Your Bag of Nothing for Tuesday, March 18, 2025

 

 

  • Texas lawmaker files bill that would get rid of Texas Parks and Wildlife
    • State Rep. Pat Curry (R-Waco) filed House Bill 4938, which would transfer the functions of TPWD to other state agencies. The bill would also disburse the funds designated to the department to the agencies that take over those responsibilities. If approved, the bill would take effect on Sept. 1, 2025.

 

  • Imagine the nightmare this is for an 82-year-old to get this DOGE mistake rectified. Unfortunately, I bet he’ll be dead before it gets fixed.

 

  • WWJD?

 

  • A bizarre moment for C-SPAN.

 

  • Long ago, I think I made fun of people who professed the greatness of LastPass. I want to make something abundantly clear: I was wrong; I was the idiot. LastPass is one of the best things you can pay for, and I can’t recommend it enough. I have it on all my devices, and life hasn’t been easier. It’s some of the best money I spend. I also want to make it clear I don’t get a commission or any type of referral benefit. I just want to take ownership of my mistake and share a bit of greatness with others to make my life easier. And they are having a sale on something that I think is of little cost and well worth its value. Peace of mind for two bucks a month. Yup, I just came up with that tagline, call me Don Draper.

 

  • It’s kinda sad that you can’t make a “three-hour tour” joke or reference unless you are over the age of 45.

 

  • One thing I’ll never fully understand about Texas is why we have to play this ridiculous game of selecting an electric provider like you’re in a fantasy football league. (Truth be told, I know the history behind Texas electric deregulation, and our thanks go to the hard work of a loyal reader, but I just want to gripe.) Electric companies (retail electric providers (REPs)) sell electricity to you, such as Gexa, Frontier, 4Change, Express Energy, etc. They don’t generate electricity, maintain power lines, or fix outages. They just buy electricity from power plants and resell it to you, adding in their own fees and gimmicks.The “real” electric companies are “Transmission & Distribution Utilities” (TDUs). These are the companies that actually maintain the power lines and restore outages. In North Texas, that company is Oncor. In Houston, it’s CenterPoint. Other areas have AEP or Texas-New Mexico Power (TNMP). In my case, no matter which Retail Electric Provider I choose, Oncor still delivers the power and maintains the infrastructure. If my power goes out, I call Oncor, NOT the electricity provider. Maybe that’s only weird to me? So, Texans go to PowerToChoose.org (the official website of the Public Utility Commission of Texas) to find a deal on an electric provider or risk getting stuck with whatever their provider decides to charge once their plan expires. For the last 11 months, I’ve procrastinated and just been rolling over on my old plan, not bothering to shop around. Turns out, my current rate is 23.9 cents per kWh.

    Meanwhile, there are three-month plans that are as low as 9.7 cents. I could literally cut my bill by 60%, yet I keep putting it off. Ideally, I’d sign a two or three-year plan and not have to think about this again for a while. But the long-term plans aren’t as competitive, and I don’t want to put a reminder on my calendar and renew every three months like I’m on some kind of weird Columbia House subscription service for electricity. If I log into my provider’s website and look at my renewal options, the lowest they’ll offer me is 20 cents per kWh — which is way higher than what I could get if I just went through PowerToChoose.

    And that’s the trap. So many people just renew with their current company without realizing they can seamlessly switch providers with barely any effort. If you forget or don’t know any better, you’re stuck paying outrageous prices while the energy companies laugh all the way to the bank.I ended up going through ChooseEnergy.com, an energy broker registered with the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT), to find a better deal than I could through PowerToChoose.org. Basically, I just cut my electric bill in half for the next two years. To get this rate, I just have to consume more than 1,000 kWh a month. Easy peasy.

 

 

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Your Bag of Nothing for Monday, March 17, 2025

  • Comments are on so you can yell at me about how absurdly long this post is. I’m taking you through a rabbit hole I went down.
  • I don’t know why I thought about my grandmother after church yesterday. She died in 1987 after living with family in California for several years. Before that, she lived with us, my dad converted the garage into an apartment. I have these two distinct memories of her getting out of the car after Dad drove them to go vote. I asked her, “Who did you vote for, Grandma?” And enthusiastically would reply to her pre-k grandson, “You! I voted for you!” That annoyed me because I wanted to know who she voted for and all about the voting process. But now, it doesn’t annoy me and makes me smile.
  • As you know, my last name is Geeding. Yesterday afternoon I was a guest of the Gooding family. For the heck of it, I asked ChatGPT if there was any relation regarding our names.
  • Sometimes when I get the genealogical itch, I’ll use FindAGrave.com to scratch that itch. I’ll start with my dad’s grave and then work backwards. Someone, long ago, began to connect all the branches of the family tree, and it’s a fun rabbit hole to go down. It’s a neat way of seeing all the siblings of a grandparent and seeing who else you are connected to. And, sometimes it gets updated with new and interesting information. For instance, I was told my great-great grandfather was a drummer in the Civil War. But there’s now documentation stating he was a Navy quartermaster during the Civil War. I always wondered why my father enlisted in the Navy at the start of World War II instead of going into the Army, from which he retired. Maybe that’s the connection, he was influenced by his grandfather. Having no clue what a quartermaster was or did, this is what ChatGPT told me.

    That led me to another website I wasn’t familiar with Ancestors.FamilySearch.org.  And that gave me this neat little writeup on Simon, who lived 76 years. And, possibly the origin of my last name.

    Not only that, but it also provided me with different options for viewing the Family Time Line. I’m shocked I can find all this information for free, and all because I asked ChatGPT about the Gooding and Geeding family. This is what I mean by going down a rabbit hole. Heck, I even found a 1891 marriage license and discovered he had two sisters, Anna and Carry.

    I don’t think I’ve ever discovered anything about Simon’s parents before, but now I know his father was William Rockingham Rinehart Geeding, who was born in 1842. Wow, I’ve just traced my last name all the way back to 1842.

    Why stop now? I might as well dig deeper. Wow, WRR Geeding died at the age of 29. I wonder why he died so young? One day, I’ll make time to try to find his death certificate. Bummer I don’t have any photos of these men.

    WRR Geeding’s father, Moses, also died young, just living 40 years.

    And that’s where it dries up. Other than a Census record for Moses, there’s nothing else free online, his parents’ names are not available, but this is much more than I expected.

    This is where it gets a little tricky. I also found an old Cincinnati Inquirer obituary that said a Simon Geeding died at the age of 91.

    If this Simon Geeding died in 1935 at the age of 91, that means he was born in 1844, right? The other Simon Geeding, the one I first mentioned, was born in 1867 in Cleves, OH. I guess there are two different Simon Geedings. However, the top photo of this post is a Bible a distant cousin sent me that I think belonged to my grandfather, and is dated 1905 and mentions Cleves. I don’t know why there is an M after Cleves. Methodist? Maybe this old church?

    To make it even more confusing, I found a third Simon Geeding.  So, there was 1867-Simon of Cleves OH, and 1844-Simon. Now, I found a Simon Geeding born in 1846 in Illinois on another genealogy website, WikiTree.com. That website leads me to believe that somehow Geeding came from the name Gidding, but I’m not so sure I’m buying that.

    I need to start mapping this out because I’m all sorts of confused, because that page also lists a Samuel Geeding of Illinois. This is information overload and I need to take some time to sort it all out.

    Alright, so far I have found the following Simon Geedings:

    – 1867-Simon Geeding of Cleves, OH
    – 1844-Simon Geeding
    – 1846-Simon Geeding of Illinois

    To make it even more confusing, I found a fourth Simon Geeding born in 1849 on Geni.com.

    Well, 1849-Simon has a father named John Geeding, so I might as well check him out to go back another generation. John was the father of EIGHT Geedings!

    There’s no more information on John Geeding, so the trail of that succession of Geedings ends there. So, to backtrack, we have FOUR Simon Geedings:

    – 1867-Simon Geeding of Cleves, OH
    – 1844-Simon Geeding
    – 1846-Simon Geeding of Illinois
    – 1849-Simon GeedingTo make it even more confusing, I found a fourth Simon Geeding born in 1849 on Geni.com.

    An obscure search led me to a FIFTH Simon Geeding. Actually, he’s a Simon Geeding Jr. So I guess that means there’s a SIXTH Simon Geeding?! Also, Jr. had a son named Josephus! What a GREAT name! We have a JOSEPHUS!

    So, there should obviously be a Simon Geeding Sr, right? NO! Instead, 1813-Simon Geeding’s father isn’t even a Geeding or has the first name Simon. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the end of the line, I can’t find anything that goes back further than L. Simon Geeting born in 1788. Cool, I may have just traced my family tree to the 16th Century, and discovered I’m probably not a Geeding but a Geeting.


    If I want more information on L. Simon Geeting, I have to sign up for a free account. Well, I probably should, or, I can do a search on “L. Simon Geeting” and see what I can find. And, now I’m back at FindAGrave.com. But get this, there’s even a photo! It turns out L. Simon and Simon Jr were both preachers. And, I think I may have posted about one of these guys before.

    converted PNM file

    Let’s just make it a little more confusing. L. Simon Geeding may not even be correct because WikiTree has him listed as Simon L Geeding.

    It looks like this Rev. Simon Geeting had a father named George Adam Geeting. Well, let’s see what we have on him. It turns out, a lot. Now, I may have discovered my European ancestors and German name, and I may have to visit this marker and do a little research on the Church of the United Brethren in Christ.


    Oh, and you thought I was done. Well, I’m darn close. I’m tired and going to bed. But, here’s the tail end of my family trail. I have no idea how many generations I’ve gone back. But I have now researched it to the 15th Century, and all for free. Wow, what a time to be alive to have all this information at my fingertips or pants pocket. I think some of this is a bit of a retread, so my apologies. I’m almost 50, I can’t remember everything.

  • Saving Private Ryan was on when I got home from church. When I watched the scene where James Frederick Ryan of Minnesota is mistaken for James Francis Ryan of Iowa, I thought the actor looked much like Rob Gronkowski. Obviously, it wasn’t him, but I was surprised I didn’t recognize it was Nathan Fillion. I always thought it was cool that Ted Dansen was his commanding officer.
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Your Bag of Randomness for Friday, March 14, 2025

  • I’m a bit sleepy and haven’t proofread anything so take your chances.

 

  • Judge orders Trump administration to give fired workers their jobs back

    A judge has ordered several federal government agencies to reinstate the jobs of probationary employees fired en masse by the Trump administration last month.

    Judge William Alsup called the sacking of these employees part of a “sham” strategy that aimed to circumvent proper procedures for reducing the federal workforce.

    The order will apply to thousands of probationary workers who were fired at the Agriculture, Defence, Energy, Interior, Treasury, and Veterans Affairs departments.

    During Thursday’s hearing, the Department of Justice maintained that the firings were done based on guidance – rather than a directive – from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

  • As much as I don’t like being on dating apps, I justify it saying there’s no better way for me to meet and make new friends or be in a potential romantic relationship. It’s funny, the moment I decide that I no longer am going to do the reaching out by liking profiles, women have been reaching out to me. They usually compliment my smile, which I always thought was a throwaway low-hanging-fruit kinda comment; especially when I was presented with a Best Smile Award for a speech communications class and gave an impromptu acceptance speech. But, I’ve been embracing it. Actually, I’ve decided to own it. For a while I stopped smiling with my teeth because when I was courting the mother of my children I mentioned that I didn’t have to wear braces and she quickly assured me “Oh, they aren’t that jacked up.”Last week, an exceptional lady told me I was handsome at two different times. Other than my mom and grandma, I can’t recall ever hearing any woman of dating age ever tell me that, not even the one I was married to for 18 years. Her comment made me lose my balance of sorts.Most girls aren’t very direct with their flirting or intentions on dating apps, but I was impressed with someone who reached out to me yesterday. After a few exchanges, she gave me her number, which was a great sign, but for some reason I’m not quite comfortable giving mine out. But I have to give the girl props on her reply, “Here I sit, with patience, as you slow play me. it’s cool though, I’ll play along. You’re the first contestant I’ve found with real potential. Good night, Keefe. Dinner’s on me if you get the pop-culture reference.” I’m eating a little humble pie here as I can’t catch the pop-culture reference, and neither can ChatGPT. I’m guessing it has something to do with Kieffer Sutherland.

  • How Brand New 370 Million $ Aircraft Are Cruelly Tested Inside Giant Fridge

 

  • This short western movie is ten years old, but this is the first I’ve known about it. I thought I’d end things with some adult or crude humor.In the tradition of classic westerns, a narrator sets up the story of a lone gunslinger who walks into a saloon. However, the people in this saloon can hear the narrator and the narrator may just be a little bit bloodthirsty.
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Your Bag of Nothing for Thursday, March 13, 2025

  • Randomly thinking about the cars left on the moon by the Apollo missions. There are three up there. The rovers were designed with a top speed of about eight mph (13 km/h), although Eugene Cernan recorded a maximum speed of 11.2 mph (18.0 km/h), giving him the (unofficial) lunar land-speed record. They ran on batteries, which have vastly improved since the early Seventies. I wonder how easy it would be to swap out the old batteries and replace them with new ones.

 

  • Every now and then I’ll start to analyze stuff I’ve always been familiar with and become astonished and upset I’ve overlooked the significance for so long. Most recently, it was World War II and the European Theater. The time between D-Day (June 6, 1944) and the fall of Berlin and Hitler’s suicide is basically 11 months. I guess I thought from D-Day to the end of that part of the war was a few years. But taking back all of Europe in less than a year is mightily impressive. Just think of all the planning and logistics it took for that to happen in a relatively short time. It makes me admire Eisenhower ever more.

 

  • I wanted to watch Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and saw it is only available to stream for free on PlutoTV. So, I downloaded the app and started the movie, and it’s all in Spanish!? All the menu options were in English, but the audio was all Spanish. There was nothing in the settings to change the language. Confused, I looked online and found it’s a common problem. Luckily I uninstalled it and the reinstall fixed the issue. And no, I wasn’t using a VPN and since there was only one option for the app, I know I didn’t accidentally download the Spanish version.
    • When I was in college, we didn’t have cable television and it was hard to get a signal over the air, so we watched a lot of movies on VHS over and over again. None more for me than The Fugitive. I say all that because I often use the name of the made-up drug in the movie around my close friends as an inside joke. So, I had a huge laugh when I saw this watching Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. Interestingly, when I looked it up online, it seemed that no one had ever made the connection. Other fans have bought the URL to the fictional company in the movie and honor the made-up drug – DevlinMacgregor.com/Provasic

 

  • “Right now the economy is so bad, Elon Musk is thinking about laying off Donald Trump.” — Jimmy Fallon

 

  • President Trump, here’s a wild suggestion. When it’s time for a new press secretary, hire Matt Laurer. Here’s not doing anything. I double-dog dare you.

 

 

  • I haven’t had time to research this website for any legitimacy, but thought y’all might like to check it out. Congress Live Net Worth Tracker – We used our data on politicians’ stock portfolios to calculate live net worth estimates for members of Congress.

 

  • I can’t believe so many people are okay with the President using the White House to advertise cars.

 

  • Robert J. Moriarty, a retired U.S. Marine Corps fighter pilot, who in 1984 illegally flew his Beechcraft Bonanza under the Eiffel Tower, a stunt inspired by his extensive combat experience and record-setting aviation achievements, including being the youngest naval aviator in the Vietnam War.This audacious act, performed on March 31, 1984, during a trans-Atlantic ferry flight from Paris, led French authorities to install bars at the base of the Eiffel Tower to prevent similar incidents, highlighting the structure’s history as a target for aviation challenges since the early 20th century.

    Moriarty’s motivation was simply “for fun,” as he stated, connecting his stunt to a historical precedent set during World War II, when a German Messerschmitt Bf 109 pilot flew under the Eiffel Tower to evade an American fighter, showcasing the tower’s role in aviation daring.

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