Tag: Patreon

Sunday, November 13th, 2022

Blog

Hey, there’s a new Podcast in the feed today. Also, if you’re so inclined, there are four new bonus podcasts over at Patreon. Until the end of the year, those Patreon podcasts (and anything else I put up there) are available to everyone. Enjoy.

I’ve been playing around with Mastodon a little, and it just reminds me of the path we took to get to this point on the internet timeline. Most of us regular (old) folk started in a walled garden like CompuServe or AOL. Then we branched out with things like Netscape, ICQ, Usenet, and IRC. Things became more open. Social Networks swung the penduluum back in the other direction and made the data we gave them a commodity to be traded, and then someone figured out how to weaponize it. That’s why I find the Fediverse so intriguing. There are open alternatives to the social networks we use today. Is it ready for prime time? Not quite yet. The Mastodon server I selected was on the verge of a nervous breakdown for the surge of signups. I’d say take a look and play around with these alternatives. It can’t hurt. Not sure if this is the future, but it’s an option if you’re sick of the status quo.

Following the Senate races, I’m glad to see the side interested in preserving democracy held on. That said, I don’t trust Joe Manchin or Kyrsten Sinema any father than I could comfortably spit a rhinoceros. Here’s a scenario to consider: Let’s say that Georgia proves that it’s brain dead and elects Walker. That means the Senate remains 50/50 as it is today. If I’m Mitch McConnell, I’m offering the moon on a goddamn string for one or both of them to pull a James Jeffords, switch parties, and hand control of the Senate to the GOP. Manchin is the likely candidate to flip, but don’t take Sinema for granted. Those two will go to the place they can have the most power, and exert the most influence.

Let’s say that the Dems hold both houses and the Senate at 51/49 with Warnock winning the runoff. Then Biden realistically 12 months to put the fucking hammer down and pass his agenda, maybe 18 if you want to push it. You put so much pressure on Manchin/Sinema you make diamonds out of them., eject the filabuster, hit the warp speed button, and pass all the things. Codify Roe and Obergfell. Pass the College Loan Forgiveness Plan. Pass 35 dollar insulin for everyone. Expand healthcare to be on par with the rest of the world. Pass gun control laws, paid family leave, fund the bullet train we should have had years ago…every ding dang thing. I promise you once those things kick in and start to help us regular folks, that’s the thing that scares the GOP the most. They know they’ll be back in the minority for a generation at least.

Here’s something else that scares the GOP: the calendar. By 2028, Millenials and Gen Z will be the largest voting block out there. By 2035 or 2040, white folks will be in the minority. They know this, and every trick they play to supress the vote, gerrymander districts and the like are designed to keep Evangelical White Republicans at the top of the food chain. It’s literally an economic and political apartheid if they get their way. We can’t let that happen, and I think the young people are going to ensure that it doesn’t happen.

Remember to hug a pollster today, they’re very fragile right now. Thoughts and Prayers.

Assholes.

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2022

Blog

• I might be nitpicky here, but I saw an ad for a product called the Bionic Spotlight last night. I don’t want a Bionic Spotlight. I don’t know who they’ve been. A roundabout way of saying that words mean things.

• From the Wayback Machine, ABC News from 11/8/1979. The show that would become Nightline was originally a daily recap of what was happening with the Iranian Hostages. So early on that Ted Koppel was a reporter, and Frank Reynolds anchored. Koppel was at his Alfred E. Neuman best.

• I have reached the point that the candidate who tells me that my mailbox is not going to be stuffed with election bullshit, and my phone isn’t going to blow up with text messages will get my fucking vote. I’m really more upset about the mail, trash that just takes up space.

• I may have mentioned this before, but I think I have figured out one of my main problems. The experts call this object permanence, which is a fancy way of saying if I can’t see it, it doesn’t exist. That’s why I’ve been so unsuccessful at keeping a journal of any substance. On the other side of the coin, having all that shit out on my desk looks cluttered, and my poor brain has to reconcile that. No wonder I’m fucked. I literally have a journal that I wrote “DON’T PUT ME AWAY” in Sharpie. WHY BRAIN DO THIS?

• Last night, something happened to my website, it caught a critical error. Anytime I’ve run across this in WordPress, where it happens suddenly after having been writing a draft earlier in the day, it’s a plugin. What I didn’t expect after deactivating the plugins in PHPMyAdmin and reactvating them one by one, it was Jetpack that was the error. It had updated during the day automatically and borked my site. I think what I need to do is control when these plugins activate and not let them auto-update. Hive mind, what say you? Yeah?

• Update about the Patreon podcasts: They’re public for now. I think I’ll keep them public until January 1st, and then flip the switch to put them behind the paywall. Everything will be that way until after Jan 1st, I think. …and there was much rejoicing…

Tuesday, November 1st, 2022

Blog

• Back in the deep, dark 1980s, there was a shop at Pembroke Mall called A Bit of England. This was the place you went to find chessboards and darts accessories, and most importantly, role-playing games stuff. It was in that store I found my two favorite games, Shadowrun and Paranoia. Pembroke Mall has gone through a cubic shitload of changes in the ensuing years, and Bit of England got the shit end of the stick. Eventually, they got evicted from the Mall because getting knocked down to build a senior living community. If you consider that the demographic that still goes to a Mall is my age, it was already a senior living community.

I ran some errands and found the store’s new location. I had to walk in. It was just how I remembered it. I ended up walking out with a set of RPG dice on impulse. I haven’t played in years. Call it a memento, I guess. I’ll put them on my ‘shelf of the ego’ and look at them now and then. Nice to walk in the past for a moment.

I’m not a person who chooses to walk in the past for very long. Like a lot of people, I didn’t have a particularly nice childhood. I have parts of the backstory that I love of course; I will talk your ears off about Guantanamo Bay in the early 80s. There was something special about that place, and I loved living there. But the common thread of my backstory is how often I was left to my own devices. I understand that’s common among my generation, but I don’t wear it like a badge of honor like some creators do on TikTok. I’m Gen X, and as we like to say, “Whatever.”

• I see the former guy appealed to SCOTUS in another attempt to keep the House from seeing his tax records. I don’t know why you’re even trying at this point. If trends are accurate, the House is going to flip Republican, and that’s it. That effectively means Trump is going to get away with a lot of stuff he should be going to jail for, because our justice system grinds ever so slowly for people in that rarified air. You and I would be well into our first year in Federal lockup. Of course, once the former guy announces he’s running for President again, all investigation is going to halt. He’s counting on that, and he’s counting on heading back to the WH so that he can’t be touched for another four years. We should have arrested him when you had the chance. We’re all kinds of fucked.

• A serious question: What is the objective reality that we agree exists? I’m afraid it got drowned in a bathtub somewhere. Not to delve too far into Ayn Rand, but one of the central tenets of Objectivism is that A is A, or a chair is a chair. I honestly believe that we have somehow split off into two groups, one that believes in an objective reality that can be observed, and one that believes what they are told is reality. Maybe it’s been this way for a long time, but this darkest timeline we’re living in has brought it into a sharper focus for me. I don’t know how else to explain it other than to say when presented with a demonstrable fact, there is a group of us here in [American] society that can deny its existence based on [insert bullshit here]. How do we resolve that? Can we resolve that?

• Finally, the first bonus pod dropped into the Patreon Feed today if you’re so inclined. First ep of the main show will be this weekend. LFG, as the youngs say.