Author: Steve

Marshmallow eating Kitty

Yesterday I got groceries. I picked up a bag of marshmallows. I left the bag in the grocery bag on my table. This morning the bag was on the floor, chewed open with a number partially eaten and the rest gooey from humidity. I know it was Pixel. What I don’t understand is a cat that eats marshmallows.

Pixel likes to lick the cheez coating off Cheetos. I can understand that. But she never tries to get in the bag on her own. She waits until I eat them and begs. But a bag of marshmallows I have to hide? WTF? And cats aren’t supposed to like sweet stuff.

Pixel isn’t the first cat owning me that has unusual tastes. Duchess Daisy like Nacho Cheese Doritos, raw potatoes and corn on the cob. No she wasn’t after the butter on the corn. She ate corn cooked or raw. Leave ears unattended and she would get past the husk and chow down. She was sneaky. The ears would look undisturbed until you peeled the husk off to find only half an ear.

I Don’t Like Mondays

This week I didn’t shoot the whole day down, but I came pretty close.

Mondays don’t mean as much when you can’t work any more. My dislike of Monday is just a tradition now. Not working does sometimes lead to confusion about what day it is, like this week.

Two days ago I got up. The grounds crew were cutting grass. That told me it was a Monday. Still, somehow I fast forwarded and got the idea it was Tuesday. I got ready to visit Dr. Detroit for an adjustment. I left a little early because of construction. I didn’t mean to leave a whole day early.

It wasn’t till I was laying on the table I realized it wasn’t Tuesday. Dr. Detroit asked what I was doing out & about on Monday. After a few moments of confusion, I realized why he was asking the question. I was a day early. So my Monday didn’t start until after 2 PM this week.

Enhanced Interrogation

6 August was wiggle your toes day. I don’t, actually can’t, celebrate. I can’t wiggle my toes any more.

I had an appointment with my Neuroquack?. He wanted me to wiggle my toes for him. I had a good laugh over that.

It was more like an enhanced interrogation day for me, complete with electric shocks and painful needles. Like the government they have innocuous sounding names for their torture methods. They call them Electromyogram & Nerve Conduction Study.

I had these done a couple of years ago but I don’t recall the pain levels being as high. The last nerve conduction study had a couple of severe shocks. This time they kept turning up the voltage until my body jerked strongly. That was followed by the EMG where they stick a needle in you. The neuroquack? seemed a bit sadistic in his needle application.

But I didn’t talk. Well, except for a “FUCK THIS SHIT!”, near the end of the test.

The tests were at De Paul. The worst pain was getting to and from the appointment. It took me 20 freakin minutes to gimp in from the closest gimp parking spot I could find. It took as long to gimp back to my car after. Fuck De Paul, never going near there again.

I was pissed when I was told during enhanced interrogation that they had free valet parking for the disabled. I saw the valet parking sign with a prominent price tag. No signs saying it was  free if you had a gimp tag or plates. You’re supposed to mead minds to find out about it.  I guess they think gimps grow a psychic sense as compensation for mobility loss.

Die HomeStapo loves my junk mail

I do believe that I’ve managed to upset Die HomeStapo somehow. It makes me so happy to give lazy civil servants something to do.

I went through my pile of bills this weekend. I had noticed a week of not receiving mail, not even junk. When I started doing bills, I noticed they all had “Unable to forward for review” stickers on the envelope.

I do hope they had a good time examining my junk mail for microdots or whatever. They at least kept it and saved me the trouble of recycling it. Note to NSA, all I get by USPS is bills and junk mail. My subversive communications are by other means.

I didn’t get an electric bill, I do hope Die HomeStapo is paying it for me. I assume that’s because it’s a co op. You know that must be some kind of subversive, pinko arrangement. It begins with CO just like Commie.

PS: I’ve changed all my dead drops.

PPS: I want to be sure to get your attention NSA so:
ABC, AK47, ASIS, ASPIC, Atlas, BAR, BOSS, Badges, Bay, Blowpipe, Bob, Bugs Bunny, CCSQ, CCSS, CIA, Chechnya, College, Communication, Cornflower, Cowboy, Croatian, DEA, DISHFIRE, DRA, DREC, Daisy, Dead, ETA, Electron, Explosives, Exxon, FBI, Face, Fax, Fedex, Firefly, Flashbangs, Fox, Girls, Glock, Golf, Guantanamo, Gulf, HALO, HAMAS, HRT, Harvard, Hitwords, IBM, ID, IDEA, IS, ISIS, ISS, Illuminati, Indigo, Information, Jasmine, Jihadis, Joe, KLM, Kenya, Kosovo, Kozole, Lacrosse, Lucifer, MD5, MI6, M60, Malaysia, Marx, Mary, Mexico, Middleman, Montenegro, NASA, NSA, NSWT, Nash, Nerd, Nike, Ortega, PPP, Panoptikon, Passwords, Platform, Police, Prism, Privacy, Pseudonyms, SAFE, SARA, SEAL, SUN, Seen, Speakeasy, Sphinx, Surveillance, TETRA, TNT, Taiwan, Tanzania, Texas, Tokyo, Tor, Trailblazer, UN, Undercover, Upstream, Uzi, Visa, WAS, WASS, Whitewater, York, agencies, ambush, anarchy, anonymous, anthrax, archive, army, assassination, assault, badger, bank, banking, basement, beef, birthday attack, blackjack, blowfish, booth, bunker, camouflage, captain, cards, carnivore, chaining, charcoal, charges, chosen, clandestine, cocaine, codebook, codes, commerce, communication, communications, conspiracy, contacts, credit card, cryptanalysis, crypto, curly, cyanide, cyberpunks, data, dead, detection, detonators, dictionary, division, dynamite, edition, electronic, embassy, emm, encryption, enforcers, enigma, espionage, evasion, explicit, explosives, fedex, fetish, football, fraud, freedom, friday, fumes, fuses, garbage, glock, government, grenades, guest, guns, hacking, hamas, hate, haven, hitwords, honor, hopes, hostages, hrt, illuminati, import, incendiaries, infiltration, information, initiators, intelligence, interception, internet, jihad, keyhole, keywords, law, locks, mailbomb, mania, manifesto, marriage, middleman, military, mines, mission, mole, monarchist, motorcade, munitions, murder, nerd, news, ninja, noise, nuclear, orthodox, package, panoptikon, passwd, password, passwords, picking, police, prescriptions, president, primers, privacy, propaganda, psyops, quarter, rain, rebels, redheads, reflection, rentals, replay, resistance, retina, rockets, sabotage, sardine, sardines, scans, secrecy, secret, seen, semtex, sex, shaped, shrapnel, silencers, site, smuggle, sneakers, sniper, snipers, sniping, speedbump, spook, spookwords, sport, steakout, surveillance, swat, sweep, sweeping, telephone, texas, threat, tiger, timers, tools, top, transactions, transfer, umes, unclassified, undercover, underground, unix, utopia, uzi, virtual, virus, watchers, weapons, weekly, words, world, zen, zip, 1911, 1984, 1997, 3M, 701, 8182, 888, 9mm.

Dumb All Over

Die HomeStapo: Always on my mind

Someone has created a new font that automatically redacts words on the NSA watch list. Some of the words on the list make sense but many are words any of you might use innocently. The NSA loves tracking innocent words because it gives them the excuse to step up surveillance on users of those words, i.e. everyone online. That’s right NSA is tracking all of you for using words on the watch list. Take a look at a partial list of terrorism flag words.

Examples of the words NSA and GCHQ track:
ABC, AK47, ASIS, ASPIC, Atlas, BAR, BOSS, Badges, Bay, Blowpipe, Bob, Bugs Bunny, CCSQ, CCSS, CIA, Chechnya, College, Communication, Cornflower, Cowboy, Croatian, DEA, DISHFIRE, DRA, DREC, Daisy, Dead, ETA, Electron, Explosives, Exxon, FBI, Face, Fax, Fedex, Firefly, Flashbangs, Fox, Girls, Glock, Golf, Guantanamo, Gulf, HALO, HAMAS, HRT, Harvard, Hitwords, IBM, ID, IDEA, IS, ISIS, ISS, Illuminati, Indigo, Information, Jasmine, Jihadis, Joe, KLM, Kenya, Kosovo, Kozole, Lacrosse, Lucifer, MD5, MI6, M60, Malaysia, Marx, Mary, Mexico, Middleman, Montenegro, NASA, NSA, NSWT, Nash, Nerd, Nike, Ortega, PPP, Panoptikon, Passwords, Platform, Police, Prism, Privacy, Pseudonyms, SAFE, SARA, SEAL, SUN, Seen, Speakeasy, Sphinx, Surveillance, TETRA, TNT, Taiwan, Tanzania, Texas, Tokyo, Tor, Trailblazer, UN, Undercover, Upstream, Uzi, Visa, WAS, WASS, Whitewater, York, agencies, ambush, anarchy, anonymous, anthrax, archive, army, assassination, assault, badger, bank, banking, basement, beef, birthday attack, blackjack, blowfish, booth, bunker, camouflage, captain, cards, carnivore, chaining, charcoal, charges, chosen, clandestine, cocaine, codebook, codes, commerce, communication, communications, conspiracy, contacts, credit card, cryptanalysis, crypto, curly, cyanide, cyberpunks, data, dead, detection, detonators, dictionary, division, dynamite, edition, electronic, embassy, emm, encryption, enforcers, enigma, espionage, evasion, explicit, explosives, fedex, fetish, football, fraud, freedom, friday, fumes, fuses, garbage, glock, government, grenades, guest, guns, hacking, hamas, hate, haven, hitwords, honor, hopes, hostages, hrt, illuminati, import, incendiaries, infiltration, information, initiators, intelligence, interception, internet, jihad, keyhole, keywords, law, locks, mailbomb, mania, manifesto, marriage, middleman, military, mines, mission, mole, monarchist, motorcade, munitions, murder, nerd, news, ninja, noise, nuclear, orthodox, package, panoptikon, passwd, password, passwords, picking, police, prescriptions, president, primers, privacy, propaganda, psyops, quarter, rain, rebels, redheads, reflection, rentals, replay, resistance, retina, rockets, sabotage, sardine, sardines, scans, secrecy, secret, seen, semtex, sex, shaped, shrapnel, silencers, site, smuggle, sneakers, sniper, snipers, sniping, speedbump, spook, spookwords, sport, steakout, surveillance, swat, sweep, sweeping, telephone, texas, threat, tiger, timers, tools, top, transactions, transfer, umes, unclassified, undercover, underground, unix, utopia, uzi, virtual, virus, watchers, weapons, weekly, words, world, zen, zip, 1911, 1984, 1997, 3M, 701, 8182, 888, 9mm.

For a complete list or words that can get you on the terrorist watchlist see: Hundreds of words to avoid using online if you don’t want the government spying on you

Come on NSA, get out of that dark basement. Join the other Die HomeStapo thugs for some sun and exercise, maybe a little goose stepping. It’ll be good for you. Nobody likes pasty secret police.

 

PS: Fuck Die HomeStapo and its alcabetical minions, one and all. I’m headed to the toilet. I’ll be thinking of y’all as I shit.

PPS: Alcabetical is intentional. It’s a tribute to one of my HS PE coaches, Mr. Harmon. He always had us line up in alcabetical order so he could take attendance.

Always on my mind

Strange Dreams

My primary quack? prescribed a new drug about 3 weeks back. One of the side effects is strange dreams. Usually memory of the dream fades quickly when I wake. I’m just left with the knowledge I had a weird dream. Until recently the dreams involved strangers. Then I started dreaming of people I knew or knew of. Hang on, this is going to be a long one, a strange dream anthology, but I “get” the girl in the end.

The first dream I remembered was a strange chiropractic dream. I walk in and it’s a theatre setup. Four tables on stage and theatre seating to wait in. Bill Clinton was walking around chatting up people. I didn’t get to talk with him as my chair starts up and drives around the room as I frantically try to stop it or at least steer it. A Dr. finally stops it and adjusts my neck by grabbing my head and lifting straight up until my necks pops. On my way out an Asian receptionist pulls a gun on me and take all my money.

I only recall a short ending fragment of the next. I was with Richard Ruhl​ in his new Mustang, leaving Mark Potillo​’s. We’re driving down a snowy street when a car passes us on the left, hangs a hard right in front of us and crashes into parked cars in a driveway. Rich hit the brakes and never touched him but the drunk staggers out of his wreck, trying to blame RIch for the accident. I woke up as I was dialing 911.

The 3rd had more people I know and was a craft filled dream. I pick up an ‘Ice Diamond’ afghan from a bed. Clipped to it is a Polaroid dated 1987 of Amee Chambers​ looking fine in a bikini. I go into another room and Mom and Amee are lighting dozens of oil candles. I follow Mom into the kitchen and she’s making pies with Christye Von Nida Jefferson​ using gadgets from QVC to make pie crust. One mixes the crust, a wringer device rolls the crust, and another perforates the top crusts with a lattice. Every flat surface in the kitchen is covered with dozens of pies either waiting to go go in the oven or cooling off after baking. I wake up waiting for a cherry pie to cool enough to cut into.

OK, we finally made it to this morning’s dream with denizens of Kennealy’s and another reincarnation. Christopher Gustave​ is working on a big table. I never see his face. He’s always head down working on his piece. He takes a short break from it and makes a shadow box with assorted objects including 4 spark plugs. He hands it to me saying, This is you, Steve.’

In another room a group of people, including the girl,  are pouring over inventory lists, looking for hard to find rare objects that people need. I join in and find they have a obsolete printer cartridge an orphanage in East Berlin needs.

Next we’re at Kennealy’s Pub  Jamming are Donny Bee​,  Bryan Rustle​, 2 drummers, Bill Wheeler with a full kit , behind and to the right  of Bill with a jazz kit is B Darrell Phelps​. There may have been other members in the band. I wasn’t paying much attention. I was involved a hot and heavy performance of dueling tongues with Penny Lane.

I try to talk Penny into going somewhere private and taking it further. She says she has to wait until she turns 18 on 11/22. But she wants me to show up on the 19th to warm up. That’s about 4 months away. I can’t wait.

Stange dreams

Sporks

I’ve been spending more time than usual in bed. I’ve been saving up sporks for a busy week. Since, I only have cable in the living room now, and since there’s nothing new on, I’ve been watching vintage TV, Emergency on Netflix.

I got my tumbleweed fix. One rescue had an old man and woman in the desert called because the house was surrounded by tumbleweeds. They scared the old lady.

 

Tumbleweeds ain’t scary. Now horny toads I could see getting scared of. Hundreds of them staring at you with their devil’s horns could get frightening.

A couple of episodes later I got a real nostalgia flashback, 1970s IT. Anonymous caller tells hospital that she took pills and turned gas on. They only are able to trace call to a rough area. And they find she’d been at hospital recently.

The billing computer can only search by name or account #, the head computer geek declares. ‘We’ll have to go through the punch cards!’ Ah, yes, 1970s technology. They start feeding cards through an IBM card sorting machine. It works but you can only sort a column at a time. sometimes it was faster to flip through the cards. A big goof is when the Doc asks for patients between 8/24 & 9/4 and the machine does it in one pass.

I don’t miss those freakin IBM cards. I was in heaven when I went to work and had a video terminal with  a backspace key. With the cards, fat finger and you start the card over.

 

<a href=”http://youtu.be/j7xUqTHGkw8″>Tumbling Tumbleweeds</a>

One armed man

In a fucking nasty mood tonight. I tried to get a roll of paper towels out of a cabinet and got an avalanche of crap that some helpful[sic] arsehole piled on top of the rolls.

You have to think of me as the one armed man. I have two and they work somewhat well. But effectively I only have one because the other is always holding on to something to keep me from falling.

I don’t have a free hand to lift crap off of what I need to get. If I need to use both hands I have to lean against a wall or something. Or in the case of lifting the trash bag out of the can, use my head against the refrigerator for support.

I’ve told people to think of me as a one armed man and not do those things. But, they keep insisting on piling shit on top of  other shit.

Well, anything in my kitchen on top of what I need to get to will be flung as far as my weak muscles can throw them. Usually in the direction of the dining room. And I’m not fucking picking that shit up.

 

QT (QuikTrick) Card Hold Scam

A bonus post today.

Just a warning people, stay away from QuikTrip is you’re going to pay with debit or credit. I’d stay away if you have cash too. Don’t encourage their fucking greed.

As I was making the kitty and Charter trips today, I noticed I needed some gas. A QT was on the way and I pulled in.

Big mistake, don’t do it unless your account has lots of money in it. Too late I noticed a very small sign saying QT may put a $125 hold on your account for using plastic at the pump.

I’ve had retailers put an inflated hold on a debit transaction before. But it has always been a rounded up amount. Like, $38.00 hold for a $37.48 bill.

I checked when I returned from giving Charter a hard time. It wasn’t $125, only $100 extra for $37.80 worth of gas. Lucky I happened to have an extra $100 in my account. If I tried to purchase that $37.80 in gas and only had $50 in my account, I’d be a walkin’.

They did reverse it later. But for a while they had an extra $100 of my money to play with. I wonder just how much they are making on the float? And do the banks give them a cut of the overdraft fees they cause unsuspecting customers?

Or perhaps it’s a way to induce you into getting a QT credit card.

Avoid QuikTrick people!

Sorry no QT massacree today. The Charter bait & switch massacree took it out of me. But tomorrow, I’ll be in shape to track down the QuikTrap corporate sods and give them a good reaming. But don’t wait on me. Stay away from QT NOW!!!!

Charter Communications Massacree

Some may be waiting to find out how the Charter visit went. I didn’t delay to build suspense. Oh no, brothers & sisters. I got distracted by QT’s $125 hold scam, Jimmy ‘Oh Lord I sinned’ Swaggart, the Video religion industry, Frank Zappa and the accompanying paranoia in cranking him up in Lilburn, GA.

But if you follow my posts, y’all know I get distracted and have to wait for it to come around again on the guitar. You can get anything you want at Alice’s …. Sorry it almost happened again. Well here it is in 6 part harmony and full orchestration, The Charter Communications Massacree.

I decided to stop by the apartment offices to ask the if the papers stuffed in my door were indeed legitimate and not a Charter scam. I related the story of last fall’s bait & switch where a Charter statement offered a cable box for $0.00/month that was switched to $12/month because the $0.00/month boxes didn’t exist except in a Charter bait & switch scam.

One of the lovely ladies said it was for real. But I’m sceptical on my best days and paranoid the rest of the time. I never worry that I’m paranoid only am I paranoid enough? I took care of the kitty supplies first of all before enjoying myself at Charter.

For some reason they seemed to be in a hurry to get me the hell out of the store. It could have because I started complaining about last fall’s bait & switch scam and inquiring if the present offer is another. They seemed upset with my question of how much a month Free would cost me.

They wanted the phone number associated with my account. “There isn’t one.” How about account number. “No don’t have one of those either. Georgie Porgie winced when I told him, loudly, “I got suckered into a Charter Bulk Scam when I rented my apartment.” That brought Git #2 running to help Georgie.

They looked over the papers I brought along and conferred. “Oh yes, you get 2 Free cable boxes, sir.” I asked, knowing the answer ahead of time, “For how long is it free?”

Georgie and Git #2 chanted in unison, “For the life of Charter’s bulk contract with your apartment complex!” It made my day because I caught them in a bare arsed freakin lie. “That’s not what it says on the papers I was sent. You just lied to me, didn’t ya? Now again, how much a month will Free cost, $12, $24, …” The looks on their faces were freakin priceless and I had a hard time keeping a straight face.

That sent them off into a huddle. I think they had to help each other read. They puzzled out that the offer was 1 box free for the life of the bulk contract and one free for 1 year and their standard monthly charge after that.

They started working together in an effort to get me out and away from the other suckers in the store. Georgie Porgie asked how many TVs I had. “Two.” He tried to give me 2 boxes and was puzzled when I would only accept the lifetime of the bulk contract free one. “I don’t want to have to return it to keep from get hit with a monthly charge. Now how much a month is Free going to cost me?”

I doubt they’ve ever moved that fast on the job before. A cable box magically appeared on the counter from the other end of the store. Georgie scanned the barcode on the box and while the form was printing put the cable box in a bag. I can see the relief on their faces that I’d be out of there soon. Wrong again.

I slowly took out my glasses and carefully read the form they wanted me to sign. Now if I want I can read 2500 words a minute. I don’t think I broke 25 on the form as I continued to inquire about how much a month would Free cost me.

On the form was the serial number of the box. I’m a geek and know if his scanner read the barcode at all, it did so correctly. But I insisted they get the box back out so I could compare the number on the box to the number on the form.

The sigh of relief when I picked up the pen was audible. As Georgie Porgie handed me the bag, thinking it was over, he got one finale bit of advice. “You know people wouldn’t hate Charter if it wasn’t for their pervasive business model of deceiving and misleading customers.”

“I’ll go out of my way to give business to a company that treats me fairly & honestly. Charter on the other hand, I stay away from if at all possible. A prime example is all the junk mail from Charter saying ‘Important Information.’ To be honest Georgie boy, I see Charter and Important on the same envelope, it goes in the trash unopened.” Actually the recycling bin but trash sounded better at the time.

I was in pain today but still had a great freakin time. If I feel better tomorrow I may just pop in to ask again “How much is Free going to cost me per month?
;-)>>>>