Category: Aggravation

I Gotta Find Another Metaphor, This Is the 3Rd Time in as Many Days That I Am Referring To, “A Bagfull of Cats”

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This time, I am referring to Ted Cruz, who is making noises about reentering the primary race:

Ever since Ted Cruz dropped out of the Republican presidential race last week, Glenn Beck and his co-hosts have been holding on to a sliver of hope that if Cruz could still somehow manage to win today’s Republican primary in Nebraska, that would convince the Texas senator to unsuspend his campaign and re-enter the race.

Today, Cruz called into Beck’s radio program and Beck’s co-host Pat Gray directly asked Cruz about this possibility.

“If Nebraska were to somehow miraculously choose you tonight,” Gray asked, “if that happened, would you consider getting back in the race?”

Cruz responded that he would certainly be open to that admittedly slight possibility.

Please.

Make.

Ir,

Stop.

H/t Charlie Pierce.

My Wife Refuses to Appreciate My Beautiful Mind

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I was talking to my Sharon* and noted that she would never guess the latest place where the consequences of fracking.

She declined to guess, and I told her that it was Oklahoma, where they are freaking out over a 300 fold increase in the number of earthquakes brought on by rejecting waste water into deep wells.

This generated a blank look from my wife, and I said that pumping the water deep under ground causes earthquakes.

I got another blank look, and I explained how the water, when injected deep underground, lubricates between faults, and that the lubrication translates into more motion, Kind of Like Sex.

I got a “what the f%$# are you talking about?” look from her, so I further explained that proper lubrication allows for more motion.

And then I got That look from her.

If you have ever been married, you know the look that I’m talking about, the one that has you worrying about her sharp knives ……… and then you start to worry about her dull knives.

*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

F#$@ Autocorrect

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I am sending a text to She Who Must be Obeyed about getting a dorm fridge to our daughter, and future Tony Award winning actress, Natalie.

She wanted to get it here, and then schlep it up.

I thought that we could find something cheaper in the greater New York City area, so while commuting, I did a web search, and found something quite competitive less than a mile from her school.

What’s more, the have free delivery.

It seemed like a winner to me, but when I attempted to text her that there was a better alternative in Manhattan, what I actually sent said, “Found cheaper fridges in lesbianism.”

Lesbianism?!?  Seriously?!?

I am SO ready for Babel Fish enabled cell phones.

Posted via mobile.

Gaaaahhhh!!!!!

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My daughter’s phone has stopped working.

The display and touch screen are dead, but the rest of the phone, an LG Mach LS 860, still works.

I’ve been trying to figure out a way to get the already MyPhoneExplorer synching software to run with no access to the screen.

Why do I do this sh%$?

What P.Z. Meyers Said

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He wrote a post complaining about business as usual at the Democratic Party titled, “Democrats: You suck.

His experience is that, following making a small donation to a Democratic candidate for office, he has been bludgeoned into something approaching PTSD from their repeated fund raising requests:

………

……… At least I think that’s what they’re doing; I now look at the incoming source, and if it’s the Democrats, I don’t bother to pick up. And here I am, entirely sympathetic to that party (if dissatisfied with their conservatism), and I have a conditioned aversion now.

I’ve had enough. I can learn. And the moral I have learned is to never donate to the Democratic party.

Who’s the idiot behind this campaign? Is it actually working for them?

Do Republicans do the same thing to their donors, or do they just scam them with things like gold coins and quack cures?

Gaah!!!!

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I just spent the better part of three f#@&ing hours fixing an esoteric server problem with the Verizon SMTP servers that read bedeviling my wife’s email program (Eudora).

We are talking in the weeds bulsh#@ port numbers and authentication settings.

I knew that one would work, but the permutations are a mind f#@$.

My gears us that someone retaken the thing because of Heartbleed.

FWIW, it was an SMTP server of smtp.verizon.net, authentication on, SSL/TLS on, port 465.

Shoot me now.

Posted via mobile.

What I Really Hate About United Airlines

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On Hold for Hours

If you read of my recent travel problems, I should note that they were all weather related, and everyone at United was polite, and efficient, energetic, and quite competent.

I really mean that.

But, because of the inevitable consequences of the snowtastrophe, it meant that I spent hours on hold.

And United has licensed George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue as its theme, and so it is their on hold music.

So I heard it for hours ……… and hours ……… and hours  ……… AND HOURS ………

It’s a musical masterpiece, and I can no longer listen to it.

UAL, drop Rhapsody in Blue as your hold music, please.

I Am a Whore, Not a Slut, Act Accordingly

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After I wrote a post about the abuse of the IP process and price gouging for a potential HIV prophylaxis treatment, I got an email from a PR person with a link to a promotional graphic for the product, and a request that I post it.

No offer of payment.

Not even an offer of swag.

I realize that my readership numbers probably don’t rate a T-shirt, but I wasn’t even offered a f%$#ing key fob.

Seriously, if you are not going to read my article, and know that I condemned what your employers are doing, at least have the decency of offering some form of remuneration.

It’s a matter of pride.

To quote fellow engineer Montgomery Scott, “This was a matter of pride.”

F%$# Me Rae Bradbury

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Some context for the title

Flight is cancelled, and I have f%$#ing been on f%$#ing hold for 2 f%$#ing hours.

I’m thinking that it would be faster to drive to BWI (We just got our road plowed*), and a round trip should be less time than I have spent on hold.

*Additionally, I am feeling the need to get a bit plowed myself.

What the Russian Revealed About the T-50 at the MAKS Airshow

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RAM on the engine.


They have what appears to be a working head mounted display


The Kh-58UShE ARM (1,400-lb., Mach 4, range of 130 nm) fits in the weapons bay


The internal weapons bay is huge because of the widely spaced engines

Some are interesting as they relate to the aircraft, but there are also some details that might say a lot about potential Russian anti-stealth techniques. (Paid Subscription Required)

The ordinary:

  • They are developing an improved performance engine for the aircraft.
  • They will be applying radar absorbent material to the spinner and inlet guide vanes. (see pic)
  • They are integrating a helmet mounted display early in the process. The dual visor approach, where there is an inner visor for the display, and an outer one for glare and environmental protection.
  • They are looking at using thrust vectoring, counteracted by the aerodynamic controls, to reduce the rear aspect radar signature of the engine.

The more interesting:

  • The internal weapons bay can accommodate very large weapons, including ultra long range air to air and anti-radar missiles.

This is a statement of where they think that future war is going:

Also likely to be carried internally by the T-50 is the RVV-BD (long-range air-to-air missile), a modernized version of the Vympel R-37 that was designed for the MiG-31M Foxhound-B but never put into production. Its total external dimensions are within centimeters of the Kh-58UShE with wings folded. It seems likely that the T-50 forward bay has been designed around the minimum-risk RVV-BD, with the Kh-58 being modified to fit the same envelope.

Both weapons are long-range types. The Kh-58UShE is a 1,400-lb., Mach 4 weapon with a range up to 130 nm from a 65,000-ft. launch altitude, and the RVV-BD has a claimed maximum range of 110 nm against a head-on target. This indicates a different operational philosophy from U.S. stealth aircraft, for which a key principle has been to use stealth to permit the use of short-range, low-cost weapons.

Later in the article, they discuss updates to the radar suite (radar suits, actually) for the S-400 Triumph (SA-21 Growler), which incorporates multi-frequency band radars:

The 55Zh6ME comprises three truck-mounted radar “modules,” operating in metric (VHF), decametric (L) and centimetric (S) bands, all with active, electronically scanned array (AESA) radars. The VHF unit has an antenna area of 235 sq. meters (2,530 sq. ft.), carrying 168 VHF transmit-receive modules, and is claimed to be able to detect a target with a radar cross-section of 1 sq. meter at 510 km range and 30,000 meters altitude in jamming conditions. The radars can be deployed in 15 min., NNIIRT says.

 The new 55Zh6UME has a smaller VHF array (with a 430-km range under the same conditions) with an L-band AESA trailer-mounted on the same structure, facing the opposite direction.

I think that the Russians believe that increasing processing power allowing for the fusion of disparate sensors to reduce the effectiveness of stealth.

It’s likely that they are right.

Clovis’s Lobotomy Scar! What the F%$#?

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Remember when I posted about Barry Ritholtz’s masterful take-down of the ongoing scam that is the Glen Beck Goldline scam?

What? You don’t?

Look at my last post, including the informative graphic.

That’s it, just scroll down a bit……Do you see it not?……Good!

Now, look to your left, where the tall banner ad is.

What do you see? Why it’s an ad from the scamming pig-felching rat bastards at Goldline!

If you don’t see it, here is the add, with the phone number obscured.

You see, Google™ Adsense™ is at it again.

I’m beginning to think that they don’t use computers, but instead they use trained monkeys to determine which ads to serve!

If they aren’t serving scammers, or right wingers like Fred Thompson pitching extension of the Bush Tax cuts, then they are pitching spammers like Constant Contact.

Unfortunately, I am way too small a fish to attract anyone else…………I dream of the day when I qualify for Blogads.

<Banghead>………</Banghead>

Again, as always, please note: once again, that I do not vet, nor do I endorse any ad that appears on my site, and I reserve the right to mock both the ads that appear on my site, as well as the advertisers.

Also, please note, this should be in no way construed as an inducement or a request for my reader(s) to click on any ad that they would not otherwise be inclined to investigate further. This would be a violation of the terms of service for Google™ Adsense™.

Damn. I Can’t Write this Badly.

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Well, it’s time for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, 2008 Results.

I’m relieved that there people who write worse than I do, even though they are trying to write badly.

The winner, if you can call it that, was one Garrison Spik of Washington, D.C. :

Theirs was a New York love, a checkered taxi ride burning rubber, and like the city their passion was open 24/7, steam rising from their bodies like slick streets exhaling warm, moist, white breath through manhole covers stamped “Forged by DeLaney Bros., Piscataway, N.J.”

I’m impressed….Horrified, but impressed.