Random Brain Droppings...

...on millennials, and the law.

First, the millennials:

Airlines should offer millennial flights (or, someone should start 'Millennial Air'.)

Features:

• All first-class seating
• Free food - locally sourced, organic, all vegan
• Free drinks - Pabst Blue Ribbon, and a wide selection of craft IPAs
• Free wi-fi, with no connection to any triggers or micro-aggressions
• Guaranteed safe space once on board and for the duration of the flight.
• And, free airfare - all costs paid by the air crew, who are, of course, the 1%
• All non, non-white passengers required to sit in the back of the plane
• In coach seats
• All non, non-white passengers required to shut the f*** up.

I know it makes  no sense. but then, look at the market.

On the law...

...started with this throw-away response:

Found this from @BobbiJoR to go with my morning coffee:

...and we're off:*

And it was about here that I got frustrated with trying to get her to clarify what she was after, which isn't germaine to this post. What it seemed to boil down to is this:

"I'm worried about lack of due process and too may laws."

 * I've reconstructed this as best I can, getting what I think is the gist of the conversation. Any errors are mine.

I'm poking about in her timeline, and it interesting stuff, but it seems incomplete:

Who are the other 8%? I'm thinking the "power players". My guess is 8% would be about right, since it seems most drug convictions wold be for possession/use.

My other guess is, most federal convictions are for white collar crime. Aaaand, the guess would be wrong, according to The Overview of Federal Cases, Fiscal Year 2012, Schmitt and Dukes, Office of Research and Data.  Interesting reading. I skimmed it, and I'm not sure if it refutes or supports @JessSmith_TPC or not.

Definitions are certainly in order, which is what irritated my in my exchange with @BibbiJoR. Here, I want to know the definition of "violent offense", and how many of those offenses were part of, oh, say, a drug offense. Thre is no category for 'violent crimes' in the Overview, so I'd like to know where @JessSmoth_TPC got that number. It does appear that the feds slice and dice their data in a myriad of ways, so she quite possibly has a report that I haven't found.

More importantly, I'd really like to know what #JusticeForAll is about. Time to poke around some more, after some needed work gets done.

Happy Father's Day!

I needed something silly after this week.

As you can see, via @20committee

Go. Read and follow this woman.

Rukmini Callimachi: on Twitter and at the New York Times

Wrong

So much wrong these days...

Bretagne (Bumped and Updated) Bretagne Was Honored Before Her Passing

Bretagne has passed on.

Click the picture for the CBS video

More at the Houston Chronicle  Via @JusticeWillett

* * *
I just didn't feel like trying to post anything for Patriots' Day (9/11) this year. I'm rather news-averse these days, what with all of the seriously bad insanity going on all over the world.  But today, I found this and needed to share:

You can see the rest here! 

Thanks to  weaselzippers and KLFY!!

BFTP*

*Blast From The Past!!

Got this from one of my Boeing co-workers:

From left to right, Rob, moi, and Chuck. This was taken no earlier than 2002. I know this because I bought that shirt for my 2002 trip to Costa Rica. It was taken at the BBC, which is local speak for the Belmont Brewing Company. We were on the back patio which overlooks the beach. 

Both Rob and I have lost weight since then. I haven't been in touch w/ Chuck for years, which is something I missed, but apparently not enough to do anything about until now. 

We spent more than one 'last day before Christmas break lunch' there,  watching the waves and the cute, bikini'd roller skaters on the bike path.

The BBC was the first brew pub I ever frequented, and is still my favorite!  It, and my friends, are some of the few things I miss about SoCal.

We're screwed?

Scientists Admit Everything They Know About Physics Is Likely Wrong

 

Scientists at CERN have announced that everything scientists thought they knew about physics may be entirely false, following the discovery of two new baryon subatomic particles. 

 

“The next few years may tell us whether we’ll be able to continue to increase our understanding of nature or whether maybe, for the first time in the history of science, we could be facing questions that we cannot answer,” Harry Cliff, a particle physicist at CERN said in a recent TED talk.

 Article here.

Reminds me of the state of physics at the close of the 19th century. Everything was nice and tidy, except for the 'black body radiation' problem, which would be solved easily and real soon.

The solution was relativity and quantum mechanics.

Here we go again. The problem is, of course not in the universe, but in our theories and hypotheses.

Heh.

Memorial Day

Breaks my heart.

#CapitalismWorks!! (Updated)

 Update: I complemented Michelle on winning the internet today, and she responded:

Yes I think it (went) viral pretty quick but the legal department at KW made me delete the post bc it was getting too much attention! Thank you

 Another humorless corporation.

Via American Digest

Mothers' Day, Part Deux

Two older posts about my deburrings (skin cancer excisions), and my Grandma G. The grandma stuff is the important part.  (Spoiler: I survived the surgeries.)

Grandma and Grandpa G, ca. 1954.

The Deburring...

posted 07/11/08
Tough day, and it's barely 1:30 PM. I spent three hours this morning "under the knife" at the nearby medical center, getting some of the results of my youthful, tanned beach-god days removed. Whilst awake. But under appropriate locals.

As usual in these things, I had plenty of time to sit around waiting, and thus plenty of time to contemplate my navel. Intellectually, I wasn't worried. I told a co-worker the other day that I thought this would be much less unpleasant that a root canal. And I was right. But emotionally, I knew I was scared. And that somehow brought me to what must be my definitive "happy place", one that I hadn't remembered or connected with emotionally in a long, long time.

After the accident, mom took me with her to Illinois so she could heal up at her mom and dad's place. I don't know the exact events that took place after that, but my earliest memories are of grandpa and grandma G. living with us in L.A. They apparently moved to California to stay with us and help care for me. I don't know if grandma G's breast cancer was a factor in that move, but I do remember knowing that she had it. And I remember the huge machine that was used for her radiation therapy, and visiting her in the hospital.

What I remembered today was what I did and how I felt when I was little-little. Grandma G spent most of her time in bed, and I would crawl in with her and we would talk. Looking back, that was the happiest, safest place I've ever been in my entire life. It puts the the crazy babysitter and the psychotic nuns into a sharp relief, which I'm willing to bet put the cap on my preference for going it alone.

I guess that warmth and safety is the experience I've been looking to re-create all these years.

Interesting.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Back Under the Knife

I spent about an hour or so under the knife, again. New surgeon, new hospital (more, later).

Once again, in pre-op, I found myself thinking of my time with Gramma G. I think what makes that time so special to me is that it was unconditional. I suppose she knew, or at least suspected, that she was dying during my time with her. If so, she never seemed to show me that she was afraid. It seemed to me that she had nothing else to do when she shared her time with me. I'm sure that her dying was a great strain to my mom and Grampa G, so they were, of course, distracted.

After she passed on, my life changed. Grampa G would take off for a few months to spend time with his other children in Arizona and Illinois. When he was gone, I would stay overnight at my best friend's house, and during the summers,stay during the day as well. This was because my mom worked the night shift at the hospital.

Anyway, I know where my "happy place" is. Thanks, Gramma.

Happy Mothers' Day!!

With nothing but respect to women raising children with dedication and love everywhere!

Politics...

...in two comics:

Baxter's Dilemma

Suzu

As I wrote to friends and family:

Took her in for a 'consult' this afternoon. Long and short, it seemed the best to let her go. She went very peacefully. 

I wrote more about it here: http://redlionwindow.blogspot.com/2016/04/suzu.html

 Thanks for your thoughts, prayers and support.

Erin Go Bragh

200 IBUs!*

 

 

 

Thank you, Stilton!


(*International Bittering Units)

Demon's Nest

Sheldon Leonard

...think about it.

Pipelines

Via the always unique XKCD

Demon's Nest - Murder

As always, via Brooke

Corporal Works of Mercy

Go. Read.