Who Wants an Ugly Dog?

 

Dogs are lovable, but some take more effort to love than others.

I wrote before about my Aunt and Uncle who had a Boston Terrier that we called "The One-Eyed Monster."  It wasn't a bad dog, just neglected.  My Aunt and Uncle were both chain smokers and chronic alcoholics and my Mother was estranged from them.  I went to visit them once, on the sly and we sat outside while they chain-smoked.  Their dog had lost an eye somehow (that breed, like so many others, have bulging eyes that are easily damaged).

(NOTE:  I searched online for images of a one-eyed Boston Terrier and found pages of them, including the one above which is not the dog in question, who is long-dead as are Aunt and Uncle.  Apparently the bulging eyes can cause problems with eye loss on these types of breeds).

Worse yet, the dog had not been bathed in ages and  had a stink to it.  He shed, too, and liked to hump your leg.  He also had a problem with slobber - drooling down his face and wetting his chin and neck.  But what was really fun was that he loved people and wanted to jump up and kiss you, as well as sit in your lap.  So I was sitting there in a cloud of cigarette smoke while 'ol stinky kept jumping up on me, giving me slobbering kisses and shedding all over me - as well as drenching me in dog slobber.

Auntie and Uncle had given up on taking care of the dog, giving him occasional kibbles, but never baths or grooming.  He was starved for love which is why he jumped up on people.  I let him sit in my lap and pretty soon he calmed down and fell asleep.  "He never does that with me!" my Aunt said.  But then again, she wasn't exactly Mrs. Warmth, either.

What made me remember this was a couple I met at a campground who was complaining about their dog. They had adopted the dog from the pound but didn't like the dog.  I couldn't divine why, other than he behaved badly or something.  They were thinking of having the dog put down, just because they didn't "like" it and that made me very sad.  But it illustrates one problem with pets - people get pets and don't realize they are a 15-20 year commitment and that if they don't "bond" with the pet, they may have a stranger living with them for a decade or more.  A stranger who shits on the floor and leaves hair everywhere.

And yet, this seems to be a norm for many people.  I see all the time, people who have dogs they never walk, but let out into the yard once in a while - or leave chained-up to an old engine block in the front yard, making a circle with the chain of exposed dirt and dried-up dog turds, as well as an overturned water bowl.  A saw plywood dog "house" is their only refuge.  Why bother even having a dog?

Sad to say, my parents were the same way.   Pets were accessories to own, not animals to love.  We had a succession of pets that rarely ever say a vet and died prematurely.  I was the only one, it seemed, to ever actually "pet" our dog or brush it.  Of course, if you don't groom your dog, it isn't really fun to pet (dogs to acquire a stink which they enjoy).  So it becomes a vicious circle - the pet is neglected which leads to matted fur and dog smell, which in turn leads to more neglect.

Then you have folks like my Dad, who literally hated pets and had our family cats put down as soon as I left for college (he told Mom they "ran away" - perhaps to join the circus?).

I wrote before about the pet trap and how expensive pets can be to properly take care of.  They can also be problematic for young people who are at a transient stage in their lives.  Finding an apartment that allows pets can be daunting!  And the long hours young people often work (not to mention socializing) are hard on pets, who easily develop separation anxieties when left alone for extended periods of time.

And yet, young people, alone in the world for the first time in their lives, often need pets for companionship.  It is a tough nut to crack.

Worse yet are designer dogs, which people acquire as style accessories.  The current rage is "French Bulldogs" which are so inbred they can hardly breathe.  I've met a lot of folks who have them and they are sure to tell me how much they cost - they are the BMW of dogs, I guess.  But they really don't seem to love them, so much as keep them around as a fashion statement.  I feel sorry for the dogs more than the owners.

Dogs indeed are a funny thing - we've bred them for centuries to have specific characteristics, whether to work for us as guard or hunting dogs or to make them a bizarre looking as possible.  How would you explain to an alien being that a teacup Chihuahua and a huge Mastiff are both "dog"?  It shows how far we have developed the species from their wolf heritage.

I am not sure what the point of all this is, only that it made me sad to hear these folks talk about killing their dog with about as much emotion as talking about the weather or trading in a used car.  The dog was just a thing to them and was just not working out.  Maybe that is how people today are in general. People spend so much time online that they don't view their fellow creatures as being real or sentient.

Sadly, this is maybe why so many are calling for "Civil War" and other violent nonsense.  If other people are just objects, then killing them isn't wrong, is it?

Mr. Fixit (and Mr. Broke-it!)

Turns out, washing machines don't like nails going through the pump.  Funny, that.

Mark got some new sleepware on sale at Walmart and decided to wash them first.  He put them in our Maytag front-loader and halfway through the cycle, it beeps and gives a dreaded error code - E1 F9.

I look online and find this helpful video on how to clean the pump inlet filter.  It ain't hard to do, so I did it.  Found nothing but a shiny Roosevelt dime and some bits of debris - not a full-on clog like in the video.

Problem is, the door was locked, so our new clothes are being held hostage.  So I plug it back in and play around and it unlocks.  Whoo-wee!  So I decide to re-start the cycle and it gives a new error code - E1 F9.  Is it the pressure sensor?  Clogged pressure sensor tube?  Bad control board?  Oh, and the door is locked again and our laundry held hostage.

Once again, to the Internets and we find another helpful video regarding this code.  Something is preventing the machine from pumping out water!  Bad pump?  Clogged filter?  Clogged discharge line?  I play around with the "diagnostic mode" and find this helpful document on how to enter diagnostic mode as well as how to run the C0 tests.  Intersting stuff, but my machine balks at going beyond C0.  Then I notice the pump is so hot it burns my hand.  And it buzzes instead of pumping.

Four screws, two plugs and one hose and the whole thing pops out!

Mr. See suggests removing the entire pump assembly as it is held in place with four screws.  Once removed, I take it to the workbench and remove six screws holding the impeller and motor assembly to the housing.  By the way, this stuff is all plastic and the motor is laughably tiny - with two thin wires feeding it power!.  I pull the pump apart and...

...the tiny nail shown above pops out.

Duh.

A couple of months ago I was on the roof of the studio pressure washing the trim and I found a few trim nails had "popped."  So I put a handful in my pocket and replaced them.  Later, I put the jeans in the wash and forgot about the nails until it started clanking.  In horror, I opened the door and found a few nails in the drum and more under the "seal" by the door.  Dodged a bullet there, right?

Well, yea, except for this one nail!  It went right through the "filter" (which is more of a coarse screen of 1/4" holes in a plastic dingus).  We put the whole thing back together and - knock wood - it works! I put some silicone on the rubber seals and it doesn't appear to be leaking.  I put a towel down just in case,  I ran it for one cycle - now to reinstall the back cover and put the laundry room back together!

 An hour or so of my time was all it cost.  A service call would be at least $125 to come out, plus $125 and hour, plus parts (and no doubt they would have replaced the entire pump assembly).  For a washing machine that cost $900 (with pedestals), spending a few hundred to fix it seems dumb.  You might as well buy a new one.

What was scary is how much of the thing is made of plastic.  Now, as an Engineer, I am not anti-plastic.  It can work well.  But I assumed the water pump was this big metal thing with ten-gauge wires feeding it, not some tiny thing the size of a two decks of cards, with 18 gauge (maybe 20!) feeding it.

I suspect this will not be the last time I have to take this apart.

It pays to be handy!  Particularly when you are prone to breaking things.

UPDATE:  Some have chastised me for criticizing Whirlpool quality.  Far from it!  While everything is made of plastic these days, that is not always a bad thing.  This washer was very easy to service and the entire pump assembly can be removed with four screws.  I feel confident that if I break it again, I can take it apart and fix it.  And our KitchenAid (Whirlpool) refrigerator is going strong after 18 years - with a new (used) control board from eBay (that took two minutes to install!).  18 years is three years longer than design life!

Jesus and the Cult of Personality

A lot of people worship Jesus but don't agree with what he taught.

I mentioned before how I found a wallet lying in the middle of the road. Someone put it on the roof of their car and had driven off (never put anything on the roof of your car - particularly infants in car seats!) We were on our way to a picnic, and when I got there, I took the time to go through the wallet and find a phone number for the owner and then contacted him.  Fortunately, he left a business card in his wallet.  He found us and I gave the wallet back to him and he offered me money as a reward, which I declined.  "I would hope someone would do the same thing for me!" I said.

Did I do this as a "Good Christian?" Perhaps. But lately, what people are calling a "Good Christian" leaves me to think that Christianity is in real trouble.  Did I do it because of The Golden Rule?  You know, "Do unto others as you would want done to you?"  This "rule" really gets at some of the fundamentals of Christianity - or at least at the original teachings of Jesus.

But you need not be a Christian or religious at all to have such values. You can figure out, by thought experiment, that the world is a better place if everyone was kind and decent to each other.  Sure, there are laws to enforce such things, but what makes society tick is what people do when no one is looking. And I am sure that there would be many a person calling themselves "Christian" today who would have taken the cash out of that wallet and tossed the rest aside - after all, didn't God place this largess in their path?  The owner was probably a sinner or an atheist - prosperity theology, folks!

If everyone was honest and decent and returned lost property, the world would be a more relaxing place, right?  In Japan they actually do this - I've seen it!  You drop a coin on the ground and people, particularly children, will alert you to that fact.  You drop your wallet, no one will touch it, but rather call the police and wait for them to arrive.  Of course, they still have organized crime in Japan - everything is organized there.

But yea, the world is a better place when people return their grocery carts to the corral, particularly on a windy day.  I know this after paying $250 for "paintless dent repair" on one of our old convertibles. If everybody - or at least most people - do the right thing, society can flourish.

If you think about it, society already works this way.  So much of our commerce and daily living is based on trust alone.  You go to a restaurant and order food, they trust you will pay for it at the end of the meal.  Granted, a few people don't, but the vast majority play by the rules.  There are people who throw trash out of their car windows, to be sure - but far more who pick up litter and dispose of it properly.  And yea, maybe you lock your doors when you leave the house, but let's face it, if someone really wanted to break in, all they have to do is smash a window.  Having bars on your windows isn't the answer and it is also unsafe!

As I said, it seems today's new crop of "Christians" are anything but. They do not follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, but rather view him as a cult leader - a celebrity influencer whose brand they follow and whose "teachings" are a series of strict rules to be followed, as taught by their evangelical pastor.  They "read" the Bible, but only the Old Testament, which is a lot of "Thou Shall Not..." rules that are part of Judaism.  Others follow Muhammad, who has even more draconian rules to follow. All of them hate each otheer's guts for following the wrong religion or even the wrong branch of it.

Speaking of which, I guess we know now how World War III starts - a war between Pakistan (Sunni) and Iran (Shi'ite) both of which have nuclear arms.  As I noted before, the number one killer of Muslims in the world are fellow Muslims.  Of course, the West has long exploited this rift and reaped the spoils as a result.  We are more than willing to sell both sides weapons, provided we keep the balance of power nearly even.  See, e.g., the Iran-Iraq war.

But getting back to Jesus, many so-called "Christians" today seem him as a brand identity rather than a philosophical following.  There are many branches of Christianity, just as there are different flavors of Judaism or Islam or any other religion.  Some are so far removed from Christianity as to be obscene - think of Jonestown for example - mass suicide is not in line with the teachings of Christ.  "Religions" like that are rightfully called cults - where the followers worship the charismatic leader who often implies or states he is endorsed by God, or is in fact, the new Jesus.  Think, Moonies.

But a lot more of so-called "mainstream" versions of Christianity are going down the same path.  Many old-line religions are being divided over doctrine, with some calling for "the good old days" of the Old Testament, while others take a more liberal view.  The Lutheran church, for example, has been divided into different synonds, one conservative, one liberal.  Methodists are splitting over issues like the ordination of women.  And Catholics - who hold the first franchise on Christianity are divided as well, with some conservatives crying, "Not My Pope!" in response to proposed changed in church policies.

It is a stage set for a battle royale.  And many people today are turning away from religion entirely, seeing how "belief" is being used to encourage young people to strap on suicide vests or gun down their neighbors or set fire to a mosque or temple. And each religion, in turn, claims to be persecuted and oppressed by the other.  It would seem that belief is the cause of the world's problems, and not the solution.

Fewer people are religious today, but the few that are, are far more strident about it.  It is akin to (and overlapping with) gun ownership.  Fewer people (as a percentage of the population) own firearms today, but the few that do, own a helluva lot more of them.  It seems that these fringe groups are going to further and further extremes, convinced that playing nice no longer is an option.  It is a powder keg ready to explode, quite frankly.

The "do unto others..." bit has been thrown out of the window in favor of "I've got mine, Jack, because Jesus likes me best!"   They root for Jesus like he is the Buffalo Bills or Taylor Swift.  The original message of tolerance and acceptance is lost along the way.  These folks believe in an angry Jesus who is going to come back and smite their perceived "enemies" - whoever they are this week.

So what's the point?  Perhaps there is none and it is already too late for our civilization, where increasingly belief is supplanting logic, particularly belief systems which are twisted and tortured versions of old-time religions.  People are angry today, it seems, over trivial things, goaded on by social media, which is mostly AI-bots run by foreign influencers.

Maybe it will all work out and people will come to their senses.  But sadly, it seems the opposite is true - with people retreating into their belief systems and then boarding up the doors and windows, doubling-down on a flat earth or whatever.

Seems some people just want the world to end, so they don't have to pay back their student loans or make their monster truck payments.

How sad.

Saving Money At The Fast-Food Joint? Maybe.

Fast-food places are advertising bargains.  What's up with that?

So many people have forgotten about the recession of 2008 when millions were laid off and the economy went into the toilet - but recovered pretty much within a year or two.  Back then, the line at McDonald's was around the block as they offered "dollar menu" items and people snapped them up.

Of course, even at a dollar, fast-food was overpriced - you can make the same meal at home for 1/4 the price, as I noted before.  And of course, no one spends just a dollar, do they?

But what is interesting to me is that similar deals are being flogged, perhaps not at a dollar, but due to inflation, at $2.50 or so.  Burger King is offering two-fers on Whopper Jr's for $5.  Other fast-food place are offering similar deals.  What is going on?

Note that I am not recommending any of these "deals" or fast-food in general, just noting that it is interesting that only a few months ago, people were whining about how expensive fast-food had become.  Now we are seeing a change in the weather!

In the news today, UPS, one of my former employers, is laying off 12,000 people, citing decreased traffic volume as the reason - people are just not buying as much "stuff" apparently.  Although, there may be other causes - Amazon cancelling its contract with UPS in favor of its own home-grown delivery service, for example.  Or more people using the cheaper (and often just as fast) USPS service, which now tracks even crap you buy on eBay and shipped by China Post.

Or, we are on the brink of a recession.  Perhaps.  The bloom is off the rose in the vaunted "coding" profession as the FANG companies all laid out tens of thousands of programmers, I think mostly to break their hold on the industry, where one could work from home and "name you salary."  Now it is "return to office" and "you're fired!"   Either there is less coding work to do, or these FANG companies colluded to lay people off just to balance the job market in their favor.

Or... nature abhors a vacuum.  When I got into the Patent business it was "name your salary" and bill the client until they cried.  Clients fought back and played practitioners against one another,and more and more people got into the profession, and pretty soon, well, the legal business ain't what it used to be.

It is clear to me that we are in the "overshoot" of an overheated economy.  Stocks are up, earnings are up, but everyone feels poorer thanks to inflation and layoffs or the threat of layoffs, as well as rising personal debt.  It will be interesting to see if it crashes before November and how that might affect the election.  The worst person in the world to "fix" the economy would be Trump - Billionaires don't need more tax cuts.  But like I said, we'll have to wait and see.  It does illustrate how the plebes think the President controls the economy (as well as the price of gas) by turning knobs on the wall of the Oval Office.

But I digress.

If you have to eat at a fast-food place, say, while traveling, there are ways to cut your bill in half, if not more.  The problem with most of these joints is that they promote the "value meals" and "deluxe sandwiches" which can run a dozen dollars or so. The real value items are nowhere to be found, particularly on the drive-through menu.  Inside, on the kiosk, you can find these bargains, which is why many fast-food restaurants have closed their walk-up services and are now relying totally on drive-through.

Of course, there are "apps" and I described the horror story with the McDonald's app a few years ago (they have since migrated to a new app provider, apparently).  If you can resist the temptation to engage in over-consumption (which the app is designed to do) you might be able to score a better deal - provided you look for the "deals" and not the "supersized value meal" or "de-luxe sandwiches."  They want you to collect points to redeem for coffee or whatever, and again, this promotes over-consumption.  People start eating out four nights a week, justifying it by crowing about all the "points" they have won.

So while those are some strategies to use at fast-food places (and pitfalls to avoid) the best and most consistent strategy is to just eat less food.  You don't need (or really want) the supersized value meal.  A simple sandwich is often more calories than you should be eating (on a 2,000 calorie a day diet).  So right off the bat, ditch the french fries.  Next, ditch the soft drink (which is nearly pure profit for the fast-food chain - and a diabetes nightmare)/  We always have our Walmart stainless-steel water cups in the car (Note: Not "Yeti" or "Stanley" overpriced crap!). So we always have a beverage.  We then split one of these two-for-$5 deals and the whole thing costs... a little over $5 with tax.

If we ordered the de-luxe sandwich value meal supersized, we are looking at $12 each or $24 for more food than we really should be eating - which would leave us feeling bloated and sick, and literally make us sick, over time.  We can each have two tacos al pastor and beer at our local Mexican dive for less money!

Funny thing, I was at a Popeye's in Jacksonville, taking the trailer back to have the new window installed.  I asked for the chicken sandwich.  "You mean the meal?" (which was twice as much money and had fries and a deadly high-fructose corn syrup drink).  "No, just the sandwich," I replied.  The lady thought I was poor or something and threw in a free order of fries out of pity.  Oh, well.  I guess I'll take that.  But it really was too much to eat, though.  Funny thing, too, but lettuce and tomato are extra but she forgot to charge me for that, either.  Sometimes it pays to look homeless.  I'll have to work on that angle!

Just that sandwich was more than enough food for lunch - it was huge!  And even without making it a "supersized value meal" it was still six bucks plus tax.  I should packed a lunch.  Funny thing, but they have these canned chicken or tuna lunch packs with crackers at Dollar Tree for a dollar-and-a-quarter. You'd be surprised how little one really needs to eat.

Eating slowly helps, too.  The problem with fast food is that the only "fast" part anymore is the consumption of it.  I see people wait 20 minutes in line at Chik-Fil-A (it is next to Home Depot, so I can watch the cars crawl through the line).  20 minutes to order the food, and they have it all consumed before they leave the parking lot - without having to park!  The same is true of any other fast-food joint.

When you eat fast, your body doesn't get that "I'm full" signal until it is too late and then you realize you've over-eaten.  Waiting until you are starving hungry is also a real problem.  If you wait until two o'clock to have lunch, chances are, you'll be more tempted to order the supersized meal.  Have a snack before then, it will calm the urge.

Americans are hardly starving to death, so I always laugh when people complain that they paid $15 to have $14 of fast-food delivered and then complain they had to leave a tip on top of that.  I suspect we'll see less and less of this type of behavior in the coming months.  I have no sympathy for someone who complains about living "paycheck to paycheck" but orders out or eats out several nights a week.  Again, though, normative cues are at work.  "Everyone eats out!" they cry, as if it were a Constitutional right and not a special treat.  When having restaurant meals and cable television and a new smart phone every few years (My Galaxy 7 is still working just fine, thank you) is considered a baseline "norm" (along with a leased SUV) then it is really hard to get ahead in life and accumulate wealth.

I see these "memes" online about how the Billionaires "took all our money away" and they post this with the notation, "Send from my iPhone XXXIV!" and fail to appreciate the irony.  They didn't "take our money away" but rather we begged them to take it from us.  Whether it is restaurant meals, food delivery, stupid stock tips, "crypto", or "must-have" consumer spending - or student loans, or overpriced houses or whatever, no one ever pointed a gun to anyone's head and said, "you must buy this overpriced Stanley Cup!"  And sadly, the same people who buy crap like that also bought Beanie Babies back in the day.

It will take another recession for people to cut back on stupid spending, and when that happens, prices will come down and people will lose the attitude about how they hate their jobs and whatnot.  But if history is any indication, they will first claim that the government owes them a bailout and when that doesn't happen, well, eventually most of them will sober up from this party that has gone on too long.

It will be painful to watch - yet again.   How many times do we have to go through this?

Useful Idiots, Liberal Edition (Please Stop "Helping"!)

A transgender art teacher claims to be a "radical climate scientist" and makes anti-Israel postings.  How much are Republicans paying this person?  And no, this is not the Onion.  By the way, they totally don't look like a dude at all.  No siree.

NOTE:  This is an older posting that I was working on and just posted today.  I guess I was in a bad mood when I wrote this.   Conservative readers may love it, though!

An art teacher is in hot water, because apparently they cracked open a box of Franzia Chardonnay and got hammered and started posting obnoxious anti-Israel postings online.  Now they (he/she/it or sh/it?) are contrite, claiming they went off their rocker, as "cancel culture" threatens to claim one of its own.

One of the conundrums of our age is why some people who identify as "liberal" will blindly support conservative causes, provided they come wrapped in a thin veil of revolutionary chic.  Che Guevara, for example, was popular among leftist college students in the 1960s.  But talk to any Cuban exile and you get a different story - a guy so bloodthirsty he personally shot children who he felt were "counter-revolutionary."  Even Castro got tired of his bullshit and sent him packing, and no one shed a tear when he was eventually killed by the CIA.

But hey - the t-shirt!  The look!  Revolutionary Chic!  People were sold an image of the "little guy" fighting for freedom, but the reality was that he was a bourgeoisie hanger-on who came to the party late, in countries that were not his own, and caused more havoc than good.

Similarly, as I wrote before, many liberals, particularly young people, latch onto the Dali Lama as a "cause" without really understanding who he is and what he is fighting for (a dictatorial theocracy with him in charge).  He is very anti-gay and yet many a gay jeep will have a "Free Tibet!" bumper sticker on the back, particularly in places like Ithaca, New York (been there, seen that!).

I am not a big fan of Bill Maher, who is a pompous self-absorbed idiot (even moreso than I, and that's saying a lot!).  But one of the things he does call out is the cognitive dissonance that some liberals have in supporting Arab terrorists who, if given the chance, would kill the very liberal Americans who support them.  I know, I'm weird - I hate people who want to kill me.  Call me strange on that count!

Worse yet, so many view issues like this as right/wrong dichotomies.  If you don't support Hamas and its terrorist attacks on civilians, than you must stand for everything Israel does!  But such is not the case.  One can be sympathetic to the plight of ordinary citizens on the West Bank or Gaza, who are just trying to live their lives and get along - provided, of course, they didn't vote for Hamas in 2006 or are handing over part of their income to terrorists, or are willingly shielding terrorists in their home, or dancing in the streets to "celebrate" a terrorist attack, or grooming their children to be suicide bombers.  To be an innocent civilian, you have to be innocent.

Similarly, the vast majority of Israelis just want to live their lives in peace - but there are a small minority that wants to stir up trouble, too.  No one side is perfect in this world.

Then there is this "lady" who is not even a full professor of art and yet besmirches the name of science by calling "themselves" a "radical climate scientist" - an oxymoron if there ever was one.  Scientists are not "radical" or "conservative" but rather methodical.  Science is not a matter of opinion or emotion.  You have to at least try to be objective.  Experiments have to be repeatable by other scientists, period.  You can't have science based on belief - although today that seems to be spreading, thanks to people like this art-teacher.

She isn't doing anyone any favors.  She is painting the transgender people as a bunch of radical nut-jobs - why not just hand over a good sound bite to Fox News?  Hannity can say, "I told  you so" and we really can't respond to that.  In addition, she is giving the "other side" all the ammunition they need to pooh-pooh climate change.  If this lady is the self-proclaimed face of climate science, there can't be much to it, can there? Bear in mind I did work for NOAA - I'm met real climate scientists and this art teacher isn't one of them - in fact, not close by a million miles!

Please stop "helping"!  The far-left "progressive" radicals are giving ammunition to the GOP and the GOP is willingly using this to sway elections.  They are promoting an image of Democrats as embracing Antifa and "defunding the police" as well as "guaranteed basic income" - among other crazy leftist ideas.  And some leftists think this is great if we lose elections.  Re-elect Trump!  When his minions appoint him dictator-for-life then the real revolution can come!  These are the "Bernie Bros" who voted for Trump or just stayed home on election day, out of spite.

Revolutions come at a cost, however.  And our system of government was designed to allow for social change without revolution.  And social change could occur (and has occurred), unless a few nut-jobs decide to throw a wrench in the works because no amount of change is good enough for them.

We stand to lose so much progress, just to satisfy the hissy-fits of a few weirdos.  Will that be the epitaph of our civilization?

Please, please!  Stop "helping!"