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.

Passing along the obituary for my brother Jim.

James “Jim” Myers passed away at his home in Hoquiam September 23, 2022 surrounded by his children after battling Cancer for the last two years. Jim was born June 22, 1958 in Kent, Washington to James C. Myers, Sr. and Darlene (Westad) Myers. Jim graduated from Kent Meridian High School in 1976. After a brief enlistment in the Army, Jim married Karen (Church) Myers in 1978 in South Bend, Washington. The two lived and raised their children in the Willapa Harbor area most of the 27 years that they were married. Jim stood by Karen’s side and cared for her until she lost her battle with cancer in 2004. In May of 2008 Jim married Julie (Bjornsson) Myers in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Jim always told people that he was a lucky man because he not only found love with a wonderful woman once, but he was able to find it twice. Jim and Julie moved from Tacoma to Hoquiam in 2015 and happily lived together on their property until Julie passed away after a brief illness in 2021.

Jim worked fourteen years as a commercial fisherman before going to work for the Westport Shipyard for more than ten years. Jim also worked many years with Federal Marine & Defense Services, Quinault Beach Resort and Casino, and until having to take an early retirement due to his illness, he worked for The Grays Harbor Transit. Jim was well known for being a hard worker as well as having a quick wit and sarcastic humor. Jim was very stoic with his feelings but showed his love through kind hearted teasing. Jim enjoyed watching and collecting movies, the quirkier the better. Jim also was an avid reader who enjoyed reading about history and anything nautical. Jim had a deep interest in tractors and enjoyed using his tractors on his property, especially with his grandson. He was a talented artist who enjoyed drawing and painting. Jim also appreciated music and not only enjoyed listening to a wide variety of music, he was self-taught on the guitar and ukulele. In his spare time Jim enjoyed traveling, especially to Las Vegas and Zihuantanejo, Mexico. Jim loved to play in Poker and Black Jack tournaments and also teaching people how to play cards. Most of all Jim just loved being at home with his family.

Jim was preceded in death by his father, James C. Myers Sr; his wives, Karen (Church) Myers and Julie (Bjornsson) Myers; His son, Benjamin James Myers and his sister, Lisa (Myers) Clendening. Jim is survived by his mother, Darlene (Westad) Myers of Auburn, WA as well as his siblings Paul (Mary) Myers of Morris, MN, Caryn Clendening of Auburn, WA, Tomi Myers- Pierce of Kent, WA, and Michael (Wendy) Myers of Auburn, WA. Jim also leaves behind his children, Rachael (Ken) Hahn of McCleary, WA, Charles (Amelia) Myers of Bellingham, WA, Evan Myers of Hoquiam. Jim is also survived by his grandson, Alex Hahn of McCleary, numerous nieces and nephews as well as his “favorite child” his Chesapeake Bay Retriever, Nestle.

An informal Celebration of life for Jim is planned for October 15, 2022 at 1pm at the Hoquiam Grand Central Event Center, 427 7 th St. Hoquiam, WA 98550. In lieu of flowers, family asks that donations be made in Jim’s name to the North Beach Medical Equipment, PO BOX 2363, Ocean Shores, WA 98569.

I’ll be making a weekend trip to the West coast in a week and a half. I wish I had a better reason for it.

Walleye fishing is a big deal here in the upper midwest, and fishermen may be known to exaggerate the size of their catch somewhat, but this is going too far. In a fishing competition, one team did more than just talk up their catch, they committed abuse of an animal corpse to pad their numbers.

The competition in Cleveland was supposed to last two days but was cut down to just Friday because of bad weather. Fishermen in roughly 65 two-man teams started the day in a specific location on Lake Erie and had eight hours to catch the biggest set of five fish.

That was going to be Runyan and Cominsky, until Fischer pulled 10 weights totaling seven pounds out of their entry, the tournament director said. Plus, Fischer added, he found filets from other fish that had been stuffed down the walleyes’ throats to beef them up. Unlike weights, filets escape the notice of metal detectors.

“It was just simply walleye filets inside of a walleye,” he said.

Wow. That’s just blatant. Those two guys are going to be so intensely ostracized in the fishing community, and they’re never going to be trusted again, that they ought to just hang their heads in shame, throw their gear in the trash, and never set foot in a boat again. If you think cancel culture is harsh on the internet, getting caught lying to such an extreme is going to utterly ruin these guys’ hobby.

Wait, those guys’ coats are splattered with commercial logos? Did they have pro sponsorships? Kiss those goodbye, too.

For the last few months, my home office has been plagued with these annoying fluttering moths. I swat them as fast as I see them, but their numbers have been increasing, and last night was the worst — they were trying to fly up my nose, my ears, my wherevers, and there was just a cloud of them in the house. It was these guys:

Rice moths. Ick. Evil incarnate. We finally realized where they were coming from — the kitchen pantry is right next to my office. I had proudly stashed away maybe 50 pounds of dry goods, in preparation for the zombie apocalypse, and they had found my repository. Everything was double bagged, wrapped in plastic and stashed in storage containers, so I thought we were safe.

No, we were not safe.

We went through the containers and found that almost everything contained eggs and web clusters (except the lentils — apparently they don’t care much for lentils). Everything had to be thrown out. We dismantled all the pantry shelves and washed them down with bleach and hosed everything down. I wanted to cleanse it with fire, but Mary thought soap, water, and bleach would do the job. We’ve got some glass canisters that will go in the pantry once we’ve reassembled everything.

This was not how I wanted to spend my Saturday, but at least I can say the moth swarm in my office is currently greatly diminished.

I need more spiders in my house, although maybe the rice moths were just too disgusting to consume.