Fraudsters

I am fed up with being given the runaround by unscrupulous merchants.  The most recent example of this occurred recently.  I had ordered a limited edition James Bond replica prop online last week (a Moonraker laser gun!).  This was after an extensive search on the internet i.e. checking Amazon and ebay.  I found the cheapest price was from an external seller on Amazon, and – a useful little piece of advice – I actually checked whether the seller had their own website and looked at the price on that, and it was even cheaper.  So I ordered it from there.  Got my e-mail confirmation, and didn’t think more about it until this week.  I wanted to know the status of my order – I hadn’t received any shipping info – so checked online and found that it had been cancelled but nobody had told me.  I happened to be paying my credit card this week, and so I knew that my credit card had already been charged for the order.  Nice of the seller to contact me I thought, as the alarm bells were going off.  So I contacted them, and found out that they had cancelled the order as it was flagged as possibly fraudulent because the shipping address on my order was different to my credit card address.  This in itself is a joke – I wanted it delivered to my workplace rather than my home address – and is hardly a reason to cancel an order.  And I’ve done this many times before, and never had an issue.  They told me to get in touch with my bank – I did, but nothing they could do as nothing was flagged as fraudulent on my end and the charge went through on my credit card.  So after some back and forth with the merchant, they told me I should reorder the item.  I had some concerns – mainly that I wanted to make sure that I wouldn’t be double-charged, but they assured me that my previous order would be refunded (it hasn’t yet).  And then, disappointingly but unsurprisingly, the item has disappeared from their website so I can’t reorder it.  I happened to check Amazon, and it is still there (at the slightly higher price) from the same merchant.  This is all too suspicious.  And all for a crappy plastic copy of a gun from one of the worst Bond films.  Not happy.  Probably not worth it.  I’m not reordering anything until I get my money back from the cancelled order – at least I’ve got e-mail proof if I need to dispute the charge.

Murder Capital

Is Oxford the most dangerous “real” city in the UK to live in?  Between Morse, Lewis and Endeavour (which is currently showing here in the Downton Abbey Sunday viewing slot), it appears to have an ungodly amount of crime and murder.  Are there any rivals to Oxford?  There are a lot of fictional places that I wouldn’t want to live in that have had more than their fair share of tragedy and violence (Midsomer, Hollyoaks, Walford!), but I’m not sure of any “real” worse cities than Oxford.  A quick online search reveals that Cabot Cove in New England is the most dangerous place on Earth – so stay well clear of there and Jessica Fletcher (she must have made a fortune from all the murders she wrote about, which always seemed suspicious to me - there is no smoke without fire…)    

Funny Little Plans

I’ve decided that I want to go to one new national park each year – so last year it was Glacier.  This year I was hoping it would be Crater Lake – but I’ve run into an issue.  This is a webcam view of Crater Lake from earlier today:

Wildfires are currently really impacting Crater Lake (as well as Seattle, as we once again have poor air quality) – resulting in road and trail closures, and as you can see really affecting the views.  I might have to rethink my plans.  The problem is that Crater Lake gets a lot of snow and the roads around Crater Lake close in October and don’t open until July.  So the window of opportunity to visit is small.  I want to visit in September, but not in smoky conditions.  Considering I’ve already been to Mount Rainier, North Cascades and the Olympic National Parks this year – and will continue to do so over the rest of the year (I particularly want to explore the beach areas of Olympic National Park – and I want to make full use of my National Parks annual pass!) – then that might have to suffice unless I end up going to hotter States later in the year.

GoT S7E7

I’ve had the chance to reflect on the Game of Thrones season finale last night, and I think much like last week my overriding feeling is a sense of mild disappointment.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s still one of the best TV shows out there – and certainly in an age of streaming and on-demand TV, it is probably the last remaining event TV that I have to watch on a Sunday night so I can discuss it at the water cooler on Monday morning.  But having set such a high bar, maybe it is unrealistic for me to expect it to meet my lofty expectations.  Especially now that events have gone beyond the books, and I think that has definitely hampered the plotting.  What I think this season has really lacked is unpredictability and nuance – it seems clear that they have had to rush through this season, and probably will do next season, just to get to the endgame.  With this, comes a host of issues – laws of time and space disregarded, a lack of character development and insight, the sidelining of more interesting minor characters for the big players in the endgame.  The show has felt hurried and, perhaps worst of all, contrived.  This is especially true of the last few episodes, where we’ve had some ridiculous plot devices to ensure that the Night King has a zombie dragon that can destroy the Wall, a string of characters with history re-uniting for some gentle banter, and some unnecessary and blatant fan servicing.  For me, the biggest disappointment of the finale was the lack of surprise.  Almost everything that happened was already known or easily predictable – Cersei’s plotting, Jon’s parentage, Jon and Dani getting it on, the Night King marching on Westeros, Littlefinger’s demise.  It is perhaps ironic that the character who most sowed and thrived chaos was killed off, because Game of Thrones is at its best when chaotic, crazy things happen (Ned Stark, the Red Wedding!) – and I feel that is sadly lacking now.  We did get some great scenes – I’m thinking Cersei and Tyrion and Cersei and Jamie in particular, plus some token comic relief with Podrick and Bronn – but that doesn’t really make up for a season with some great action set pieces but very little emotional connection to the characters and the events unfolding.  One of the recaps I was reading online stated that it felt as if the story was driving the characters instead of the other way around this season, and I couldn’t agree more.  We’ve got some time now until the last season and its remaining few episodes, but I don’t feel so bad about having to wait for them (particularly compared to waiting for this season) as I fear that Game of Thrones may have already peaked and we are just ticking off the boxes now until we get to the inevitable showdowns between Cersei and Dani and Jon and the Night King.  

Nothing

Somehow today just kind of got away from me, and now the Game of Thrones finale is about to start and I haven't even got round to downloading my photos from yesterday yet.  I'll add photos to yesterday's entry at some point this week.

I have absolutely no comments to make on McGregor vs Mayweather.  A ridiculous, over-hyped charade that shames boxing.

I also have absolutely no comments to make on the Premiership - it seems like I once again need to rescind my support of Palace.  I did get a lot of satisfaction in seeing Liverpool destroy Arsenal though.

It's now 8.59.  Time to watch the Game of Thrones finale.  I'll write about it tomorrow.  Enjoy!

Mount Rainier - Sunrise

With clear and sunny skies in the forecast, I got up early today (like really early, I left the house at 5.15 am!) to go to Mount Rainier today.  I went to the Sunrise area, on the east side of the mountain.  It's not as popular as the Paradise area, but is at a higher elevation, quicker to drive to, and just as photogenic.  I combined a few different trails to do something of a loop - in combination, just about the right amount of elevation change and distance covered to tire me out but not totally exhaust me.  Glad I got there early, because when I was leaving there was a MASSIVE queue of cars waiting to get in!

I'll update with some photos tomorrow.

PHOTOS ADDED!

Texas

The number 4 reason I moved away from Texas - the weather.  And here we are:

Let's see how Trump manages to screw up dealing with this.  With the hurricane dominating the news, he has already managed to sneak in some controversial actions (banning transgenders from the military, and pardoning a racist sheriff), wished Texans "good luck", and then escaped to Camp David for the weekend.  A-hole.

Lottery

Sadly, the fact that I'm writing this blog and haven't quit my job meant that I didn't win the 750 million dollar Powerball jackpot yesterday.  The odds of winning were 1 in 292201338, so I didn't really fancy my chances.  With these odds it's no wonder these jackpots grow to enormous amounts - I think the last time I bought a ticket the jackpot was 1.5 billion dollars...  The fact that I'm even buying a lottery ticket brings shame to me as a qualified statistician, but hey we can all dream.

Lake View Cemetery

One of my Chinese friends at work had never been to Bruce Lee's grave site even though he'd lived in Seattle for about 15 years, so I took him on a lunchtime pilgrimage to it the other day.  It's not really that far away from the office, but quite significantly uphill so a good workout!  I think I've posted a photo of the gravestone before, so I won't again.  But the cemetery is at a nice location, and called Lake View Cemetery for a reason.  My photo probably doesn't do the view justice.

Eclipse

We had clear skies over Seattle yesterday morning, so I was able to join most of the rest of the office on the roof of our building and watch the eclipse yesterday (along with what seemed like most of the country).  And driving into work and looking around the vicinity of our building, there were hundreds of other people doing the same thing – so it was a nice moment of unity, especially in light of recent events and a distinctly polarizing president (and, naturally, that dumbass was photographed looking at the sun without glasses on).  You really needed the solar eclipse glasses, because you couldn’t really see the eclipse without them (pinhole cameras suck).  I didn’t get a pair of glasses, but fortunately there were enough people on the roof to share glasses around.  Was it spectacular?  Not really – we didn’t have a total eclipse in Seattle, I think it was around 93%, but it was enough to notice a change in lighting and temperature.  I didn’t check any shadows, but apparently they got weird as well.  The total eclipse, where it goes really dark for a few minutes, would have been something  - a few people at work went to see it, but I’m not sure the time, effort and cost to get into the zone of totality (some of the hotel prices on Sunday/Monday were beyond ridiculous) was worth it for just those 2 minutes.  It was kind of cool – but for some reason I had a sense of déjà vu that this wasn’t my first solar eclipse, but for the life of me I can’t remember if that is really true or whether I’ve just seen too many apocalyptic films.  No photos – you needed something better than my iPhone to get a good picture, but loads of good photos and videos can be found on the web.  Not quite a once-in-a-lifetime moment – there is another total eclipse in the US in 2024.  But sadly, if you’re stuck in the UK then you’ll have to wait until 2090 for your next one (and it’s probably more likely to be overcast!).

GoT S7E6

I’ve had a night to digest yesterday’s episode, plus read some recaps/reviews this morning.  My initial reaction still stands, which is one of mild disappointment.  I should have written down my predictions before the episode started.  For a start, I thought we might lose more members of the Magnificent Seven – rather than just Dennis Pennis – but that is because I didn’t realize that there were additional members on the team with no names and no lines, so just like Star Trek away team extras they were always doomed.  I think it was pretty obvious that Dany was going to save the day – much like Gandalf in Lord of the Rings.  And it was also obvious that one of the dragons was going to die – though the prospect of a very CGI-heavy zombie dragon is an interesting one (does it breathe ice now instead of fire?).  But the whole thing is just too soaked in ridiculousness - the mission was stupid in the first place, the various 2-way conversations in the lead up to the battle were as corny as hell, the Night King was able to take a dragon down just by throwing an icicle javelin – really?!, all sense of time and distance has been totally ignored throughout this season (just how long were they stuck on that island, and don’t the undead army have any kind of projectile weapon?), and how remarkably timely Uncle Benjen’s brief cameo was.  Compared to other battles, this one I was emotionally disconnected to – just mowing down one zombie after another in a very Walking Dead type manner.  And too much fan service – think Tormund and Brienne, Arya and Sansa, and particularly Jon and Dany.  We need the emotional impact of a major character death – it had better come in the season finale.  

Boston Counter-Protesters

I'm no fan of Boston people -- in particular their obnoxiousness when it comes to their sports teams - but some of their signs during the counter-protests to a right-wing rally over the weekend were great:

"Ugh... where do I even begin"
"Boston only hates the Yankees"
"Losing twice wasn't enough?  #1865 #1945"
"We are on the right side of history"
"How can you hate matzo ball soup?"
"This episode of Black Mirror sucks"
"Will trade racists for refugees"
"You know it's bad when a straight white guy makes a sign"
"I prefer the other White Walkers"

Liverpool 1 - 0 Crystal Palace

I am worried.  Palace looked like a second-tier side - against a Liverpool side that Palace normally do well against, and who have Champions League qualifying on their mind.  I don't think Frank de Boer is going to still be the manager by Christmas - they just looked so disjointed, very little threat up front, and continually giving away possession cheaply.  Palace are not good enough, and nowhere near good enough, to play that expansive, technical, possession-based Ajax/Barcelona style of game that I think he wants them to play.

A couple of other miscellaneous thoughts:

- Happy Birthday to me today!  Just another day as far as I'm concerned, I haven't celebrated a birthday for years.  The only significance is that I plan to have a lazy day today before making a more concerted effort to diet and exercise beginning tomorrow.  I'm doing quite well on the exercise front - though not averaging the 15,000 steps a day I hoped for, I'm comfortably doing over 10,000 steps a day.  The main thing is that I haven't been eating particularly healthily recently, and I'd like to improve on that.

- I have no intention of travelling down to Oregon or across to Idaho to catch the Total Eclipse on Monday.  The American media is going doolally over this event, but I don't fancy braving the traffic and the crowds just for a couple of minutes of darkness during the day.  I think in Seattle we're going to get about a 90% eclipse rather than a total eclipse, and that is sufficient for me.  The long drive down to Oregon to watch a 100% eclipse is not worth the trouble, especially with predictions that the traffic is going to be horrendous, all accommodation was booked out a long time ago, and I'm just not sure it's worth it (and certainly not the "life-changing event" I've seen it described as).

Milk Duds

Another in the series of American candies - and we have a classic today: Milk Duds.  Big discs of chocolate-covered caramel, hard and chewy, and have been around for ages.  I have no idea what a "Dud" is, and "Milk" is also something of a stretch, but they make for a good road trip candy, and apparently are also a popular movie-watching treat.  All I know is that they are incredibly filling, which probably means they are absolutely not good for you!

Hello!

How do you answer the door to Mormons?  I think this might have been my first encounter with them – at least in the US – recently.  I opened the door, instantly twigged who they were from the way they dressed and the religious pamphlets they had in their hands, and before they could say anything I said I wasn’t interested and shut the door in their face.  On reflection, I’m wondering if I was too rude.  I don’t particularly appreciate having my personal space invaded by someone trying to sell me a religion.  But I think I could have been more polite – I just didn’t want to engage them in conversation, no matter how patient or good people they might be.  I hope they didn’t take it personally – I’ve got to believe that they probably encounter a lot worse on their door-to-door rounds.  I’ve watched the Book of Mormon – that, and the fact that I think some of their churches look fantastic architecturally (I’m particularly thinking of one I used to live near to in San Diego), is about as far as my interest goes.  Ironically, on my road trip from Texas back to Seattle, one of the best places I overnighted at was near Salt Lake City in Utah in the heart of the “Mormon Corridor” – great hotel, nice food, nice people.  It seems that the quality of life is very good in that part of the country, but I fear you would be quickly stigmatized if you were to move there and people found out that you didn’t believe in God.  At least you probably wouldn’t have to deal with any white supremacists there!

Land of the Free, Home of the Brave?

I’m struggling to articulate how I feel about America at the moment.  Anger, disgust, but hope that not all is bad when so many people – across the social and political spectrum – can condemn both white supremacists and the president.  How far can Trump push the line without consequence?  It seems way too much.  Trump’s inability to denounce Nazis would seem to cross the line –  and this backlash seems to be the most vocal of any of the ill-considered things he has done so far.  Yet the Republican Party still continues to not publicly criticize Trump – how long can they continue to support his presidency?  Perhaps the only silver lining on this cloud of horrible racism is that hopefully more Americans get to see the real Trump – a thoroughly boorish, unpleasant human being who should not be President.  There is always going to be a sad minority of Americans who still continue to support these despicable extreme far-right beliefs, but the fact that they even have a voice in modern society is a disgrace.  The American Civil war was over 150 years ago – the Confederates lost, get over it.  Mind you, a recent poll had a quarter of the people asked saying that they thought Trump’s response was sufficient – that seems worryingly high.  There was even an “alt-right” rally in Seattle this weekend – and probably many more across the country – but nothing as horrifying and fatal as the one in Charlottesville.  This quote from a KKK leader sums things up “They were a bunch of Communists out there protesting against somebody’s freedom of speech.  So it doesn’t bother me that they got hurt at all.”.  Ignorance.  Of all the celebrity reactions, I think I agree most with Seth Rogen who tweeted “By the way, fuck these nazi motherfuckers.”.  STRONG OPINIONS MEAN STRONG LANGUAGE – I don’t apologize for any profanity on matters like this.

Blue Tuesday

It has just been one of those days – down in the dumps; lacking energy; irritable; fed up with everyone and everything.  Mind you, every workday for the last year has felt like this!  Today just happened to be worse.  And for all sorts of reasons – personal, professional, stuff within my control, stuff outside my control, trivial things, deep things, a perfect storm of shittiness.  Everything just got to me today.  I wish I was someone else, somewhere else, doing something different.  I wish they’d hurry up and invent the Holodeck from Star Trek.  Or if I’m living some The Matrix type existence, well my simulated reality absolutely sucks.  I crave change – something different and  something better in my future.  The status quo can’t and won’t suffice.  Is this a new midlife crisis?  Or a continuation of whatever midlife crisis I’ve already suffered through throughout my 30s?  Jeez, getting older is a real downer isn't it…    

Interlaken and Montlake

After a relatively uneventful and lazy weekend, I felt like I needed to get out today.  So I took a long lunch break and did a city walk that was relatively close to work: “Interlaken and Montlake: An Urban Wilderness”.  Basically, a short stroll through a small green oasis within the city – and somewhere I hadn’t been before.  Only about 3.5 miles (plus the distance to/from my office – maybe another mile), no big inclines (the biggest elevation change was probably the one I actually had to make in getting to the start of the walk from the office), no scenic viewpoints, just a simple walk amongst the trees and mostly away from traffic, plus a detour to some pretty houses.  Nothing special, just an opportunity to stretch my legs.  My book said about the trees “It all makes for a spectacular interplay of light and shadow” – maybe in the evening, but nothing particularly spectacular about it at lunchtime.  The walk didn’t even go past anywhere I could grab some lunch, which was mightily disappointing.  I doubt I’ll bother with this one again.

GoT S7E5

Could today's episode beat last week's?  Nope.  A break from the action as we set up the big showdown in the North.  But still good - albeit rushed.  Observations as I watched below.


Hello Eastwatch to the opening credits
Seems implausible that Jamie and Bronn would "escape" so far away from the battle
Goodbye House Tarly - is was nice briefly knowing you
So Jorah's back.
Sounds like the worst plan ever - to kidnap a zombie, and then smuggle that into King's Landing to show to Cersei?  What could possibly go wrong?!
Sansa/Cersei/Daenerys - who is the worst Queen?
Heavyweight match up - Tyrion and Jamie
GENDRY!!!!!!!!  A blast from the past - last seen rowing away many seasons ago.  And nice hammer!
Was that The Actor Kevin Eldon?  As a different character?  Weird.
Cersei expecting?  Didn't see that coming.
SAMWELL YOU MUST LISTEN TO WHAT GILLY IS TELLING YOU ABOUT THE ANNULMENT - THAT IS JON SNOW'S PARENTAGE
Goodbye Oldtown
Littlefinger up to his tricks.
That is some Dream Team assembled to go beyond the Wall
Next week should be a good one.  The penultimate episode of any season, hopefully also including abbreviated seasons, always is.

Palace 0-3 Huddersfield

Oh dear.  Not the way you want to start a season.  A pasting at home to a likely fellow relegation candidate.  I was worried about this game - you'd much rather play one of the newly promoted teams, particularly one who has not been in the top league for a long time, later in the season rather than early.  And so it proved. This clearly goes to show that the goal of this season for Palace will be simply to stay up.  Frank de Boer has a lot of work to do - and it better happen quickly, before the pressure intensifies to make changes and make transfers.  And maybe Palace do need to splash that cash to get Sakho from Liverpool - though it doesn't help that they're Palace's next opponents (and probably not a good time to play them either after they were pegged back by a very controversial last minute equalizer in their opener).  Could be a long season.


A late addition to today's blog: some comments on today's events in Virginia.

I am angry.  Angry that in the 21st Century a Nazi rally can take place in the US.  The scenes in Charlottesville are disgusting.    And I am sickened by the fact that President Trump did not condemn these Nazis - instead blaming "all sides".  I'm sorry, but there is only one group that should be condemned for the violence and resultant deaths - and that is the white supremacists who organized this.  And there is only one person who can be blamed for inciting this kind of rally and emboldening these sick people - and that is the President.  

A few more photos

Since I was in the vicinity this week, a couple of close up shots of the iconic Space Needle.  We’re clearly in peak tourist season as there looked to be horrible lines to go up there – it’s not even the best or cheapest place in Seattle to get the best views.

And it finally looks like the smoky atmosphere we’ve had for the last couple of weeks might be clearing up this weekend – some cooler and cloudy weather coming in.  Maybe even some rain to break the current 50+ day run of no measurable rainfall.  This was the view of the downtown waterfront on Wednesday, and it was a clear day so you should have been able to see Mount Rainier in the background – instead, as you can see, even the stadiums are a little hazy in this shot.

Obsession

My current obsessions:

- Getting 3 stars on Level 188 of Two Dots on my phone.  It’s nigh on impossible, and it’s driving me crazy.
- Live PD on A&E TV station on Friday and Saturday nights.  You might have heard of Cops – the seminal camera following police around as they chase down bad guys show – and this is a scaled up live version of that, consisting of a disproportionate amount of white cops pulling over black drivers for minor infractions and finding drugs in their car
- Watching Road Rage videos on YouTube – perhaps to make me feel better about my driving!  It’s so easy to get lost watching pointless videos on YouTube – I’m also prone to watching Grand Theft Auto V Fails, and uncensored Gordon Ramsey.
- P. F. Chang’s Chicken Fried Rice – my go-to frozen meal, delicious
- Why there wasn’t an August 14 2017 issue of Time magazine?  We don’t always get an issue every week, but normally we get a double-issue the previous week to make up for it.  Nothing this week, and it just appears to have never got released rather than not delivered.  Very strange.
- Waiting for the LEGO NASA Apollo Saturn V set to come back in stock – inexplicably I really want to get this (and rumors that a big Millennium Falcon set is going to be released next month – that will also be one to get)
- Why the IKEA “Veberod” bench that I really want to get is out of stock and the expected delivery date at my local store keeps on being pushed back further and further each time I check (currently Sep 11 to Sep 18)
- Not really an obsession per say, although it could easily be turned into one if I wasn’t in a fit state of mind, but I found out today that a load of people at work got invited to a party over the weekend at one of our department’s senior manager’s home, but I wasn’t one of them.  Not really a surprise, but kind of  a disappointing reflection of my social (and/or professional) standing at work.  This on top of just finding out today that my manager’s manager has quit – someone who I liked a lot and putting a big spanner in the works for my hopes of transferring into a new group.  The nightmare scenario would be my manager taking over that role.  So I guess you can say I am getting increasingly obsessed with changing jobs.

Dunkirk

94% on Metacritic.  93% on Rotten Tomatoes.  I snuck away from work early today (not as bad as it sounds because I was in the office at 7am) to finally watch the universally acclaimed Dunkirk.  My rating (subject to change, as I'm still digesting what I watched): 7/10.  A good film - yes.  A great film - I'm not so sure.  I think it will win some Oscars, because technically it was superb - the cinematography, special effects and especially the sound design were all amazing.  Some of the best dog fights I've ever seen filmed - I could feel myself leaning my head to match the lean of the camera.  Definitely worth watching on a big IMAX screen - it looks amazing.  But my problem was with the characters and the storyline.  It was basically a very simple and linear series of set pieces - very intense, but lacking in nuance and depth.  And I think the idea of mixing up the timelines was probably a late one made in editing and I'm not sure if it was necessary.  The characters were, intentionally, nameless and somewhat undeveloped - I wonder whether the film would have worked better if it had better characterized protagonists.  But these are minor gripes - I will definitely watch it again, all of Christopher Nolan's films are better watched more than once (though perhaps they are not as clever as he thinks they are) and I may grow to like it more.  But is it one of the great war films?  I need convincing.    

The End of the World is Nigh

So President Trump has, with typical rationality and consideration, threatened to bring “fire and fury like the world has never seen” on North Korea.  This could be interpreted as a threat of a nuclear attack and nuclear war.  A worrying development indeed.  My first reaction was that Trump was threatening to let loose dragons, and maybe a Dothraki army, on North Korea – having just watched the latest Game of Thrones episode.  It wouldn’t surprise me if he believed that the US has a secret facility full of dragons ready to attack.  How long do we let this dangerous idiot and his cronies keep on yielding so much power?  Until he presses that big red launch button?  I hope the leaks from the White House keep on coming – with so little transparency from the people at top, it’s so important that the public knows what is going on.  But with so much bullshit spewing from his twitter feed, it’s difficult to take him seriously.  Certainly, he is the least presidential president in modern history.  Every single day of his presidency makes Obama look like a godsend.        

Job (Dis)Satisfaction

I think my manager has just crossed the line.  I was already frustrated with her over-controlling nature and the resulting lack of control I have over my work – but now her micro-management has gone one step further and she has set up regular meetings with my reports.  This is unacceptable.  It once again shows a lack of trust and a lack of respect.  I think this is the final straw – I’m going to ask to transfer into a different therapeutic area, with a different study team and different manager.  I’m sad to say that coming back to Seattle and to this job and this company hasn’t worked out so far – I’m disappointed, demoralized, unmotivated, and indifferent to the work I’ve been assigned.  I want to care about my job and my work, I want to feel passionate about what I’m doing – and I want the opportunity to show that I’m good at what I do and to earn the trust, respect and reward that comes from that.  I have been wholly mismanaged and underused since coming back, with little to no opportunity to prove my worth.  I can’t stress enough how important it is to have job satisfaction – I didn’t have it when I moved to Texas, and I don’t have it now.  The last 3 years have been very frustrating, and it has made me question my career and my future.  I really want to give it one more shot at finding a rewarding and satisfying job, preferably in the SoCal area, but if that doesn’t work out then I would seriously question whether I’d even want to stay in the US.  It’s not like there’s anything or anyone to keep me here... which may also be part of the problem…

GoT S7E4

A Stark family reunion (they have issues).  Incest?  The Onion Knight - the most sensible person in Westeros.  John and Theon (they have history).  DRAGON AND DORTHRAKI CARNAGE!  Bronn (one of the best characters) taking down a dragon like in The Hobbit!  Jamie cliff-hanger?  Holy cow, that was a pulsating episode.

The Cove Community Beach

A very pleasant, and very rare, social excursion this afternoon/this evening.  Was invited to a beach bonfire and picnic on a private beach.  It was really enjoyable - good company, good weather, good food and had a good time.  Not quite as hot as it has been, and not quite as smoky as it has been, but the haze still made for a quite spectacular sunset.

Seafair

It’s Seafair weekend in Seattle, which means the Blue Angels flying over the city and the workplace.  I did go up to the roof of our workplace to catch some of the action, but not exactly ideal viewing or flying conditions because the amount of smoke around Seattle has only got worse.  The location of our office is also not exactly where the air show is taking place, so we don’t get to see the full display and it’s often only a case of hearing rather than seeing the jets – but we do catch bits of the show.

The air quality is terrible which, combined with the heat, is making it horrific to spend any considerable amount of time outside – reminds me so much of my time in Texas.  I was thinking about going to Mount Rainier this weekend, but I think I might put that off until better viewing (and photographic) conditions return.  I still need to get my steps in, so I’ll have to find some shady and forested walks to do this weekend.

Summer TV

Lets have a quick look at my DVR to see what I'm currently recording/watching from the meager offerings on TV over the dog days of summer: Manhunt: Unabomber, Shooter, Suits, Broadchurch, The Sinner, What Would Diplo Do?, The President Show, The Great British Baking Show, Room 104, The Tunnel: Sabotage, Game of Thrones, Ray Donovan, Preacher, American Dad, Loaded, People of Earth, Last Week Tonight With John Oliver.  Apart from Game of Thrones, not really anything must-see - though I do think Preacher is very good, and The President Show has one of the best Trump impersonators around.

To Screw The Mooch

With the heat comes fire.  I woke up this morning to a faint burning smell, and apparently the whole region is enveloped with smoke from a load of wildfires burning in Canada that has carried south.  It’s nowhere near as bad as that time in San Diego when my office had to shut for a few days due to the really bad air quality resulting from nearby wildfires, but still not pleasant.  It’s definitely very hazy today and did notice that sunrise was more orange than normal as a result of the smoky atmosphere – I should have taken some photos…

I realized I haven’t even touched on the meteoric rise and fall of “The Mooch” in these blogs.  It’s clear that reality-TV star President Dump is turning the White House into a reality show.  Or at the least a very dark comedy….

My podcast intake seems to have exponentially increased – to the extent that I’ve started trying out more and more new shows.  The most recent permanent addition to my library – Ear Hustle, produced by prisoners within San Quentin – is very good so far.    

I want to see the film Dunkirk in IMAX 70mm – supposedly the  best way to view the film – but sadly there isn’t anywhere in the state of Washington where you can do that.  Disappointing.  Instead, I will have to resort to watching it in IMAX with Laser.  That’s for next week.  Over the last few weeks, I’ve had to give a history lesson on Dunkirk to various uninformed Americans and Chinese.

Thank god the noise from the wasp nest behind my downstairs wall has finally diminished – the sound of the wasps chewing the wood or doing whatever they were doing behind the wall was making my skin crawl.  Hopefully my landlord will soon cover up all the holes he put in the wall to drench the nest in chemicals.  I maybe should have done more to deal with the situation myself, but my DIY skills are limited to putting together Ikea furniture.

My daily step count has taken a bit of a knock recently – and the hot temperatures and bad air quality will not help my chances of averaging 15,000 steps a day.  As long as I record enough steps and activity to earn the Gold Prize (a $75 gift card) then I will be satisfied!  I’ve already resorted to watching some godawful and dated videos about dealing with stress and suchlike in order to add some more points to my total.

Some mid-year promotions were announced today.  Every single promotion in Statistics and Programming belonged to someone with a Chinese name.  I’m not sure if this is just reflective of the make-up of my department or some nefarious display of favoritism within my department, but I don’t like it  one bit and once again makes me question the lack of equality and the lack of inclusion that I have to endure in my current workplace.

Just finished watching the second season of The Expanse.  I do like a good Sci-fi show – and although it doesn’t quite reach the gold standard of say Battlestar Galactica, it is a very watchable space soap opera with nice Battlestar Galactica-esque visuals and a touch of political intrigue very pertinent to today’s highly charged political landscape.  Makes Doctor Who look like the cheap and dated show it really is (which I haven’t watched in years, and couldn’t give a monkeys about what sex the next Doctor is).

Excessive Heat Warning

Another day off work today, but after yesterday's excursions and the fact that our region is now under an Excessive Heat Warning I decided to postpone my planned trip to Mount Rainier.  I'll go another time, maybe even this weekend if I can get up early enough to avoid the worst of the weekend crowds.  The Excessive Heat Warning is a severe weather alert issued by the National Weather Service (the nearest the US has to the Met Office) and states that "unusually hot weather is forecast to begin today and continue through Friday.  Widespread record highs are expected.".  Seattle has only gone above 100 degrees Fahrenheit (about 38 degrees Celsius) 3 times since records began, but they expect a 4th time this week.  This is where the widespread lack of AC in our area is a real downer...