fitbit Friday
Quick fitbit Update
At 11:40a, (CST), my app tells me that I've burned 867 calories so far today. Interesting, since I didn't put my fitbit bracelet on this morning, because it hasn't been recording my steps lately. It might have something to do w/the message I've been getting on my app, which says, "Update available"?!
Political TUE . . . on Friday
From Norfolk Daily News (1/5/16): "Lot of Hot Air," column by Cal Thomas. If representatives of the nearly 200 nations gathered in Paris for the United Nations Conference on Climate Change had instead formed a coalition to fight a real threat--Islamic terrorism--they might have accomplished something useful. Instead what they came up w/is a document that even Secretary of State John Kerry, in a rare moment of candor, confessed is pointless , , , There has been a near complete complete media blackout & intimidation of anyone presenting contrary scientific evidence disproving the theory that Earth is warming & humans are responsible . . .
"Remote Sensing Systems (RSS) is a scientific research company located in Northern California *, specializing in satellite microwave remote sensing of the Earth. According to RSS, the Earth's temperature has not increased in the last 18 yrs & 9 months, a record."
* California...that hotbed of ultra-conversation climate-change doubters!
"As previously noted in this column, predictions of global warming have been based on imperfect computer models. That those models do not reflect reality has not affected the minds or policies of people who worship at the altar of government & wish to impose additional regulations on already overburdened corporations & individuals." [In the interest of fairness, I'm giving well-known liberal pundit Leonard Pitts equal time in my valuable blogging space.]
From Lincoln Journal Star (1/15/16): "Fighting ignorance with call for peace," (column by Leonard Pitt's Jr.) As a general rule, I loathe both Holocaust & slavery comparisons. Sadly, such comparisons have become more common in recent years even though, almost by definition, they trivialize two of the greatest crimes in human history. When GOP senatorial candidate John Raese declared that having to place 'smoke-free environment' stockers on bldgs he owned was the 'same thing' as Jews being forced to wear yellow Stars of David & when eventual GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson claimed the ACA 'in a way...is slavery,' what was revealed was not some eye-dropping insight on stop-smoking campaigns & healthcare reform, but, rather, the historical illiteracy, incapacity for reverence & utter imbecility of the 2 men & anyone dumb enough to believe them. [emphasis added]
"So yes, ordinarily I loathe such comparisons. Yet I'm here to make one. Because, as more than one observer has noted, the parallels between the rise of Adolf Hitler & that of Donald Trump have become too neon to ignore."
- [Had Mr. Pitts added abortion & made it one of three greatest crimes in human history, I might have read with a more sympathetic eye.
- Is Mr. Pitts suggesting that "he who shall not be named" & his supporters are operating in the same environment as Adolph Hitler & his supporters in Germany, circa 1920s & 1930s?]
Criminal Minds
From Omaha World Herald (1/11/16): "Allergies? Blame Neanderthals. As recently as 2010, it was considered scientifically dubious & frankly somewhat indecent to suggest that humans might once have interbred w/Neanderthals . . . 6 years & several massive projects to map the Neanderthal & human genomes later, we now know that there was more than a little hanky-panky going on some tens of thousands of years ago . . . " [DEPT OF IMAGINARY PRESS CONFERENCES . . . "Affluenza" Teen's Mom: My son deserves far more sympathy from the press & public than he seems to be getting! REPORTER: Are you still claiming that he's the innocent victim of "affluenza"? MOM: No! I'm claiming that he's the innocent victim of Neanderthal DNA!]
Also from NDN (1/12): "Case dismissed. A federal judge has dismissed a nude protester's claim that police violated his rights by arresting him while he played violin stark-naked outside the federal courthouse in Portland. Matthew Mglej (sic) of Hillsboro, OR, sued the Portland police & the county last JAN, seeking $1.1 million in damages. The 26-yr-old was arrested for indecent exposure in May 2014 . . . the judge said Mglej's nudity didn't advance a specific message, so it wasn't protected by either the 1st Amendment or the state constitution." [I would be a lot more sympathetic toward this guy had he been arrested for playing the violin nude in January in Nebraska to protest global climate change.]
Food for Thought
Also from OWH (1/11): "A goat meant to be dinner for tiger is now a friend. An unlikely friendship between a tiger & a goat who was supposed to be his dinner has charmed Russia. In a zoo in the far reaches of Siberia, predator & prey have become best buddies. Amur the tiger & Timur the goat's charmed life started in late NOV, when Amur decided not to eat the goat when it was unleashed into his enclosure. The intention was that the goat would be a gastronomic delight, not a play pal. But instead the 2 animals appear to have bonded, sharing a good bowl & appearing to play w/each other by romping through Amur's pen." [Maybe this tiger is a vegan?]
Wait . . . What?
Also from OWH (1/14): "Portables no wee concern. Building boom, outdoor events give potty providers more regular customers. {caption under picture follows} A-Relief Services' Watson services a porta-potty in Omaha. Rob French, the owner of A-Relief, says he has doubled his stable of portable restrooms, from 600 to 1,200, to keep up w/demand. 'We've done well,' he said." [As the possibility of early retirement weighs heavily on my mind, this opens up a possibility for a career change instead.]
There Is No Place Like . . .
England?
Also from NDN (1/12): "Too sunny. It's the dark days of one of the rainiest British winters on record. So some London commuters were surprised to hear their trains had been delayed because of the sun. A rail operator tweeted TUE that 'we had severe congestion through Lewisham due to dispatching issues as a result of strong sunlight.' The company said low winter sun was hitting monitors at an angle that meant the drivers could not see them." [England swings.] *
* For many, if not most of you, this will only make sense if you follow the link.
Nebraska?!
Also from LJS (1/14): "Video alleges fraternity member's branding. UNL police are investigating a video posted to social media in 2014 that allegedly shows a Phi Kappa Psi fraternity member being branded with the organization's symbols." [When I was a freshman @ St. Paul's College High in 1967 or 1968, Tex Castens, a junior whom I looked up to, * gave me $5 & ordered me off-campus to fetch him some french fries from Creemy Freeze over the lunch hour. I suppose I should be grateful.]
* He was the captain of our intramural football team.
Ditto: "Krispy Kreme opening Tuesday. Krispy Kreme will open its first Lincoln location TUE." [They are loaded w/anti-oxidants.]
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