It’s all her fault. Iliana is bringing on Winter Storm Iliana. I hope she doesn’t have to pay for all the damages.
She must like her grandparents though, because it looks like it’s going to miss my part of Minnesota.
Yeah, that’s my granddaughter.
I know that this was low-budget mid-1960s sci-fi, but this monster is ridiculous.
I am concerned.
I’ve got it under control. It really helped finding the place that was the greatest possible distance from any seacoast.
Except that now my obsession has shifted to more accessible multi-limbed invertebrates.
We have lubed up our mighty door, and it opens and closes much more easily now. Unfortunately, the damage is done, and my wrist is undergoing some fascinating physiological changes. It is now mottled and blotchy, and pain has increased. I may have to pop into the emergency room to get it splinted up, but This Is AMERICA, and a couple of tongue depressors and a pressure bandage might bankrupt me, if applied by a trained professional.
Unfortunately, I have to compose an exam for my genetics class today, and the ouchieness of typing these short paragraphs is making me dread the effort of typing four or five pages. Maybe I can get a wrist splint at the drugstore today?
This is the main door to my house.
It’s massive. What you can’t see is how thick and heavy it is. This is a door that would stand up to an assault by orcs armed with Grond. In the winter it’s the only door out of the house to a path cleared of snow, so you’re not getting in if we don’t let you.
The only problem is that not only is it heavy, but in the recent cold weather the shape of the frame has shifted and is clamping down on the door, so it massively resists movement. Right now, going out that door is a difficult enterprise, requiring that we grab that door knob and lean back with all our weight to pull it out; coming in requires turning the knob and bashing it with your shoulder. It really needs readjustment.
This prelude is to explain why I have sprained my wrist by trying to open a door. It was that door. Right now my wrist is swollen and bruised, changing colors — last night it was yellow and green, but today it’s more of a dark grey. Yes, it hurts. Why am I typing? I need to stop. Ouch. Bye.
I was cleaning up a pile of stuff, and I found a treasure!
That’s me and my son, Alaric, taken in Eugene in about 1984-85, I think. He’d just eaten a sandwich, so his face was a little messy, but that’s OK, I think I’ll keep him.
It got the name in the 16th century, it’s internationally accepted, but one clown thinks he has the authority to change it.
Map of the Gulf of Mexico from 1718
Unfortunately, Google is happy to cave on this issue.
Google said Monday it will change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to “Gulf of America” in Google Maps after the Trump administration updates its “official government sources.”
The company also said it will start using the name “Mount McKinley” for the mountain in Alaska currently called Denali.
I think someone told Trump that McKinley oversaw the last surge of American territorial expansion, and he thinks he can make a name for himself by seizing real estate. Maybe someone should mention to him the end of McKinley’s story? I don’t think he read it to the end.
Sometimes, I hear about other people’s diets, and I’m left somewhat nauseous. I think this one needs to be called the FAFO diet.
The Fuck Around
This guy, in his 40s, decided to try what he called a “carnivore” diet. He was eating between 6–9 pounds of cheese, sticks of butter, and burgers daily—adding extra fat to the burgers for good measure. He claimed to have dropped weight, gained energy, and experienced improved mental clarity.The Find Out
Our dear Florida Man went to the doctor for painless yellow nodules that had developed on his elbows, palms, and the soles of his feet. He was diagnosed with a condition called xanthelasma, which basically means you have so much cholesterol in your body that excess lipids leak from your blood vessels and form deposits. While the rest of his body worked overtime to keep him alive, his total cholesterol level was over 1,000 mg/dL. For context, the “at-risk” threshold for cholesterol is 240 mg/dL.
He could just swipe his hand across a piece of toast to butter it, I guess.
My cholesterol levels are well under control, but then we don’t eat any red meat, except for an occasional Impossible Burger, and most of my protein comes from fish. Moderation in all things, you know.
I’ve long had queasy feelings about those all meat diets, anyway.
I opened up You’re All Just Jealous of my Jetpack this morning, and this cartoon leapt out at me.
I felt so smart, like a classically trained art historian, because I knew instantly that this was a reference to a famous cartoon from Gary Larson’s The Far Side. I even remember seeing it in the newspaper back in the 1980s, and puzzling over its profundities.
It’s become the painting of a pipe for our age.
My niece is busily archiving a vast pile of family documents to ancestry.com, and I periodically get these announcements that something new about long-gone relatives has appeared. This is a family portrait of the Westads in Fertile, MN ’round about 1900.
The stern bearded fellow seated in front is my great-great-grandfather Jens Pederson Westad, and next to him is my great-great-grandmother Marit Oldsdatter Solem Westad. The tall young man standing at the back is my great-grandfather Peter. He looks to have been about the age of the students I teach nowadays, which is a bit strange to me, since I remember him as a tall old guy with a great grey mustache. We all get old, I guess.
It just reminded me that I’ve got Peter’s pocketwatch (he’s not wearing it yet in the photo, he won’t buy it until 1908) out for repair and it should be ready any day now, and I do have his Talebakke Totenkniv (not worn in the photo, again it’ll be a few years before he buys it) on the desk in front of me. I always feel this odd thrill at seeing connections like this.
