Rain, Rain and More Rain

Tropical Storm Colin blew through a hundred or so miles north of here so we've had nothing but rain for the last 24 hours. There were a couple good gusts of wind as well, but no big deal and no damage other than a couple tipped-over chairs on the patio and a ton of leaves and small branches on the ground. I haven't checked, but I'm sure the local news is full of all sorts of Armageddon stories featuring massive flooding, missing roofs, downed trees, etc. Even if they have to dig up years-old video footage like they were showing last night, hours before the rain even started, during the spots advertising the evening news. Add in the inevitable man-on-the-street interview from someone who swears that they've "never seen anything like it" and you have what passes for news these days.

A long-winded way of saying the whole thing was no big deal. It rained. The wind blew. It's Florida. In June. Get over it.

Another celebrity death this week. Muhammad Ali died Friday evening. Matt Taibbi is a few years younger than I am, but he sums up my neighborhood gang's view on Ali pretty well:

When I was growing up, it was impossible to imagine anyone cooler than Muhammad Ali. He had the perfect looks of a rock star, was hilariously funny, and was beautiful to watch in the ring. My friends and I used to pop in tapes of his fights and double over laughing watching his opponents flail about in search of that infuriatingly pretty face of his.

Our parents hated the guy; "draft dodger" and "coward" were probably the nicest things they had to say about him. But we didn't care. I saw the news from Vietnam every night. I'd use words like "smart" to describe anyone who did whatever was necessary to avoid that.

The absurdity called the presidential election continues and grows more weird by the day. James Kunstler's site has been knocked out. I'm assuming it was some form of SJW pissed about something they think he said that he probably didn't. In any case, it's the web and nothing goes away for long:

Considering that the 2016 election looks like a Dark Age puppet show — Pantalone and La Signora smacking each other with dildos — we forget this spectacle is serious. Rather large matters are at stake, such as the continuity of governance, the legitimacy of the two major political parties, the credibility of our financial arrangements, perhaps even the durability of the nation as a united polity.

It's hard to make fun of this stuff anymore. The image of Hill and The Donald in a televised presidential debate screaming incoherently and beating the crap out of each other with six-foot latex dongs should be hilarious, but in 2016, it's too close to the realm of reality to be anything but terrifying. And the latest weirdness doesn't stop there. Scott Adams is endorsing Hillary in self-defense:

So I’ve decided to endorse Hillary Clinton for President, for my personal safety. Trump supporters don’t have any bad feelings about patriotic Americans such as myself, so I’ll be safe from that crowd. But Clinton supporters have convinced me – and here I am being 100% serious – that my safety is at risk if I am seen as supportive of Trump. So I’m taking the safe way out and endorsing Hillary Clinton for president.

Now I've been reading Adams since he first popped up on the internet, and I know he loves to play mind games. I wouldn't be completely surprised to see a "Ha Ha!! Gottcha!" post, but this has been up for over 48 hours now. That's a little long for a joke. We'll see. But, again, the take-away is that there is doubt that this is anything but satire.

Speaking of real life as satire, another SJW has struck a blow for the emancipation of... wait for it... lobsters:

So hey, did you hear about the Canadian lady who “rescued” the lobster?

Apparently, the sight of a lobster for sale in a grocery-store tank “weighed on [her] psyche.” So she bought it, “drove six hours to Winnipeg, [and] shipped it via UPS to a vegan contact out in Halifax for $225, where the lobster was released into the ocean by a fellow vegan out east.”

This story might remind some readers of the first act of a 1998 episode of The Simpsons, but no, it happened in real life just a while ago, and if you dare, you can listen to this chick compare what she did to the Underground Railroad.

I wonder if this brain trust thought to remove the bands from the lobster's claws. Assuming it survived being shipped via UPS....

On a slightly different note, we have John Oliver ripping apart the debt collection industry:


Stumbling onto this clip is actually perfect timing. We've been being harassed since we moved here by some sleezebag outfit that calls itself Medical Services (813-675-0408). They keep calling our number asking for someone we've never heard of. The first time, we were actually helpful; told them the person they are looking for does not live here and we have no idea who they are. We've become progressively more hostile as the calls continue, looking for random people (and insulting and threatening us in the process) who all supposedly gave our home phone as their contact number.

Bullshit. Complete, unadulterated, 100%, Grade-A BULLSHIT.

Today was the final straw. Medical Services called our number four times between 9:25am and 9:30am. I ignored the first three calls and let them hit the answering machine. (They left no message, of course.) While these calls were happening, Debbie was trying to talk to a client and I was trying to get some stuff done while I had an unexpected day off. The last time they called, I answered and said very clearly and loudly, "If you call this number again, I will hunt you down and I will kill you!" Then I hung up. They haven't called back yet. I seriously hope they try to press charges.

That's a lot of typing; time for a nap.