Prime Day 2022

We're about 2 weeks out from Amazon Prime Day.  And I'm ready for it this year.  I've got 8 things sitting in my cart, currently coming to a grand total of about $1,300.  Let's see if this figure comes down when we get to Prime Day.  And certainly for a few of these items, I am not beholden to a particular brand - so I'm fairly hopeful that I can find some good discounts.  Naturally, none of these things are close to essential so I might end up with nothing.  From the cheapest (some placemats) to the most expensive (a better portable AC unit than the one I currently have), I feel a degree of shame about my materialistic wants.     

Westworld

Westworld is a classic example of a big budget prestige drama that has gone off the rails.  I was a big fan of the first season - in fact I think I blogged about each episode, and bought the blu-ray.  But then the 2nd season underwhelmed and the third season was just a mess.  It shouldn't have been that way - a great premise, great actors, so many twists, so much potential.  But it lost the plot - it went too overboard with the multiple timelines and who is really human and who isn't, and the "bigger picture".  I lost interest and lost caring.  I'm disappointed with Westworld - but a different kind of disappointment than say the last season of Games of Thrones.  I don't feel anger, just indifference.  Which is why when the first episode of the 4th season aired this weekend, I didn't even bother watching.  I'm through with this show.  I don't remember anything about the 3rd season, and I'm not inclined to try to pick up the convoluted plot - if that's even possible - for this 4th season.  Good luck if you're still watching it.  You're probably the same kind of person that is still inexplicably watching The Walking Dead.     

Song of the Week #116

Some classic 80's for your enjoyment.

Every year ...

... after the first spell of really nice weather, the same thing happens to me.  Every year.  I get ravaged by insect bites.  And not just small bites, but big ones that result in these noticeable, red, swollen, itchy bite marks.  This weekend, my arms got hit hard.  Which is surprising, because I thought my legs would be the number one target as this was the first weekend of the year where my pasty white gams were on display.  Either way, perhaps a sad inditement of how appealing my blood is to insects.  And this is not a new phenomenon.  

Mischief

This popped up on my YouTube feed recently (I had to include the link here, because I wasn't able to imbed the video, but if that doesn't work then look up Peter Pan Goes Wrong on YouTube):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAVQtknp3XQ

And I have to say, I quite enjoyed it.  Very silly, very British, kind of like the next evolution of pantomime.  I had never seen this before, but when I googled the theater group it appears that they have had a few Christmas specials and a series on BBC, so you might be more aware of them than me.  But I noticed they also happened to be doing a US national tour of their play, and quite coincidentally they are in Seattle next week.  How fortuitous I thought, I think I'll get a ticket and go and watch them live.  Imagine my disappointment when I discovered every single one of their shows - and they are in Seattle for about 2 weeks - are sold out.  Gutted.  Hopefully I might catch one of their live shows another day (a less than subtle hint for something to do with certain family members when I'm next back in the UK!). 

Florida

I would consider moving to Florida when I retire.  Despite the heat and humidity.  And despite Floridians.  However, then you come across stuff like this:

This monstrosity was captured in the Florida Everglades recently.  A Burmese python that was 18 feet in length and weighed 215 pounds (excuse the American units of measurement - suffice to say this is a huge snake).  Nope, I can't be doing with crazy wildlife like this.  Time to reconsider my plans.  

A Dark Day

I like living in the US for lots of reasons.  I hate living in the US for lots of reasons.  Sometimes living in the US makes me really happy.  Sometimes living in the US makes me really sad.  Today, with the Supreme Court decision that we knew was coming because it was leaked, living in the US makes me f*cking disgusted.  An enormous backward step for women's rights.  A total disregard for decency and common sense.  A decision made by a court that should be impartial but in actuality is highly politicized.  A decision made by a court that just expanded gun rights earlier in the week.  It beggars belief.  And it makes you stick to the stomach.  And with the mid-terms coming up, when a bunch of unqualified lunatics that believe in QAnon, an illegitimate election, etc. will be voted into positions of power - we can expect a further erosion of women's rights, voting rights, civil rights, etc.  This is not the America I want to live in.  

Weather Alert

What's this now?  After a couple of month's of cold and rain, a weather alert was issued today.  And, shockingly, it's a heat advisory!  Yes, we've actually got some good weather in store for the weekend.  It's been so long!  We've barely had any t-shirt weather this year, and now we are talking about shorts weather this weekend.  It was around this time last year that we had our record-breaking heatwave, but we're not expecting it to get anything close to that this time.  Thank god.  But it's finally that time when I need to get my AC unit set up in my bedroom if I'm going to have any chance of getting some sleep in the warmer temperatures.     

Golf

Golf, a game that I have decided I won't even consider taking up until I'm retired.  If at all.  But I have some thoughts about this new professional golf tour that some players are defecting to.  Yes, they are only in it for the money,  Yes, we are talking about Saudi money - so dirty money.  But do I have a problem with this competition?  In all honesty, no.  I'm not really invested enough in golf to really care too much.  And are the Saudi's really much worse than the racist, sexist, white men that run the existing tours or own these sickeningly elitist and environmentally unfriendly golf courses that they already play on?  Arguably not.  So to me this is a whole bunch of nothing, just the PGA tour throwing their toys out of the pram because they've got some new competition now.  Some of the golfers that have loudly criticized this new tour, like Rory McIlroy, have golfed with Trump - so to me, there is a massive amount of hypocrisy here.  So whatever.        

Song of the Week #115

We're going grunge this week.  And a song that is the namesake of a slightly better known song by Radiohead from around the same time, but which is just as good in it's own way.

Garfield

I'm like Garfield - I hate Mondays.  I also love lasagna.  

A New Enemy

A new enemy to my sanity has revealed itself in the last week.  An enemy that has haunted me in the past, but not recently.  And not in the US before.  An enemy that will always beat me on numbers, but can't match up to the might of a vacuum cleaner.  Yes, we are talking about ants.  I discovered a whole bunch of them in my downstairs bathroom the other day.  On and underneath my bath mats, all quite organized in their little lines.  I have no idea what they were doing there, especially since I had only cleaned that bathroom earlier in the week.  I probably should have paid more attention to where they entered into the bathroom from, but I was more consumed with vacuuming up the little buggers.  I haven't seen any since, but I fear there are loads more just inside one of my walls or underneath the house or some other place nearby ready to launch another offensive.  And I shall be ready to face them with the might of the Dyson. 

A Confession

I need to make a confession.  Something I'm ashamed and embarrassed about.  Something I regret, and something I've never done before and something I hope to never do again.  I cheated at Wordle.  After 4 guesses, I knew that the word started CA and ended with O.  As far as I'm concerned, the only possible word it could have been was CARGO.  But I had already eliminated the R.  And no other combination of letters produced a legitimate word.  So I guessed CARGO, just in case something was wrong with the game, but nope sure enough that was incorrect and so I was left to my last guess.  The only possible thing I could do was to test every single combination of letters between CA and O until I got the right, and only, answer.  But I was doing this at 2 am in the morning because I couldn't get to sleep, and I just couldn't be bothered to go through every single combination of letters I hadn't eliminated yet.  So I looked up the answer.  CACAO.  What the eff?  A word I've never encountered, never used, don't know how it's pronounced, don't know what it means.  Is it even English?  I would never have got this.  I guess it means something similar to cocoa, but I am totally clueless.  Is this kind of gap in my vocabulary the reason why I only got a B in my English Language GCSE?  So now my Wordle statistics and current streak are tainted by my cheating.  Kind of like the home run records for juiced up baseball players, I think I need a big asterisk attached to my statistics.  I feel great shame about all this.  

World Cup (2026)

Good news.  Actually, really good news.  Seattle has been confirmed as one of the 16 venues in North America to hold games in the 2026 World Cup.  Indeed, it has been proposed that Seattle will hold a quarter-final, and the meaningless third place game.  If I can, I am going to try to get a ticket for the quarter-final, and any half-decent group games that will be held here.  I think it's going to be tough to get a ticket, but I will try.  And that is of course assuming I still live in the Seattle area in 4 years' time.   

Local Wildlife

I was staring out into my yard yesterday, and saw a rabbit. I tried to get a decent photo, but this was the best I could do.  And then I saw a second rabbit - I didn't know there were 2 of them around, so that was nice.  And then things got crazy.  I was looking out of the back door at both the rabbits, when I saw a cat approaching.  Now my neighbor's cat is black and white, but the one coming up to my backdoor was brown.  Okay.  And as it climbed onto my patio to cross it, I got a good look at the cat and then it dawned on me.  This was no domesticated cat, it was a freaking bobcat.  Wow.  I tapped on my window, but it didn't even flinch - all I got was a quick glance.  And then just as I was looking for my phone to try and get a photo, my phone rang.  It was my friend calling about meeting up for lunch tomorrow.  And as I was speaking to him, I saw one of the rabbits rushing push the kitchen window with the bobcat in rapid pursuit, before they both disappeared into the undergrowth.  I'm not sure if the bobcat caught the rabbit, but I think it was hanging around in the undergrowth for a bit before disappearing - either consuming a meal or staking out it's next victim.  So I missed getting a photo of it, not even my stupid trail camera captured an image, which is really disappointing.  But I wanted to include this photo of the rabbit, even though it's a really crappy photo, since it might be a while until I see another one in my yard - and indeed this might be the last ever time this particular rabbit was captured on film alive! 

Nations League

I don't care about the Nations League.  I don't care that England got thrashed at home by Hungary.  It was a meaningless game in a stupidly over-hyped tournament that should never have been held after a long and tiring season.  I don't even know why we're bothering with it - I'd rather the English players had rested in the off-season so that they're ready for the new season and the World Cup.  After all, it's the World Cup that's way more important than some inconsequential Nations League "relegation".  I say bring back international friendlies, and screw this tournament. 

Song of the Week #114

This week - something from one of my favorite genres.  Chill out.  This is a more recent track (2018?) from a band whose first album from 2000 I own.  And it sounds great - lots of strings, a slow tempo, and a classic chilled out vibe.

Noise

As you know, I am somewhat oversensitive to external noise.  Which is why many neighbors over the many years and many places I've lived have really annoyed me.  But even I would never have predicted doing what I did today.  I submitted an "animal complaint form" with the local government.  And what animal did I complain about?  A rooster.  Yes, unbelievably a neighbor of mine has a rooster.  It's difficult to know what the official laws are, but from an 8 year old newspaper article I found online it would appear that the county's noise nuisance laws do apply to where I live.  Which say that you're not allowed to own a rooster.  So we shall see what comes of this.  But frankly I'm shocked at how inconsiderate the neighbors are - it's not like the rooster is really quiet, it makes a ton of noise throughout the day but especially in the early hours.  I happened to be awake around sunrise at 5 am this morning, and I heard the cock-a-doodle-doo's so loudly and clearly.  I can't believe no other neighbor has complained - they surely will do when the weather gets warmer and people sleep with their windows open.  I'm just glad I sleep with earplugs in.  These happen to be the same neighbors who have already annoyed me with some of their other antics - knocking down all their trees, trampolining kids, constant bonfires, etc.  So I'm not entirely unhappy at hopefully causing them some (minor) grief.     

Rain

I shouldn't use rain as an excuse to not go out for a walk.  I can deal with some rain - as long as it's not the really heavy stuff, and I can deal with a muddy trail.  It's just an easy excuse when I'm feeling lazy, which is way too much recently.  I need to get into better habits, and that starts with going out more frequently - ideally every day, but at least every other day.  So I think that changes beginning tomorrow - despite rain being in the forecast, yet again. 

Guttered

Note to self - ask my landlord to clean out the gutters round my house next time, rather than try to do it myself.  With all the rain we have been getting, I had noticed that a couple of my gutters were overflowing where they shouldn't overflow.  So I decided to clean them out myself - I've got an extendable ladder that goes up high enough to reach the gutters (and supports my weight!).  So I climbed up the ladder and with a pair of gloves on shoveled out all the tree debris that had collected there.  And it was disgusting - god knows how long some of this stuff had been up there.  It was slimy, it smelt horrible, and there was lots of it.  I had to hose down the ladder, change my clothes and have a shower afterwards.  But it was satisfying to clear all this crap out of the way and finally have the gutters drain properly.  Unfortunately, now I need to wash down my back patio tomorrow because that is where I threw all the crap.      

The National Pastime

Baseball, or at least modern US baseball, is well over 150 years old.  Yet this is still my favorite moment ever:

Sucking Up

Some of our department's leadership team happened to be in Seattle this week, so it was kind of mandated that we be in the office on Tuesday and Wednesday to attend a couple of meetings and get-togethers.  There was my manager's manager's manager - who I knew - and her manager, who I didn't know.  And I actually made some effort to make small talk and suchlike at these social events, even though I hate that kind of thing.  We had a meeting with my manager's manager's manager, and I think my pessimism has given me a bit more confidence to speak my mind.  So I don't think it's coincidence that during this meeting I mentioned our light workload and that I thought I was underused, and the next day I heard I've been assigned a new task in a different therapeutic area.  So I might finally have something substantial to work on for what feels like the first time in ages!  Generally, I don't care much for my manager's manager's manager - back in the day, she was my manager when she turned down my request for a leave of absence and subsequently I quit.  So she lost my trust and respect, but clearly decisions like that have helped her rapidly climb the promotional ladder (it's not that she is particularly good at her job, but has also been a lucky recipient of circumstances and delegation).  At this meeting, two things of note came up.  The first, that the SAS programming language - which has been the standard in our industry since I started, and the only programming language I am proficient in - might not be the first choice for statistical analyses in the future.  And then one of the scariest words in my profession came up, again - automation.  Both these things are a major concern for the future of my career, but hopefully not during my professional lifetime.              

Song of the Week #113

This week - a great tune from a band I really like.  I've not really explored this band's discography beyond their 2nd album from the mid-2000's, so this one was new to me.  But I do like me some 70's influenced "folk rock".  And this band is one of the few good things to come out of Texas - definitely in my top 2 least favorite states.

 

I Hate Them

I think I've said before in this blog about how much I hate crows.  Well my hatred has just escalated to a new level.  I was in the office today and went for a post-lunchtime walk, and at one point during the walk a crow attacked me.  Twice.  Was it because I was wearing a black top today?  Maybe, but I'm not sure whether the color of my top really mattered.  Was it because I was walking too close to it's nest?  Much more likely.  I know where to avoid walking next time.  It didn't exactly hurt me fortunately - but just kind of brushed over my head.  A very weird sensation, I didn't know what it was first of all.  I never actually saw it coming either time - but certainly I saw it on a nearby roof aggressively cawing in my direction right after both times.  Don't know what else it could have been.  Got me really paranoid for the rest of the walk whenever I heard other crows cawing.  This is not the first time a crow has attacked me in Seattle.  Nasty creatures.  And that is why I really hate them.       

Covid Scare

What you don't want to hear - that a friend/colleague has tested positive for COVID.  The same friend/colleague whose house you went round over the Memorial Day weekend, and who you spoke to last week for a while in their office.  Yikes.  I'm already a bit nervous, because I've had a nagging cough for about a week now - but nothing else to suggest anything more serious.  Until now.  I did test myself this morning, but fortunately I came out negative.  So let's see what the rest of the week holds.  Good timing that I just got some more free COVID tests delivered today.   

Out of Stock

There are 2 Lego sets I want - Titanic and Back to the Future Time Machine - and both of them seem to have been "temporarily" out of stock more or less all of the time since the day they were released.  Which has been for what feels like ages.  Talk about frustrating.  For Titanic, you can arrange to get an e-mail notification for when it is in stock.  But I have found this to be utterly useless - you get the notification in the middle of the night, and by the time you try to read it and go online to order it then they are out of stock again.  I think and hope at some point that both sets will be readily available again, but who knows when.  Ideally I would like to get them around Black Friday, because that is when you tend to get the best free sets with your order (which make perfect gifts for nieces/nephews!).  I imagine they will probably be available later in the year, because Lego have announced price increases which will come into effect during summer - somehow I predict these sets will become magically available only after the price increase.

Two shows

A quick shout out to two TV shows I've been watching.  Better Call Saul had it's mid-season finale recently, with only a handful of episodes left now before it finishes forever.  And this is high quality TV - very cinematic and totally enthralling.  It maybe gets lost in the shadow of Breaking Bad - but shouldn't do.  It is outstanding in it's own right, and arguably just as good as Breaking Bad even if it has a slightly different vibe.  This is definitely in my list of top 20 TV shows of all time, and may even make it it into the top 10 if it sticks the landing in the remaining episodes (which I am confident it will).  The other show I want to mention is We Own This City - a 6 episode "based on a true story" look at corruption in Baltimore police.  And yes, the mention of Baltimore should mean something to you - it was written and directed by the same people who did the The Wire, and even features some of the same actors.  By it's factual nature, it's not really a true sequel to The Wire - but definitely shares similar DNA, with an even more pessimistic view of police enforcement.  Again, highly recommended viewing.  

June Gloom

Last month went down as one of the wettest and coldest in Northwest history.  And apparently June is not going to be any better.  This month has started with thunderstorms and some REALLY heavy rainfall.  Like all my gutters overflowing heavy - I think I need to clear out all the tree debris in them (or ask my landlord to do so!).  Quite unusual to get that here.  I got woken up yesterday about 5 am by the loudest crack of thunder I've ever heard, and it was right above my house.  Scary.  In this first week of June, apparently we are going to get more rainfall that we normally get over the entire month of June.  So much for getting out and about more - at least I don't see wildfires being a big issue this year.    

A Swizz

So, I want to change my phone provider.  I've found a new one that offers all the same features my current account has, but $15 less a month.  It's a no-brainer right!  But in order to change my provider, I need to unlock my phone.  Shouldn't be an issue I thought - I meet all the criteria that allows me to unlock the phone: I've been with the provider for years, I've been using the phone that I want to unlock for years, etc etc.  But nope, when I logged onto my account it told me I had to wait 6 months in order to unlock my phone.  Then I chatted with a customer rep, who after a lot of back and forth told me the same thing and was absolutely no help.  Then I went to a retail store and spoke to a manager there who was really helpful but could do absolutely nothing about the situation.  Apparently when my current phone was activated 2 years ago, my account was not updated to associate the new phone with my account.  So I've got to wait 6 months until I can unlock it.  Utterly ridiculous, nothing I did wrong, and I'm stuck with this stupid provider for the time being (guaranteed I'm changing provider as soon as I can).  I think it's within my rights to kick up a right fuss about this, but I just can't be bothered - and that's probably how they screw you over.  It's also a lesson that when I get a new phone (something I've been thinking about, since my current phone doesn't use 5G) then I'm going to buy the phone already unlocked.    

Song of the Week #112

This week we have a ... novelty record.  Oh dear, my apologies.  But for whatever reason, this song randomly returned to my consciousness this week - despite not having heard or thought about it for many years.  Not sure how I feel about it - the artist in question is somewhat tinged by Operation Yewtree allegations (though never prosecuted), and the "novelty" part is from a TV show that was a bit before my time so I never really watched.  But for some reason I do remember this song from when it came out in the 80's.  Memory is just weird that way I guess.