesting that the above quotation floated up in the 8-ball for this post. I met Nat in Wappingers today, and rode with him to Cold Spring, where we met Angie for lunch. Modern art was a topic of conversation on the ride.

Anyway, I found this optical illusion:There are four complete and perfectly round circles, and they are not interlinked or crossing. (It's all over the internet, at Switched, and Digg, and a few blogs, and I don't know where it started, so I didn't credit it.)
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2546 To go or not to go, that is the question.

Friday, August 14, 2009

There are a lot of people who like to be told what to think.
They are more dangerous than the people who tell them.

Oops. And here I am asking for advice.
---------------------------

I have a ticket to the 40th anniversary concert, "BETHEL WOODS MUSIC FESTIVAL starring Heroes of Woodstock", tomorrow. The groups appearing include Levon Helm Band, Jefferson Starship, Ten Years After, Canned Heat, Big Brother and the Holding Company, Mountain, Tom Constanten and Country Joe McDonald.

When I bought the ticket on line a few weeks ago, I didn't think it was going to be that big a deal. Lawn tickets were only $19 (about $31 after Ticketmaster added their ripoffs). There are a group of 40 of us who are to meet there.

Over the past week I have been getting one email after another from the organizer of our group, and from the concert organizers, and I'm getting more and more worried. Rule after rule, warning after warning.

It will take me about two hours to get from here to there, with normal traffic. The organizers warn that traffic approaching the grounds will be heavy and slow, and they advise that you get to the parking lot as early as possible after it opens at 2 pm. The gates to the grounds open at 3 pm, and "you should get in line early to avoid long lines". (The concert starts at 5 pm.)

Buses will be arriving from pickup points around the state.

What are the chances drivers and people in line will be courteous and thoughtful?

You can take in only two unopened bottles of water (for many hours in sun and heat?) and a blanket or towel to sit on. Oh, and lots of money to buy their food and water and rent chairs - all at reasonable prices, of course.

Once through the gate, if you must leave (like you forgot something in the car) you WILL NOT be allowed back in. Period. No excuses accepted.

I was getting more and more negative about this.

Then the kicker came today. How does our group find each other? Should we meet up just inside the gate? The organizer and her friend have notified us that they will have a "sort of turquoise green tarp, and will spread it out in the middle of the field in front of the stage". "look for the tarp."

Uh, I'm not arriving by helicopter.

This is looking hairier and hairier. I'm thinking about just not going at all. I wouldn't be so negative if I had someone to go with. None of the others in the group live within 40 minutes of me, and I'd be heading southwest, while most of them will head northwest or west. So I'm pretty far out of the way.

Anyone have an opinion? (Oh, yeah, the ticket has my name on it and ID is required, so no, it isn't useful to overnight it to you. And no, I'm not a fan of any of the groups. And if everyone stands up, I won't see much of anything, even if we're on a slope.)

I think I'll find something else to do tomorrow.
.

2545 Another medicare shock

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Little girls grow up to be women.
Little boys grow up to be ... big boys.

---------------------

I received a letter from the Social Security Administration yesterday, in reference to Medicare. They say that the amount I pay each month for medicare is based on my income level, and that they get those figures from the IRS. The total that they use includes income from all sources, including tax-free income.

When I read the number they had for my total 2008 income, I about fell over. It's at least 60% higher than I was aware of. I'll be paying a small fortune for Medicare.

I stopped by Piper's office today to ask him to please check it against his records and explain it to me. He has a lot of my investments in tax-free bonds, and he rolls over the interest from those bonds into new bonds, so I never really see it, never get to touch or use it, unless I specifically ask him to cut me a check. It's probably reported on those back addenda of the return, the pages I don't look at very carefully, because they don't matter to the IRS bottom line. I'm also aware that late last year he moved a lot of my stock out of "dangerous waters" into safer areas, so I suspect there were capital gains I never actually had that I could use, but that the SSA is counting.

He wasn't in. Perhaps I'll catch him tomorrow. I guess I'm going to have to pay more attention to what's going on.

------------------------

Tonight I'm going to a lawn concert in Sugar Loaf, about an hour and a half southeast of here. The weather is iffy, but I'm going anyway. I'll take an umbrella. If it does rain, I suspect the group will relocate to a restaurant or bar down the road, so it won't be a complete waste of a drive. (Although, on my current diet, a restaurant or bar is a complete waste on ME.)
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2544 Robots. Just how functional are they?

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Explanations are interpreted at the level and understanding
of the listener, not the speaker.

-----------------------------

Boston.com's Big Picture set today is on the current advances in robotics, from military to fun to humanoid. Asian developers seem to be fascinated by female humanoid robots.

I can understand that if you want a robot to "man" a reception desk, or serve drinks, or putter around the house, you'd want it to have some semblance of a face to interact with, and hands would be needed to use things designed for humans, but, uh, why does it need humongous breasts? At eye-level?
It's not like it will be nursing baby robots. And the "male-form" robots don't have interesting bulges for us ladies to peruse.

Unfair. And silly. And so so typical of humans.
.

2543 A thought

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Computers have raised writing to a new low.

-----------------------------------

A few days ago I noted that health care doesn't seem like an area where profit should be the main determinant. Consider this: what incentive do pharmaceutical companies have to develop cures? That would be killing the golden goose.

Same for energy policy. What incentive do energy providers have to discover or promote more efficient machines, generators, or batteries?

----------------

I sent The Man some advice today: "Don't walk behind the elephant."

I got back a two word reply: "Too late."

I'm wondering, but I know he'll be too busy to explain until next week. Besides, I think he likes being mysterious.

Like I said - frustrating.
.

2542 Typhoon Photos

Monday, August 10, 2009

Heat, pressure, time.
The same things that make a diamond also make a waffle.

-------------------------------

Terrifically devastating typhoon in southeast Asia, over the past few days and today. 100 inches of rain. Wind. Battering waves. Flood. Amazing photos at Boston.com. Go. Look. Be grateful. See comments #12 and #19 under the photos at Boston.com.


.

2541 Dressing, or Overdressing?

Monday, August 10, 2009

Originality is the fine art of remembering what you heard,
but forgetting where you heard it.

(I forget where I heard this.)
-------------------------------------

Many people have told me that they like the way I dress. Guys tell me I dress "touchably", but not flashily or provocatively.

I like loose clothing that I can move in. My favorite slacks (many pairs in black, and one each in the few other colors they come in) are a smooth knit with lycra, loose and flowing, swinging to brush the calf. I don't care for cotton or demin on my legs, because my legs are so very short, and by the time I get a non-stretch fabric loose enough to not constrict, my legs look even more stumpy. The few jeans I have are fake demin - stretchy with lycra.

I currently have no short skirts. They're all long, ankle or below, because I don't like to show my short muscular legs.

I almost never wear T-shirts because the high round neckline does not flatter my face. I wear knit tops, but with V, turtle, or scoop necks. I prefer micro-knit to cotton because they're silkier and feel good. I wear kurtas, because they are beautiful and loose. I have a very few button-front shirts/blouses, and those I do have are dressy, and I wear them open over a shell, like a light jacket. I have a problem finding them to fit, because my bust is way out of proportion to my shoulders, and if I size them to button, the shoulder seam is halfway down my short arms to the elbow, or if it's sleeveless, the armhole is huge. Looks awful.

(I do have some grungies - cotton knit pants, a pair of baggy jeans, some of Jay's old shirts, some Ts - but I almost never wear them off my property. Just ain't gonna happen.)

So, what's the problem?

The same guys who tell me they love the way I dress (women rarely say anything) also tell me I always overdress. The Man once asked me, "Don't you have any ordinary shirts?" Well, no, I don't. We'll go to karaoke in a bar, and all the other females there are wearing jeans and T-shirts or cotton blouses, and I'm wearing my black silky slacks and a hand-painted silk kurta. I don't feel out of place, because for me, that's ordinary attire, equivalent in my mind to their jeans. Being dressed perhaps more "nicely" doesn't make me stiff or stuck up. I bounce around and have just as much fun.

It's not like I'm overly concerned about appearance. I rarely wear makeup these days, can't remember the last time I set my hair, and don't polish any nails. I just like to wear pretty and comfortable things, and I do believe that what you choose to wear reflects your level of respect for the places you go and the people you're with.

I see guests on daytime TV talk shows, and I wonder, "Did they know they'd be on TV today?" I've seen people going to church on Sunday in clothes I would wear to paint the kitchen. To me, this seems disrespectful.

But then, I come from an era when women wore a hat and gloves to church, and even to visit the neighbor's kitchen for coffee. The year I started college (1962) was the first year gloves were not required in the dining hall at dinner. We were still required to wear skirts, stockings, and high heels. To dinner. In the college cafeteria.

Things have changed.
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2540 Photos from around the village

Monday, August 10, 2009

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati
(When all else fails, play dead.)

----------------------------

Photos from some recent walks.

A squirrel on the fence around the village parking lot. He'd been lying there stretched out with all four legs hanging straight down, and his chin on the boards. He tensed up when he saw me watching him, but until then he was the epitome of laziness.

I liked the way the roots of this tree looked like lava pouring over the sidewalk.

This is a tree root bulging out of the ground, and full of water and grass clippings in the hollow. When the TV weatherman reminds people to dump standing water to keep mosquitoes down, I think of this. Yeah, we've had a lot of rain.
I fell in love with these whatever-they-ares in the lot of a business. Three clumps of some kind of grass-like plant. Not bamboo, though. They are over six feet tall. I'd love to have a clump on either side of the bottom of my driveway.
Closer, this is what they looked like at the base:
Anyone know what this purple flower is? I like it.
I like this stuff, too.
End of walk.
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2539 Remembering the bad things

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Josh Billings: "There are lots of people who mistake their imagination for their memory."

-----------------------------

In the movie I saw last Tuesday, the young man is hurting from the breakup, and his little sister advises him that to get over a lost love, you don't dwell on the good things, you try to remember the bad things.

Yeah. When we're in the midst of an infatuation, we see all the good and push away the bad.

I did that with Roman. He's got a lot of good points, but he's also got a lot of bad, and when I was too close to him, I saw only the good. That's why now, when the unacceptable situation that drove me away is gone, done, no longer an issue, I know that I'll never get back with him in that way again, because now I see him clearly. I still like him and count him as a friend, but no longer a partner candidate.

I know this happens with The Man, too. I feel wonderful when I'm with him. He's so strong and smart and protective, funny, fast, and physically impressive, and, well, other stuff. That wonderful feeling lasts about ten days. So if I see him at a minimum of every two weeks, I stay high.

When we head into three weeks, though, I start to see all the problems. He's covered in red flags. So many in fact that I wonder why he continues to see me, it's just all wrong, and then I get paranoid.

Today marks seven weeks since I've seen him. A date was canceled about 5.5 weeks ago and not rescheduled. Although I'm a little hurt that I'm not a higher priority than what he's doing, I know what's going on, and I understand, and I hope he succeeds, so that's not the problem. We have been keeping in touch. Just not literally touching.

The problem is that with such a (relatively) long separation, I'm beginning to forget the good. The red flags are flapping, and I'm wondering what I'm doing with him and why. I'm beginning to think that if I never saw him again, that might be a good thing, and I wouldn't be too broken up about it at all.

And then I look at the other men available to me, and I get depressed.

He has awakened parts of me I didn't know I had, and I never want to be put to sleep again.
.

2538 Strength, Power

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Plants are living things too - they're just easier to catch and you can’t hear them scream.

(For all my vegetarian friends.)

---------------------

Kim Komando's video of the day is an amazing pair of acrobats, known as Golden Power, from the International Circus Festival of Budapest. To quote Kim: "This type of acrobatics is known as Hand Balancing. The men essentially use each other as gymnastic equipment. They are amazingly strong and graceful. And each stunt is better than the last."

Um - if you watch the video in the blog, rather than through a reader or aggregator, you might want to turn the music off over there on the left. "Alice's Restaurant" really doesn't add to the performance....


[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYpUs87ha0w]
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2537 Movie

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Me: "Time is like a sausage skin. It has no set length of its own.
How long or short it is depends on what it's filled with."

-----------------------------------

Last night I saw "Ray", the movie for which Jamie Foxx won an Oscar for his portrayal of Ray Charles. I hadn't seen it when it came out.

The movie was very good. I recommend it. The music alone was worth it.

I watched it in a private home theater, about 40 minutes upriver. Twelve foot screen, seven black leather recliners. Surround sound. Nobody crackling cellophane or crunching candy in your ear.

It was just the host, Chris, and me, but it was ok, his wife and children were elsewhere in the house. I don't understand, but that's ok. He said that usually there are a few neighbors who turn up, but not last night.

---------------------------------

I mentioned to Chris that I had joined several dinner and movie Meetup groups in the Kingston and Poughkeepsie areas, that many of them had been active for two or more years with 200 or more members, but that in just the past two months, several of them had lost organizers and no one would step up to take over.

He mentioned that it costs to run a Meetup group, and some people just get tired of paying the subscription fees. Members don't pay, but the organizer does.

I went out to the website this morning and looked up the fees to start and maintain a group. There are a couple fee structures, and I don't understand the difference between them, but just as an example, one is $19 a month.

At not one of the meetups I attended has the organizer mentioned a fee, although they are allowed to request a membership fee or attendance contribution if they wish. (An Albany dinner group I joined yesterday, but haven't been to yet, was the first - she asks for a $2 donation at the first event you attend.)

Now I wonder why any of them take on the role of organizer. Not only is it work and a pain, but it COSTS!
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2536 Nuthin'

Friday, August 7, 2009

There can’t be sin without knowledge.

--------------------------

Nothing day. The outside temperature was 75 F, but for some reason it felt terribly hot to me, so I didn't do any walking. It was 75 in the house, too, but it felt cool in here. Must have been the sun. And humidity.

Mostly I spent the day moving old emails from the AOL archives to my new Gmail id. Mostly from The Man. Naturally, I had to read them all as I transferred them - all 4000 or so from over the past 2.3 years. I've been reading them over the past several days. We've used email like other people use instant message, I guess.

I do love his mind, it's been fascinating reading, but he's also the most frustrating person I've ever known, so it's also been a rollercoaster read.
.

2535 More sighs

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Pardoning the bad is injuring the good.

----------------------------

Quotes from soccer players that were interviewed:

1. Yes, the final score was 1-1, but it could have just as well gone the other way.

2. Soccer requires strategy. It's just like chess, but without the dice.
.

2534 Sigh

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Consensus is a political concept, not a scientific one.

--------------------------------

A random “favorite quote” in a random Facebook profile:
“dont lsn 2 the 99 ppl who say ur useless n lsn to the 1 prsn who says u r”

I lost 30 IQ points just copying that over to here.
.

2533 So good to be bad

Thursday, August 06, 2009

Bertrand Russell: “A stupid man’s report of what a clever man says can never be accurate, because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand.”
-----------------------

I was bad today. Since 6/17 I have been very good about the diet, and even better since starting the Nutrisystem. I really truly have not cheated.

You're supposed to add bread, or milk, or vegetables, or fruit to the packaged meals, and as between-meal snacks. I haven't added much bread (110 calories per slice!) or milk, but I've been getting lots of veggies and fruit, and absolutely nothing fried.

Today temptation struck.

I LOVE fried green tomatoes.

I haven't had them in years because you can't easily get green tomatoes unless you grow them or know someone who does. There used to be a farm down the road where the kid running the farm stand would pick some for me, but they went commercial years ago. No more roadside stand.

Now there's a new farm stand just outside the village, where I turn around on my walks. They DO sell green tomatoes because the Hispanic people buy them. So during the second half of my walk yesterday I was carrying a few pounds of green tomatoes.

I used to coat them with egg and crumbs or corn starch, but that soaks up the frying oil. Today, to be a little bit good, I didn't coat them and I fried them on a thin film of olive oil.

They were even better uncoated! They were wonderful, with a little splash of low-sodium soy sauce.
Bad is so good.
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2532 Truth and honesty are not the same thing

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

You know you're in law school when you consider dropping out of school approximately every hour, but after that first semester you realize you are already in too much debt to be anything but a lawyer.

-------------------------------

The movie last night was "500 Days of Summer". I have no positive or negative recommendation. If you like that sort of thing you'll like it, if not you won't.

There were seven of us, all female. I was surprised to see a few scattered men in the theater. Date night, I guess. Can't imagine a man choosing that movie for himself.

We went to a faux-Thai restaurant next door after the movie. For once, I had an actual thought about the movie that I wanted to express, but I never had a chance. Five of the women knew each other from other meetups, another woman and I were the new folks, and that other woman monopolized the dinner conversation, completely. Utterly. We heard about her move from Florida, her job interviews, the garden she's planting, how she gets lost even with a GPS, her husband and his naval career, everything. Everything. She had that loud excited way of speaking that takes over and brooks no interruption, and I found her very annoying.

One funny thing happened. Several people mentioned that it was a bad neighborhood, that they were glad there was a security guard in the parking lot. We were sitting on the patio, and noticed a heavy police presence, constant cruisers up and down the street. Between ordering and the arrival of the food, I lifted the chain around the patio and stepped out to the corner where there was a trash can, to have a cigarette. I was watching the traffic on the street when a police car pulled up across the street, and sat there for a bit. Then the policeman, without getting out of the car, got on a loudspeaker or something, and said something, it was so loud and distorted that I'm not sure what he said, all I could understand was "rumble rumble rumble come over here rumble rumble".

I looked around and couldn't see anyone he might be talking to. A few older people sitting on their porches enjoying the slanting sunlight. No kids on the sidewalks or in the street. I couldn't see inside the car to see what direction he was looking. And then it hit me.

I put the cigarette out, lifted the patio chain, went back to the table, and sat down with my group. And the cops left.

Learned: When in bad Albany neighborhoods, do not stand on a street corner next to a lamppost watching the traffic go by. You will suffer sexual harassment. From the cops!

--------------------------------

My observation from the movie:

Truth and honesty are not the same thing.

Guy falls in love with new coworker (Summer) at first sight. She says she doesn't want a boyfriend, that they should be just friends. She says it many times, every time he starts getting too romantic. But she kisses him, dates him, sleeps with him, plays house with him, feeds his fantasy, until she meets another man and drops him.

It bugged me that it was obvious that we weren't supposed to be angry with her. After all, she "told him the truth!" The guy has a too-wise younger sister who points out that he shouldn't have fallen in love with Summer, because she told him right from the start that she didn't want a boyfriend, just a friend. So "it's your own fault."

By the way, I think the little sister was wedged in to tell us what to think.

Well, I AM angry with Summer. Yes, she told him the truth, but then she acted differently. She knew he was falling in love, and she played with his feelings. She was not definite enough, she allowed him to hope, and she knew it. And I don't think she cared.

Truth and honesty are not the same thing. Summer may have been truthful, but she was most definitely not honest.
.

2531 Three days?

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

T.S. Eliot: "Some editors are failed writers,
but so are most writers".

-----------------------------------------

I haven't updated in a while. I've been busy moving archived emails from AOL to Gmail, and in the process, I'm rereading them. Fascinating. And we've had a few days without rain, so I've been walking. I'm still eating under 1,000 balanced calories per day in five or six "meals", but I'm still stuck at 10 pounds lost and 15 or 20 to go, so every day it's not raining, I walk.

I'm going to a Meetup movie and dinner tonight in Albany. We're to meet in the theater lobby at 6:00, and I don't know exactly where it is, or what rush hour traffic might be like. The GPS says the drive should take an hour, so I figure just to be safe, I've got to leave here a little after 4.

It's not raining, so I want to get a walk in before washing my hair and dressing.

Bye.

------------------------------------

A few minutes later: Wow! Google maps is helpful! The GPS would get me there, but I still wondered where I was going, so I looked it up.

Then I looked at the street view, and my heart fell. The theater fronts on a street full of businesses, with a store abutting on each side. Albany is famous for parking difficulty. I didn't see any sign of a parking lot or lot entrance next to the theater.

So I looked at the satellite view. Bingo! There's a large parking lot immediately behind the theater reached by turning in at the next side street.

GPS wouldn't have told me that.
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2530 Music

Saturday, August 1, 2009

Scott Adams: “The most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management.”

---------------------------

I don't like hearing music on others' blogs or websites, because their choices are never my choices, and I find it annoying. Of course, MY choices are perfect. Everyone will just love it. Or lump it.

Over there on the left. Pink block. Playlist. Hear the music? Too loud, probably. Haven't figured out how to make it softer. DIY.

The website to build the list has links to MP3s for thousands of selections entered by users. Unfortunately, not everything is there (and some are just ringtones - watch the "minutes" notation when selecting). Click on "pop-out" to see my complete list.

Almost everything on the list has some meaning to me:

• The Kingston Trio was high school boyfriend Obie's favorites, although the specific favorites don't seem to be available.
• Buffy Sainte-Marie was my first album. "My Country 'Tis of Thy People You're Dying" was my favorite, but the link is broken. BTW, "God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot" is supposed to sound like that. There's nothing wrong.
• John Wolford broke my heart in eighth grade. My last dance with him was to "To Know Him Is To Love Him". When I hear it, I still remember the scent of his woolen sports coat.
  
• It was BNL that provided the connection to The Man.
• "Norwegian Wood" is connected to Warren Roscoe, my still wondered-about lost cause.
• Tracy Chapman speaks to my heart, my childhood fears and desires.
• M&P's "Dancing Bear" is just plain beautiful.
• Johnny Mathis got me through many college study nights.
• Judy Collins and Joan Baez, well, everything.
  

... and so on for the bulk of the list.

I suspect only someone my age will fully appreciate the collection.
.

2529 Bits

Friday, July 31, 2009

Common in Paris: “[That] is forbidden. But possible.”

--------------------------

I did a volunteer stint at the tourism booth at the county fair (the next county over) yesterday. Man, that's a sad fair. It's really just an overblown carnival, very little on the usual county fair offerings. Mostly just rides, lots of "bad-for-you" food, and those knock down the clown and win a teddy bear booths.

I came home to change and wash and eat before going to the movie last night, and found no electricity. With a well, when there's no electricity, there's no water. And no microwave for the Nutri-dinner. So, I didn't go to the movie. House was hot, so I went to the diner in the village and had tea and a sandwich.

---------------------------

Stupid commercial for a whole-grain cereal: "Studies have shown that people who eat mostly whole grains have a healthier body weight."

False implication of cause-and-effect.

By the same logic, since people who live half the year on their yachts are wealthy, if you want to be wealthy, you should buy a yacht.

People who want and work for health are simply more likely to eat whole grains.

People who have more money are more likely to buy yachts.

People get paid for this kind of lying-by-implication? Nobody had the courage to say, "Uh, that's not honest."

--------------------------

I'd like to remind folks who complain about bailout/stimulus money about the "bailout/stimulus" efforts of the past administration. In January of last year, Bush gave 53 billion dollars in advanced weaponry to seven Islamic nations, some of whom are already the richest nations on Earth. There's an article here that talks about part of it.

Note that "sales" doesn't mean the US gets paid. The purchase price is discounted and is a loan which will be forgiven. I don't have the links anymore for the rest of the $53B.

Who was he bailing out, and what was he stimulating?

----------------------------------

In an effort to get out more, I signed up for several Meetup groups. The two I enjoyed most - a dinner group and a dinner/movie group - are dying. They've both been very active for literally years, but the organizers of each has decided to resign, and no one is picking up the reins.

I don't know about the dinner group, but the movie lady is sick and tired of getting emails from people who were too stupid to be on time, or too dense to know that the ten people standing in the middle of the lobby WAS the group (they expected a sign), or who didn't like the movie and restaurant choices. As the group got larger, the proportion of inconsiderate idiots went up.

But gee. The groups have been around for ages. Why now? Is it ME? Kiss of death?
.