2023 can go f*** itself

The blog title expresses my sentiments regarding 2023 well enough.

This year has been a shitshow.

I was one of the waves of tech layoffs early in 2023. Finding new work has been... challenging... amid the ocean of other people in the same situation.

I sustained several injuries from hobbies. None serious, but all-together, they've been problematic.

Several friends died over the course of the year. Each one was a shock.

And the capper was when my father passed away.

Gotta say I'm still struggling with that one. There's a 'Dad-sized' hole in my life that I can't quite figure out how to process.

In the interests of fairness, it hasn't all been bad. The layoff meant I could spend time with my father before his passing, and that worked out remarkably well. I've also been able to help out family in the midst of all this, which has also been nice.

And I can't recall the last time I've managed to get so much sleep!

The year's been a constant source of anxiety, from the personal to just watching the news and seeing the wars and the violent rhetoric and the rise of - let's be honest here - nazi-like sentiments in my homeland.

Fucking shitshow all around.

I will not look back on 2023 with any fondness. If 2023 were a person, I'd be tap dancing on its face until it stopped being fun. And I think I'd get a lot of fun out of that.

I certainly hope 2024 is better (though the jury duty summons I got suggests that won't be the case... that's almost funny, really).

So, as I raise a glass... fuck you, 2023. Fuck you and good riddence.

Ah, that felt good.

For anyone reading, I hope the coming year brings you good fortune, good health, and all the good things.

Deconstruction of Heroes - a really annoying trend

I found it was really getting to me when Steven Moffatt took over "Doctor Who".

"Doctor Who" had transitioned from the Russell T. Davies reboot to Moffatt, who had written some of the best, and most haunting, episodes during the Davies tenure.

Under Davies, there was a fair amount of deconstruction of the Doctor's character and personality. A lot of trying to get into the character's head and part the mystery, but for some reason, I didn't find it too much. Then Moffatt stepped in and just kept going bonkers with incomprehensible story arcs that just orbited the Doctor in a bonkers fashion. And he went further in trying to deconstruct the character and break apart all the mystery that made the Doctor so interesting. He even invented an entire incarnation (the "War Doctor") to go nuts on the mythology.

I would up giving up on the show after a while. I've read a bit about what Chris Chibnall has done for the show's mythology and... no regrets from walking away.



Then Rogue One: A Star Wars Story came out.

I have to admit, I didn't think Rogue One was a bad story, exactly. It was just... unnecessary. I honestly didn't need an entire rambling caper telling me how the Rebels got the plans to the Death Star. And having watched the movie, with the really insanely contrived plot twists, it didn't do the story any favors, imho.



Then came the Han Solo movie. I watched a trailer and... nope. I really didn't need an entire movie trying to pidgeonhole in all of Han's backstory so we could see the Kessel Run and how he won the Millennium Falcon. Honestly, that much naked Disney greed to milk more and more out of the fanbase was too much for me.



Around the same time, I think Rian Johnson's The Force Awakens came out and we got treated to PTSD Luke Skywalker, with his addiction to alien blue milk, fresh from the alien teat.

Wow. Yeah.

Watching the heroic Jedi from Return of the Jedi turned into a broken old man with a milk fetish was way over-the-line. I was somewhat annoyed that Abrams had turned Han and Leia into a divorced couple, with Han a scrounger on the run, but given the plot thread of killing off Han, it seemed pointless to get irriated. Turning Luke into an attempted child-murderer and weirdo hermit was just way too much.

I was done with Star Wars at that point.



"The Mandalorian" came along and, I gotta admit, I found myself hooked on the franchise again. Then they did "The Book of Boba Fett" and... really? I mean, making the cool character from The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi return was... okay, I guess? Turning him into a weirdly-broken, weak, and kind of pathetic wanna-be sheriff/boss on Tatooine was really unnecessary. If the show hadn't jumped to the Mandalorian for a bit, I'd have written the whole thing off as a waste of time.



And now we've got "Obi-Wan Kenobi".

So, honestly, I never saw a point to telling a story of Obi-Wan's time in exile. There was no way he was doing anything especially-noteworthy during his time as a desert hermit, right?

I'll admit, what they've got going is somewhat-intriguing. A side-quest to rescue young Leia is intriguing. It's unclear if she knows who he is and the attention paid to some details has been fun, but honestly I really don't need to see broken Ben Kenobi, cowering in the shadows. And there's a lot of that, three episodes in.



This trend to take heroic characters from various series and put them through some kind of blender to squeeze some kind of drama from their past tales - stories told after the character's performed their main heroic arc - is demeaning to the character and kinda lazy storytelling. It's a really irritating trend, and I really wish it would stop.

I'm enjoying parts of "Obi-Wan Kenobi". I have to admit, I like the new villain characters. The girl playing young Leia is awesome. Bringing back Owen Lars was well-done. I'm ambivalent about the return of Darth Vader. Seems kind of pandering, but I suppose the entire series is that.

Thoughts on "Pacific Rim: The Black"

Season 2 of "Pacific Rim: The Black" aired on Netflix last week. I binged it. Now, as my seasonal allergies kick me in the brain stem, I find myself processing it.

"The Black" is a sequel (I think) to Pacific Rim 2. Set in Australia, the Precursors (the extradimensional aliens behind the invading kaiju) open multiple rifts in Australia, overwhelming that land with kaiju. The Pacific Defence force (it has a fancy name that I forget just now) enacts a protocol to cut off Australia from the rest of the world and leave it to its own devices because of reasons.

Mind you, I don't understand what the reasons are, but when you watch Pacific Rim, you don't worry about the details too much.

"The Black" follows the Travis family. Parents Brina and Ford Travis are Rangers who pilot a Jaeger. Young Taylor Travis is a cadet, learning to become a Ranger and pilot of a Jaeger (and kind of shit at it). Young and headstrong Hayley is the baby of the group. For reasons, Brina and Ford leave their children with some survivors of the frenzied and chaotic evacuation of Australia in some kind of isolated and idyllic haven, then go off for help.



Five years later, it seems Brina and Ford ain't coming back. Taylor has grown into a teenage control freak with a stick up his ass. Hayley is a brat determined to get out of the idyllic haven and try to get off of Australia, despite the continent being overrun with kaiju. Things happen. The kids come across an abandoned Jaeger named Atlas Destroyer with a fancy talking AI to guide them. Atlas Destroyer, being a training Jaeger, is unarmed and needs proper power cells. That leads to hilarity that has the annoying protagonists come across the mysterious Boy, a mute child in an abandoned government lab, and Mei, a gun-toting teenager with attitude who works for the ruthless Shane, an Aussie warlord in a casual suit who wants Atlas Destroyer.

Whew!

Shenanigans ensue. Turns out Shane has Jaeger drift tech and uses it to do a mind-whammy on Taylor. He steals Atlas Destroyer and tries to have the kids killed, but Mei swoops to the rescue. They all jaunt off in Atlas Destroyer as a dysfunctional family with interpersonal strife and... wow does the story go off the rails.

Season two introduces the Sisters, some goth-mask wearing cult women who work with hybridized kaiju. They want Boy because it turns out Boy ain't a normal boy. More shenanigans. Then we have our conclusion that ends our weird anime excursion.

Yeah, I hastily summed up the plot there, but I have to say, season two really didn't make a lot of sense. It offered a lot of mystery, but answered no questions posed in season one, and really just made all the characters annoying as hell. Except Boy. Boy was just Boy.

All-in-all, I appreciated what "Pacific Rim: The Black" was trying to do. It was trying to be Pacific Rim: Road Warrior. It was doing pretty well in season one, getting that mojo down. The character of Mei was clearly the writers' favorite, with her attitude, lethal skills, and dance moves. I'll be honest: she was pretty much my favorite as well, along with Boy. Those two seemed to have the most interesting stories going for them. The Travis family was just a bunch of dead weight, as far as the narrative went. They were agencies of moving the plot along, but I wouldn't call them especially sympathetic characters. In the end, I really wanted to know Mei's story and what the deal was with what Shane did to her. And I wanted to know exactly wtf Boy's story was. Like explicitly. But the writers didn't seem interested in actually answering questions. They concluded their story the way they wanted and... uh... well that was that.

There were some good mecha vs monster fights, mainly in season one. Season two spent way too much time trying to delve into contrived conflicts, which frankly distracted heavily from what season one set down. It was disappointing, but such is the way of things.

Pissing on the dumpster fire

As I started pondering my drinking, I found myself thinking of the good things that happened in 2020.

Shocking statement, right? What good things happened?

• Trump lost his bid for re-election. By a lot.
• The toilet paper crisis turned out to be a bunch of shit.
• Trump lost.
• Medical science has performed a basic miracle and come up with vaccines for COVID-19. Vaccines - plural.
• As of 12:01 PM on January 20, 2021, Trump will no longer be in the White House.

Yeah, it's not much, but ya gotta find the positives in life.

Wrapping Up 2018

I feel oddly-obligated to make a New Year's Eve post. Not sure why.

I've just finished (re-)watching Shaun of the Dead with some Zachary's deep-dish pizza and a bit of Campfire whiskey. That's pretty much the sum total of my New Year's Eve plans in a nutshell. I may pop another movie on. I may try a bit of writing. I expect I'll have a bit more Campfire. I'm not sure if I'm going to bother staying up 'till midnight.

2018 has been a really weird year. Can't say I'm sorry to see it go. I'm curious what 2019 will bring. I'm sure it will be interesting times.

Almost there...

As 2018 winds down, I sit nursing sore muscles. I overdid it yesterday. A life lesson: make sure your destination has what you're looking for before you walk a couple of miles to fetch something.

Got my SSD configured. Turns out I had to do things. Google pointed me to the things. I managed to do the things. I feel very empowered and technical, despite my inability to describe what I had to do to get everything working properly.

I'm set for New Year's Eve, for the most part. I couldn't get the beer I wanted (part of my fruitless trek yesterday) but I've got plenty of other stuff to make up for the lack. I've also got a deep-dish pizza waiting to be baked as my dinner tomorrow. Mmm...

I figure I'll marathon some movies, maybe all the Avengers flix in my library or the entire LotR series. If I'm still up around midnight, I'll toast the new year and go to bed.

Yeah, it's not exciting, but I'm not really looking for excitement.

2018 was a fairly ridiculous year for me. It certainly had no small bits of excitement. I changed jobs. I saw one of those "landmark" birthdays come and go. I thought I was going to lose my mind more than once. I changed Internet providers (aaah... to be websurfing at civilized speeds...). I did a lot of personal journey stuff that would mean nothing to anyone other than myself. All said, despite the worldwide shitshow that was 2018, the year itself treated me fairly well. Gonna be interesting to see where 2019 takes me.

Abitrary Countdown Start

Fifteen days left in 2018.

As Xmas looms and the rain pours outside, I'm finding myself thinking back on this year and wondering what the hell 2019 is going to bring.

I started 2018 changing jobs. I'd be lying if I said it was a smooth ride. More than once, I thought it was a mistake and considered walking and trying something else. All said, it's turned out okay so far. It certainly could be worse.

I've continued training in a new martial art. Haven't regretted it for a moment, though I could stand to be a bit more dutiful in attending classes.

I've managed a trip to England and seen more of the north. I got to explore York, including its myriad pubs and winding streets.

I've read a number of books. I've taken time to attend to life matters I've neglected for far too long. Hell, I've started reading philosophy.

My homeland is going nuts and it seems to be getting worse day by day. The planet isn't doing a whole lot better. The icecaps are melting. Climate change is far worse than anyone anticipated. Scientists believe we're going to hit the point of no return in less than twenty years. And the governments of the planet are not responding in time. Hell, in the US, half the country thinks climate change is a myth.

How can all that get fixed? What's the solution to all this? I honestly don't know.

I wonder if 2019 will offer any solutions? I wonder if I can come up with any?

Review: "Ant Man and the Wasp"

Yeah, yeah. I know. I'm late. I finally saw it.

Great caper movie. Funny. Quirky. It felt a bit rushed in parts and not as solid as the first one, but a decent sequel. I couldn't quite figure out what to make of Michelle Pfieffer's Janet Van Dyne/Pym, but Michelle Pfieffer rocks, so whatever works. Fucked ending, though. Overall, I quite enjoyed it.

2017: A personal recap

The Good Stuff

• Family and friends were healthy and reasonably prosperous.
• Got my DSL line fixed early in the year.
• Much soup. Relatively-healthy eating there.
• My gaming group lost a player.
• Zombie Tools!
• Started martial arts again.
• Found a brewery with smoked beer on tap.
• BART
• Much sleep
• Promotion at work.
• Overseas trips for work.
• In the UK for their June election. Hung Parliament!
• Many cool things (Kickstarters, other junk) in my pile of junk.
• Finished some stories. Started another story.
• Game progress
• EDIT: Winning the Little Drummer Boy game.

The Bad Stuff

• Trump is President of the United States.
• Alt-Right Nazi bullshit.
• Equifax hack fallout.
• Sinus issues. So. Many. Sinus. Issues. And horrible, horrible allergies.
• My gaming group lost a player.
• Phone jack died and having merry hell getting someone to fix it.
• Learned of a sad and weird fate of a high school associate.
• Lost some excellent co-workers as they moved on to other positions.
• BART
• Self-inflicted wound of stupid
• Work just got more and more insane.
• Overseas trips for work.

Conclusion

I guess I made out okay in 2017, at least for the most part. 2018's looking pretty uncertain, certainly in the first quarter. Guess we'll see what happens.

To the handful of people (mainly from Russia? Whyyyyyy?) who actually read this, I wish you all a Happy New Year. Hope 2018 treats us all well.

EDIT: 774 views? WTF?

A bit of this, a bit of that

I keep neglecting my blog and depriving it of random, incoherent nonsense! Naughty me!

Must correct behavior...

Thanksgiving


So how was your Thanksgiving, fellow Americans? Mine was gluttonous, as usual. Sucks to be back to work. Sucks harder to have Xmas music playing in full force in the stores. The hell of the Holidaze is upon us. Oh well, apparently North Korea's missiles can now reach DC, so I suppose nuclear conflagration and self-destruction may trump (hah!) that problem.


Things Breaking


What the hell is it with misfortune happening in clusters, anyway? First my phone jack in my apartment dies a mysterious death, then my computer chair breaks (maybe that extra slice of pumpkin pie was a bad idea?), then a goddamn storm drain breaks (flooding my balcony), then lightbulbs on the back of my building (including my balcony) burn out (not ominous at all), then my key-holder breaks (causing said house keys to stab me in the thigh - AWESOME!). I swear, if this is related to offending those pagan gods while breaking a mirror under a ladder I'm gonna be miffed.

BART Weirdness


This morning, I swear to the FSM, my BART car smelled like cotton candy.

Do you have any idea how weird that is? On a good day, BART just smells like unwashed train car and possibly marijuana. Most times one notices an odor, it's extreme body odor, feces, urine, or some combination of all those mixed in with indescribable horror.

Cotton candy just isn't a BART smell. I'm really curious what that was about.

A Job Medium Rare


Hah! I made a funny! Get it? Medium rare instead of we... oh never mind. Anyway, I've been deluged with projects over the last few months and actually managed to complete the big one two days ahead of deadline! I'm giddy enough that I am actually mentioning a semi-positive work thing!




Yeah, okay. It sound stupid when I see it written out.

Futility


Few things are more fun than finding out you've spent an hour of your life doing testing on a product by using an unsupported browser. So all those nasty issues you found? That nice, long list of detailed notes? Totally useless.

Yup. Great fun.

2017's kicks to the balls

Recap:

• Trump is still in the White House.
• Equifax fucked us.
• Nazis are a thing again. Seriously.
• North Korea's got nukes and Trump is in the White House.
• CCleaner malware. Yeah, I use CCleaner. Whee!
• Equifax fucked us royally. Like for the rest of our lives. And who wants to bet there's no consequences for that? Anyone?
• Fucking Trump is still in the White House!

So I've been finding myself tremendously depressed in September. Like "I-don't-want-to-get-out-of-bed" or "I-would-rather-eat-glass-than-interact-with-people" depressed. It's affecting my work. It's affecting my hobbies, though on the plus side, I'm devoting a fair amount of time to this Krav Maga class.

I keep thinking that the next time I step out the door, someone's going to launch a nuke or start a riot or whatever. People feel helpless and really, really scared. And it's rubbing off, goddamnit.

And just to add insult to injury, my Fall allergies have started kicking in.

A shade more than three months left in the year. Ye gods.

September stuff

I probably should have picked a day other than 9/11, but it is what it is.

It's September already! And it's weird!

The San Francisco Bay Area has gone through record heat waves (for us) and had a really weird bought of thunderstorms (as recently as an hour ago by the time of writing this).

Weird.

Almost time to start thinking about Halloween and all that fun stuff. Anything to distract from the clusterfuck that is life as we know it.

Let's recap, shall we?

• Massive hurricane blasts the unholy hell out of Texas and puts a chunk of Houston under water. Fifty-two inches of water fell at one point!
• 8.1 earthquake hits Mexico. Eight-point-one. Fuckin. Ing. Hell. That's big.
• Hurricane Ivanka-sorry-Irma hits Florida. Sure, it dropped down to Category 4 but that's after nearly wiping clean some islands in the Caribbean.

And still people deny the climate change evidence. Good lord.

It's enough to drive a fellow to drink. More.

What the hell happened to August?

I swear it was just July a moment ago but I looked up and it's freakin' August! It's almost September, for the FSM's sake!

What the hell?

Madness has taken hold, clearly.

In the last month I've returned to martial arts again. This time I'm trying Krav Maga. It's pretty kick-ass and I'm enjoying it, but it's really driving home how out-of-shape I am.

In terms of reading, I just finished "The Barrow" by Mark Smylie, the creator of the glorious "Artesia" fantasy comic. Set in the same world, "The Barrow" follows the adventures of Artesia's brother, Stjepan, a cartographer and probable spy as he and a series of other dungeon crawlers go through a lot of sexual escapades and some seriously fucked up shit.

I've also started reading the Witcher books by Andrezej Sapkowski. Entertaining fare, though the main books are a little chatty and could use a bit more action.

Random bits of whimsy

Commuting, as a rule, sucks.

It's not fun. It's not really supposed to be fun.

Commuting on BART is an especially dicey ride. You never know when you're going to be sharing a train with some wacked-out meth-head, violent nutjob, or just someone who hasn't had soap touch him in a year.

On top of that, BART is an aging system prone to breakdowns. Delays, while not super-common, are also not unusual. If it isn't an equipment failure of some sort, it's usually a medical emergency or some kind of police action.

On a bad day, you can get all three.

Commuting by train has its advantages. Sure, you rub shoulders with some people you usually don't really want touching your shoulder (or any other part), but if you have a book or a game on your phone, there's ways to pass the time.

And it's better than driving, most of the time.

Still, riding BART isn't something I especially enjoy anymore. It's more of a necessity than anything else.

What's helped take the sting away is the neat little things that I've come to notice over a few years of commute. You see, at one station (or possibly more), if you look down at the escalator steps, you can sometimes see that whomever painted the yellow warning markers on the side decided to add a little random smiley face on one of the steps.

I've seen these on two sets of escalators so far. On a really good day, sometimes I see them on concurrent uses of the escalators (assuming they're actually working).

This morning, I got to see both smiley faces I'm used to seeing. It's weird what a strange lift that was to my morning. It's a little thing, but it's nice to see those little bits of whimsy in an increasingly-depressing world.

The Joys of Travel

Just got back from a trip to the UK. Was there for the election that resulted in a "hung Parliament", leaving them with a bit of an uncertain road ahead.

Interesting times.

I returned home with a box of fudge and some kind of cold or bug that may or may not be strep throat. I'm waiting to hear on the last bit. Goddamn but I hate flying now. When I was a kid, it was an exotic, interesting thing. Now I find myself in a tiny seat in coach for hours on end just praying to get the hell out of the plane. I avoid the airline food like the plague (which almost certainly saved me from stomach problems) which left me beyond hungry. The only saving grace was that international flights have a fairly good selection of movies.

I got to finally see The Wolverine (meh), Moana (excellent!), Logan (not bad), The Great Wall (terrible, but I enjoyed it nonetheless), Jupiter Ascending (wow... beautiful but horrible), and at least one or two other movies that have left no impression on my memory at all.

It's good to be home, sick or not. There's just something comforting about sleeping in one's own bed.

And it's nice to have cars driving on the right side of the road.

Berry Cake Experiment

My mom makes an awesome berry cake.

She uses frozen blackberries and somehow makes it light, fluffy, sublime, and tasty. Not too sweet. Just perfect.

So I got the recipe from her last time I saw her. On a whim, I tried making it earlier (see my KHAAAAAANNN!!!! posts).

So... yeah. Some mishaps in putting it together. First of all, I didn't let the butter thaw enough, so when I used the mixer, chunks of sugar and butter went all over the goddamn kitchen. Then I decided to use frozen blueberries instead of blackberries. And the pan I used is a smidge bigger than what the recipe calls for.

Oh, and I forgot to add baking powder.

So the outcome:

• It's kinda flat. Forgetting the baking powder will do that. At least I didn't add baking soda. That's always a fun mistake to make.
• The berries didn't sink properly. I think the consistency is a bit off.
• I baked it for less time. Turned out to be a good call...
• Tastes good! I decided not to add all the sugar the recipe calls for and that was a good call.

All-in-all, not a bad first try. I'm glad I remembered to grease the pan. Cleanup was easy, though I dread the bits of sugar I missed and the ant issues that will ensue.

Good for what ails ya

The other day I was looking at my accrued time off. Looked good. Actually, looked kind of on the high end.

I think I deliberated for about thirty seconds before I put in the request for time off. Fast forward to this morning and I'm looking at a long weekend.

It felt damn good to wake up at a sane hour. It felt even better to traipse out, devour an unhealthy breakfast (mmm... bacon...) then meander home with nothing really to do. I took a run an hour later. Went further than I'd planned or expected. I regret nothing. Any healthy benefits I got from that was undone by lunch anyway.

Yes, lunch was mostly beer. Mmm... beer...

And now? And now I think I'm due to poison myself further while catching up with an old friend.

Sometimes it's the simple, little, things that make life worth living.

Damn but I needed this weekend.

Shaking my head

My table-top gaming group lost a player today.

When we're not having our monthly sit-down session at someone's place, I try to fill the gaps with an email session. It helps me get tiresome exposition out of the way while practicing my creative writing skills. Some of our email sessions are quite entertaining reading. One day I hope to edit them into a proper story.

I'm not sure how I'll handle the current one.

When I look back at what happened, I can't say I'm sure what went wrong. It was an argument, but I'm still fuzzy on how it got out of control so quickly. It was role-playing. One player has a gruff sort who is the leader. Another is playing an opposite gender character from a very different culture. The dispute started over something fairly small. The leader character was insisting on a promised (indeed, a vow) of silence over a plot twist. Everyone agreed. The outlier player character seemed to have agreed, but the player for the leader character pressed for a specific promise. The player for the outlier character got offended. There were some tense exchanges, seeming to be in-character, then everything sort of settled down.

In all honesty, it wasn't all that unusual of an exchange. In role-playing games, often players get a little "lost" in their characters. Terse and tense exchanges happen. Sometimes there's some seriously hard feelings. I've been on both ends of those kinds of exchanges and this particular situation didn't even seem to merit honorable mention when compared to those.

Clearly I mis-judged.

The player for the outlier character was still quite offended. Part of it was the player's interpretation of the character's view. Part of it was seeming to be a very personal offense taken from what the other player said. I've re-read everything multiple times and I honestly can't see the cause for complaint. But I'm not the one who is offended.

There was another exchange over the long weekend. It concluded today.

And I lost a player.

I'm not sure I could have done anything to fix this. I'm honestly not sure I wanted to. Now I have a very, very small gaming group and I'm wondering if it's got a sustainable future.

Perfect start to a fucking Tuesday.

Overdue Commentary

To celebrate the growler of tasty beer in my 'fridge, I feel an urge to post to my neglected blog!

REJOICE!

Why am I drinking on a Monday night? Well besides the obvious answer of "why not?" there's always the celebration that we're about a month-and-a-half into the Trumpocalypse and the nukes haven't sailed just yet. I'm cautiously-optimistic that we might make it through March before all hell breaks loose.

It's a game among people I know: to start the day asking "What godawfully fucked-up and stupid thing has Trump and his Legion of Evil done today?"

I try not to speculate. It just irritates me. I'm also afraid word might get back to Der Gropenfuhrer and he'll get inspired.

In other news, I'm working on a new slew of fantasy and sci-fi novels grabbed from Amazon. I'm currently working my way through "The Crimson Queen" by Alec Hutson. It had a slow start, but I have to say I'm quite enjoying it now. I'm about halfway through and things are getting horribly fucked up in a delightful way. I'm not entirely-clear I know what's going on and that's just fine with me.

Thanks to a friend's generosity, I'm able to see season two of "The Expanse" (currently airing on SyFy). It's surpassing my expectations and making me quite giddy. The introduction of Bobbie Draper is all I'd hoped for. Oh glory day! Please Tweety McTangerine! Don't nuke us before season two ends!

At the recommendation of a friend, I've started to make modifications to my wardrobe. I'm now getting tailored shirts made. Shirts with buttons! That should really be ironed!

It's a far cry from my shitty t-shirts and frayed hoodies. I'm still sticking with my jeans for the time being, but I may pony up for some chinos at some point and maybe even (gasp!) another suit.

Crazy times.

Speaking of crazy times, it's been raining like Biblical endtimes in parts of California this year. I feel for folks near Oroville Dam. That shit is just nuts. I can't believe how fast we went from drought to floods.

Wait. Trumpy-poo is prez. Yes. Yes I can believe that. I can believe that and more.

Five days in

It wouldn't be the new year season if I weren't going through some ill-advised attempts to get in-shape. The jogging, step-climbing stuff isn't a problem, all things considered. I've been faithful enough with jogging that it's not too troubling.

No, it's the upper-body stuff that's kicking my ass. I've neglected push-ups and chin-ups for longer than I ought. I've been pretty faithful for the last five days, but I'm starting to feel it a lot.

I guess that's a good sign in that I'm doing something right, but... ouch.

I think I'm going to take 2017 slow. Get one thing done, then move on to another. Gonna be that kind of year.

On the plus side, my pool game is improving a lot. While I'm still the worst person in my office by a mile, I'm starting to win games properly instead of due to the other player scratching.

Whee.

Now we're due for a cold snap before a major rain storm hits the Bay Area. Should be a fun weekend.