Bag of Randomness for Monday, September 14, 2020

The LA Rams could not have chosen an uglier uniform to open their new stadium with.They looked like old tattered practice unis. Their new stadium is beautiful, but I’m surprised it only holds $70,000 for an NFL game.

I’m not a fan of all the fan noise being pumped into NFL stadiums. Some of it has been too loud.

Every school day, around mid-morning, DaughterGeeding and BoyGeeding like to take a break and go for a brief walk. I’m usually stuck on a conference call when they leave but I was able to break free and follow them on Friday. It was nice to see that as they cross the street, they always hold hands. I doubt this continues for much longer, so I’m trying to cherish it while I still can.

I’ve used a kneeling office chair for the last four or five years. It was cheapest version I could find on Amazon as I just wanted to experiment using one for a full workday. Overall, I like it, but the padding in is cheap. I’ve tried to modify it a few times by pulling the fabric staples out and replacing the padding with an old memory foam pillow. It was better, but still didn’t cut it. I found one with much better padding on Amazon, but thought I’d try Craigslist. Lucky me, there was one for sale and it was less than three miles from GeedingManor, but the man selling it set an odd price. I talked him down to $65.

How a mysterious man fooled a Harvard scholar into believing the ‘Gospel of Jesus’ Wife’ was real

You can modify that headline to apply to a few other stories this year.

  • “How a mysterious man fooled Liberty University into believing the pool boy cuckolding your wife is a virtue.”
  • “How a mysterious man fooled Evangelicals into believing he’s a Christian president”

Today’s dose of capitalism run amok – Louis Vuitton Launches $961 Covid Face Shields

A World War II veteran will get his final wish to have Juicy Fruit-themed casket

https://twitter.com/RexChapman/status/1304525341835382784

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Bag of Randomness for Friday, September 11, 2020

Every September 11, former White House press secretary under Bush43 will tweet the events from 2001 as they happened. The first few years he did this I thought it was thoughtful and sincere way to honor what happened that day. Now, I think it’s an act of self-absorption.

I wonder what Marissa Mayer has been up to. She was a standout at Google and tasked with saving Yahoo!, but that didn’t quite work out. But I’m expecting a huge comeback, but not sure when. This is the latest on her Wikipedia page:

After leaving Yahoo! in 2017, Mayer started Lumi Labs with former colleague Enrique Munoz Torres. The company is based in Palo Alto and is focused on artificial intelligence and consumer media.

Lumi Labs, per their website, is stealthy.

I saw a new commercial from Disney promoting visiting their parks with a focus on masks and sanitation. But a lot of it was holiday themed, which I guess means it’s the first Christmas commercial of the year.

Dame Diana Rigg death was reported yesterday. I really not familiar with any of her previous work, but I adored her as Lady Olena in Game of Thrones. She had some of the best and most scathing one-liners.

Really, what’s the point of these short stubby screwdrivers? Why would someone prefer to use it over a regular-sized screwdriver? I’m no handyman, but never have I worked on anything in which I thought a short stubby screwdriver would function better than a regular-sized screwdriver.

Maybe I’ll change my mind one day, but it’s hard for me to believe anyone willfully working for the Trump Administration is doing it more so for love of country than they are for themselves. I’ve changed my stance on several Bush43 thoughts after the passage of time, thought and reflection, and being exposed to additional information and perspective, so I suppose it could happen.

The Woodward audio recording interviews are getting a lot of attention about what and when the president knew about COVID19 and how he mislead his subjects the country.One thing I haven’t heard is regarding this is Vice-President Pence’s involvement. He knows everything the president knows. This isn’t like the time FDR didn’t let Truman know about the bomb. Pence was also leading the COVID-19 task force and thus chose to mislead the public just like Trump.

Not too long ago, I mentioned I’m a sucker for AmazonBasics products. Yesterday, CNN posted an investigation into the safety of a lot of their products.

U2 has updated their Twitter profile picture. They used the heart-in-suitcase image in their All That You Can’t Leave Behind album and tour. That image has always fascinated me. The imagery of a trip to heaven and packing for it, there’s only one thing you can bring. Love. It’s the only thing that you can bring and leave behind. I’m not the type who would get a tattoo, but I’ve always told others if I were to get one, it would be of that image. It’s been my only Twitter profile picture since its inception in 2008.

I Accidentally Accumulated the World’s Largest Archive of ’80s Esprit Merch

Michelle’s archive (for which she created an Instagram account) is both an act of love and a valuable lesson in archival work. “Throughout the years I collected iconic Esprit garments from the ’80s,” she says about that work, “I became serious about the archive in 2017 when I received a personal Esprit collection containing over 1,800 artefacts from a friend and former Esprit employee who passed away. She knew how much I loved the brand and trusted me with her collection.”

President Trump is having trouble reading simple words and surprised at the things his teleprompter tells him to say. You can tell he puts in a lot of effort in things he has to communicate verbally. Both of these occurred yesterday.

https://twitter.com/CamJunior1972/status/1304162723903791111?s=09

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Bag of Randomness for Thursday, September 10, 2020

I’m predicting the only Texas high school football teams who will complete this season will be those 2A and lower. They aren’t as populated and can more easily social distance in school and within their own communities. I at least think 90% of all six-man schools will complete their season.

Tuesday was the first day students could physically attend class at WifeGeeding’s school. Later that evening we received word a teacher was exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID-19.

Trump just gotta Trump. Audio recordings of him admitting he knew how dangerous COVID-19 was going to be despite playing it down in public are released and he distracts by stating he’d like to nominate Ted Cruz to the Supreme Court. And his defenders just put ear muffs on and refuse to live in reality.

TMZ – President Trump Autographed Bible For Sale

The autographed Bible is going up for sale through the memorabilia company, Moments In Time — and they’re hawking this slice of Trump history for a cool $37,500.

Robot dogs join US Air Force exercise giving glimpse at potential battlefield of the future

Emerging from United States Air Force planes, four-legged robot dogs scampered onto an airfield in the Mojave Desert, offering a possible preview into the future of warfare.
But the exercise conducted last week, one of the US military’s largest ever high-tech experiments, wasn’t a movie set.
Flying into a possibly hostile airstrip aboard an Air Force C-130, the robot dogs were sent outside the aircraft to scout for threats before the humans inside would be exposed to them, according to an Air Force news release dated September 3.
The electronic canines are just one link in what the US military calls the Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS). It uses artificial intelligence and rapid data analytics to detect and counter threats to US military assets in space and possible attacks on the US homeland with missiles or other means.
Tech. Sgt. John Rodiguez, 321st Contingency Response Squadron security team, provides security with a Ghost Robotics Vision 60 prototype at a simulated austere base during the Advanced Battle Management System exercise on Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, Sept. 1, 2020. The ABMS is an interconnected battle network – the digital architecture or foundation – which collects, processes and shares data relevant to warfighters in order to make better decisions faster in the kill chain. In order to achieve all-domain superiority, it requires that individual military activities not simply be de-conflicted, but rather integrated ??? activities in one domain must enhance the effectiveness of those in another domain. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Cory D. Payne)

 

In other dystopian news: AI Wrote An Op-Ed Convincing Humans That Robots Will Not Replace Humans

It cracks me up when Bo Jackson responds to highlight clips people post of him.

This a very short video, but be sure to notice how the moving circular dot becomes a moon.

South Dakota governor uses coronavirus relief funds for $5 million tourism ad despite COVID surge

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s administration announced Tuesday that it is using federal coronavirus relief funds to pay for a $5 million tourism ad campaign aimed at drawing people to the state. The move comes even as the state emerges as one of the nation’s top hot spots for COVID-19 infections.

The 30-second spot, which premiered on Fox News alongside Noem’s speech at the Republican National Convention last month, features the governor saying that “with our breathtaking landscapes and wide-open spaces, we’re a place to safely explore.” But the state currently ranks second in the country for new cases per capita over the last two weeks, with 439 new cases per 100,000 people.

https://twitter.com/RexChapman/status/1303819698438582273

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Bag of Randomness for Tuesday, September 8, 2020

Saturday morning started off with the burial of BoyGeeding’s guinea pig, Lilly Noodle. DaughterGeeding first noticed the lifeless critter and placed a small American flag over his body. She then spoke to me and WifeGeeding, and then we broke the news to BoyGeeding who just broke down in tears. I have this sweet photo of BoyGeeding wrapped up in his mother’s arms with tears and snot dripping down, but posting it would just feel wrong, a violation of boundaries of some sort which I can’t adequately articulate.

I’m not even a hockey fan, and I found this insulting. Our local NHL club, the Dallas Stars, played and won a game-7 playoff game. I watched the NBC5 10PM sports segment and the game wasn’t even mentioned. There was a brief story on the Cowboys, who are doing nothing but practicing, and high school football highlights.

Truth.

This Eastern Kentucky football player is an interesting-looking specimen.

I’m surprised this was even a consideration. I always used to pick up a copy when visiting what was then Carswell AFB.

Trump Says He Will Reverse Pentagon Plan to Close Newspaper That Informs and Speaks for Troops – The reversal on Stars and Stripes came as President Trump was in full defensive mode over reports that he had disparaged military personnel.

In select locations, Arby’s is selling meat by the pound.

News from across the pond.

Queen Elizabeth’s Sandringham Estate Opens To Host Drive-In Movies

School that Boris Johnson visited to show was ‘safe’ closes due to coronavirus days after visit

Albany man rescued from Lake George by priests on a floating tiki bar

The video is available to watch in the article – President Trump Confronts Faux Barack Obama In Resurfaced ‘The Apprentice’-Style Video

President Donald Trump is shown firing an actor playing former President Barack Obama in a recently resurfaced video from 2012, when he was considering running for president.

The scene was reportedly made for the 2012 Republican National Convention, but was axed from the broadcast. There were reports that year that Trump would make some kind of surprise appearance on the first night of the convention. But those plans were scuttled because of the threat of a hurricane striking the Tampa region, where the convention was held.

Adapt and overcome.

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