Did you know that you can actually get formal training in how to stage an effective peaceful protest? I got some non-violent activism training years ago. There really are experts in this subject who are steeped in the history and statistics and strategies.

I guess these two bozos skipped the class.

I am so entirely supportive of the cause of reducing oil production and consumption, I would be cheering on the cause except…

Their chosen form of protest was to throw tomato soup (what symbolic message is that sending?) on a famous Van Gogh oil painting (is that supposed to be a connection to the oil industry?) and super-glue themselves to the wall. This action sends only one message: the members of the “Just Stop Oil” protest are fucking irrelevant idiots.

Here’s their weak justification:

What is worth more: art or life? Is it worth more than food? Worth more than justice? one of the activists yells, adding, are you more concerned about the protection of a painting, or the protection of our planet and people?

She continued, The cost-of-living crisis is part of the cost of oil crisis. Fuel is unaffordable to millions of cold, hungry families. They can’t even afford to heat a tin of soup.

The problem with that logic is that putting art in a museum does not at all conflict with the goal of reducing oil consumption. Are they suggesting that sacrificing art is necessary to protect the planet and to feed the hungry? They’ve also “called for roads across London to be blocked every day in October to protest fossil fuels” which sounds like a stronger protest than defacing paintings. There’s at least a strong connection between the action and the goal.

Also, the painting was protected behind a sheet of glass. They couldn’t even get the defacement right.

Oh boy, I get email.

I’m reaching out one last time about featuring your brand in influencer-generated gift guides for the upcoming holiday shopping season.

I have 20 fabulous influencers who are doing holiday gift guides and they have a combined reach of over 3 million consumers who are eager to hear about your brand.

I’m running a special where I will feature your brand in all 20 gift guides for $4,000. It’s a one-time fee and it covers the influencers’ fees.

Gift guides are the most impactful way to get the word out about your brand to consumers who are looking for gifting ideas. This is the 4th year that I’ve run this campaign because every year, my clients get fantastic results.

Spaces in these gift guides are filling up fast and I don’t want you to miss this great opportunity!

Please feel free to reply to this email if you have any questions and/or if you would like to be part of this campaign.

Look, you’ll never persuade me with a tease that features the words “brand” and “influencer”. That’s a great way to get me running in the opposite direction.

I notice also that I am expected to cough up $4,000 to be mentioned in these “gift guides” from 20 different “influencers” who have almost certainly never even heard of me, while the “influencers” are getting paid. Seems a little unfair? I think I’ll pass.

I’m going to have to get on an airplane this weekend. I’m not happy about it, and Sun Country (which had the cheapest, low budget flight to Seattle) is not reassuring me.

Masks are now optional for all passengers and crew members onboard Sun Country flights within the United States. For international flights, masks are optional for Sun Country customers and employees, except where required by applicable governments for international travel. Please continue to bring a mask with you as required for international travel.
At Sun Country Airlines, safety is our number one priority, and we remain committed to maintaining a clean, healthy environment on board.

Why do they do this? They announce safety is our number one priority, while stripping all the health safety requirements from the flight. Isn’t it obvious that safety is not their number one priority? Is anyone fooled by this double-speak?

I’ll be wearing an N95 the whole way there and back.

Sorry, SETI, I already deleted it all. Maybe Google can recover it?

I do kind of wonder why so many aliens want to sell me insurance, and others are sending me photos of weird aliens without any clothes on.

I was contemplating my crowded daily calendar, and I noticed a gap — there’s an unfilled time slot on Thursday afternoon! This cannot stand. Therefore, I’ll fill it with an Open Q&A session from my office at the University of Minnesota Morris, and invite you all to stop by and pester me with questions and comments and complaints. Let’s try it and see how it goes.

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Oops. And then I remembered there was a one-time temporary change to my teaching schedule for just this one day. Rescheduled slightly to start at 10:30am Central.

Our local movie theater is a non-profit coop, which means they occasionally surprise the community with neat little surprises like this.

That is awesome, an opportunity to see some oldies on the big screen for free (and sell popcorn on the side). I would happily spend all afternoon and evening in the theater, except that today I have to dig myself out of the hole I made yesterday when I was flattened by the vaccine. Maybe I can sneak away for one showing.

If they do this again in the future, what I’d like to see is some of the older movies that I never had a chance to see in the theater. Karloff/Lugosi/Chaney stuff, the black & white classics I’ve only seen in late-night television, sprinkled with used car commercials. Or do a whole month of Hammer films. I’d plan my whole October calendar around that.

I woke up at 2am. At first, it was because my shoulders were aching from the vaccinations, but then my brain decided it would start composing new essay questions for the exam I’m handing out today…and my stress started rising. Then somehow it started dwelling on my dead siblings — I have two, a sister and now a brother — and at first it was serving up happy memories, but then it segued into contemplating how neglectful I’ve been of the family I was born into, and next thing I know I’m running on the hamster wheel of regret, which is not at all helpful if you’re trying to sleep. I’ve concluded that I’m enough of an asshole to have been less than supportive, but not enough of an asshole to not care.

So now I’m wide awake with a hyperactively depressed brain, tweaking that exam. I am going to be such a fatigued mess when I have to go to my lab.

On top of everything else I’ve got going on today, I got both my yearly flu shot and the COVID booster a few minutes ago. My survivability score just went up a good bit.

Only bad news is that my previous vaccinations have flattened me the day after. This one will be fine, right? Still worth it if it wasn’t, I’d happily trade one day of fatigue for the opportunity to not die wheezing my lungs out.