You spin me right around, Baby.

Well, they say a picture is worth a thousand words. So here, in a nutshell, is my Monday. Or at least my Monday at the day job.


This graphic shows all my mouse movements for most of Monday at work (click to embiggen). The circles represent where I parked my mouse for some time (size of circles are related to time spent there, so those were the lunch, getting a bottle of water, bathroom breaks, on the phone, etc). Hmm, I wonder where I put the main open windows for apps, the floating pallets, and open screen reality?

Art accomplished with I/O Graphica. (I believe there are apps for the different platforms).

Random thoughts on the morning commute

Peddle-bike taxis in the Congo, going up and down hills. Peddle-bike taxis would make more sense than foot cabs in San Fransico. Should change that over.

In the first paragraph, Avram needs to see the Relic's batteries as being low, and relate that to his own faith. Those two things need to happen in that first paragraph, and there we've set up most of the story. Also, I should include more of his feelings toward Grace when I first introduce her. That will make Avram seem more sympathetic.

"La Barbie" is arrested in Mexico, and he's a US citizen. I wonder what it would be like during an outer-space alien invasion, would there be those who would cross over cultures like that?

Writing, it's not just a passion, it's a sickness.

Story Bone

Nobody talks about the long suppressed Fourth Law of Thermodynamics. The one that exempts dragons from the first three. The dragons, of course, have long known about their speciality.

Sunday coast

Got some sleep, slightly better. Still a little twitchy.

Next week we restart the madness of classes, work, and government meetings. Plus trying to catch up with chores at home.

How's your weekend?

Story Bone

but even with all that, ideas still come.

Son of Sin.

The sins of the fathers cause the curse to be passed down to the 3rd generation. Through no fault of their own, they are condemned to hell. All because because of their grandfather's transgressions. And, their own children would be free of the curse. What does this do to their psychology? Are they good for goodness sake even though no Santa is ever going to visit them? Or do they act out, compounding the original sin?

And what is their life like knowing that no matter what they do, they're going to hell anyway?

Maxed out

Here at Context and I've hit the wall early on Saturday night. I want to be anti-social for a few hours at least. Exhausted to the point of not even being able to join in with a party, which I used to be able to easily. Small talked out. I want to be someplace quite with me and the voices in my head. Hell, free alcohol at the party, and I can't gear myself up for that.

I usually don't feel this way until Sunday morning. But all day today I've been forcing myself. And not doing a good job. I get a few sentences into a conversation and then I go silent. I'm sure it's exhaustion, and I'm not able to tap into the energy of others, but instead being around others is draining me faster. Again, that's not the normal way of things.

There are times I keep feel I'm screwing up, and I'm sure I am. I'm not able to jump in or be entertaining. Heck, I've had moments where I should have said, "Why, yes, I do have a novel past the first draft," and my brain shuts down. Instead I feel like a poser. Sure, I have work out there, and stuff in submission, and novel in various states of revision.

What I need is a weekend to myself. And because I came with a friend, I really can't have a moment to recharge all by myself. Maybe that was my mistake this time. I was no where near as rested as I should have been and I left myself no time to decompress and recharge. It's a dark wind again. I do not want.

Two for a Friday

Because I'm taking a short lunch today, only a few links.

Rachelle Gardner has some words about having a target on your back. She basically has two points about living life in the public eye (as writers with stories/books out in the wild, or as blogger), grow a thick skin and think before you criticize others. Pretty good advice.

And, because the spin will be ramped to insanity levels this weekend, a little onion humor. Tests are biased against students who don't give a shit. Not only a great piece of satire about education process, also a great send up of the "pundit roundtable" philosophy of "news."

edit This is just too cool, an animation about the discovery as asteroids for the past 30 years.

If it weren't for those meddling kids

Many proponents of Tea Party and the far right Libertarianism are trotting out the concept of laissez faire as an economic idea. You can see this in the current call for "get the Government out of (insert pet industry here)" sentiments and the general "less regulation, dismantle government agencies" arguments.

But, again, we've tried that as we grew as a nation. How did it work out? Not as well as the proponents would have you believe. Of course, they also give the reason that "we didn't try hard enough." Because there was some limited involvement of the government (like a central bank and early trials with income taxes, tariffs and charters) before abuses became so great that all these government agencies were created to help regulate the businesses. You might also see that Unions were created at the same time to protect workers from the most egregious work conditions. The "we didn't do it all the way" is the same as Peter Pan imploring us to "clap harder" so Tink will live.

So, how did laissez faire practices work out? Strident monopolies (rail, oil, textile, steel), labor abuses (child labor, 12 hour work days, factory towns/store/script), the stifling of innovation and entrepreneurship, physical intimidation as a business tactic, environmental degradation, the amassing of wealth in the top 10%, and eventually the Great Depression. That last one was the final nail for what remained of laissez faire attitudes, which we had already begun to move away from by the beginning of the 20th century (yes, there's an argument to be made that early regulation brought about the GD, but most economists will tell you it was also government interfering in the economy that got us out, finally).

What people tend to forget is their government, for the most part, is a reactionary vehicle. All those government programs like Civil Rights, Social Security, and Medicare and the Departments of Labor, Energy, Environment, Education, etc didn't form from a "wouldn't it be nice" philosophy. They came into being, kicking and screaming, because of the need to correct some wrong (or at least perceived wrong) that was happening. You may remember the fuss and consternation over the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. And heck, that only took a dramatic attack, a few thousand dead, and almost two years to enact.

However, people tend to forget that we had this time in America. Or look back on it with some fondness while ignoring all the terrible things that came with it. Again, nice idea, doesn't work in the real world.

Unless you want to go back to the conditions of having everything owned by the company, being paid in script that was useless outside the company store, and working until you dropped dead (literally), which then your family would be thrown out of the company owned house. Oh, and don't forget the price fixing and other monopolistic activities.

History, it's a bitch. And the liberal bias of reality intrudes again.

It's a kinda magic

Conservatives these days have warped up the reality distortion field and increased the shields on their bubbles. And, just to mix my metaphors, have begun shouting at the masses to clap harder because their Tinker-Bell ideas lay dying on the floor.

First up, the Bush Tax Cuts. Way back when there was a Republican majority in both houses of Congress, they held the Presidency, and they were stocking the courts with activist ideologs emerging from their decades long program of raising them in a bubble. And they decided to try their ideas of Lower Taxes and Less Regulation. So they passed the Bush tax cuts.

Now, if you remember these cuts were sold on the premise that lower taxes helps create jobs, brings wealth to everybody, and would increase tax revenues from all the prosperity. If you don't remember that, hey, just turn on the TV and listen to the conservatives these days. Why? They're touting the same old line and saying exactly the same thing. You may also remember that the actual CBO projections were so bad that, even with a majority and having the Presidency, they couldn't stomach the financial disaster of making those tax cuts permanent. You may have heard about "making them permanent." Yeah, it's another line the conservatives, especially the Tea Party supported conservatives, like to spout off.

But here's the thing. We've now had a decades long live experiment with that ideology. So, how did it work out?

Zero job growth for the decade (Washington Post and as a side note, look at that chart, actual job growth was greater when tax rates were substantially higher. In fact, they start to slow after the Reagan tax cuts, which strangely enough were sold with the same tired line). Also, real wages declined and wealth concentrated at the top end of the scale (Business Insider article I linked to before which pulled together several charts from other sources, and Alan Greenspan). As to tax revenue, do I need to find links about how we went from a surplus to record deficits (and ran that way since the first tax cuts)?

So, that ideology is demonstrably wrong. Reality. It's a bitcher. It also has an obvious liberal bias. Don't believe me? Hey, the tax cuts are here. Right now. We're living with them. See all the new jobs created by them? Neither do I.

The ideology is bankrupt, and it's nearly bankrupting our country. And we now have a wave of people who think that the real problem is that we didn't try hard enough. That's magical thinking. It's also the definition of insanity. And it's the reason why the advertising logic of "buy more, save more" still works. So if you ever wonder why I get so stabby at times, here's your answer. The whackaloon quotient keeps going up.

Things that make me all stabby in the morning

Eric offers a little help on how to be a political blogger. Hahahahahaha. Happy little penguin, happy little penguin, deep breath, happy little penguin. Just put the knife down and write the blog.

I so relate to that because I continually run into things like this. The whackaloon quotient goes up, again. I would say this is rank pandering, but I've come to realize these people actually believe these things to be true. And notice, this is a conservative who has finally admitted that he doesn't reach across the aisle. For all that blustering about "locking the Republicans out of the discussions," you now see the real cause. No matter how much the Democrats reached across the aisle, tried to include the Republicans, people like this made that impossible. You may remember several committees having to postpone and cancel meetings last year because they lacked a quorum. Guess which side was missing. Of course, the only reason he's admitting it is that he's under the impression the House and possible the Senate will swing back to Republican control. You remember those days. When John Boehner said, "50% +1 is a majority and a mandate" and proceeded to believe in the "permanent majority" and his actions would never come back to bite him in the rear and so shut out anybody not "pure enough" (you might remember the RINOs).

And a follow up on the Anthem rate hikes of last summer (hopefully they'll provide the whole transcript soon). You may remember that Anthem wanted to raise rates in California by 39%. Well, fortunately California has some strong regulations on rate hikes including a consumer advocate office that has to approve those rate hikes. You know, that godless commie idea the conservatives are all up in arms about and want to make sure our federal government can't do a similar thing for Health Care and now the Financial segments of business here in the US. Well, it seems Anthem had a little problem with their math, which the advocates called them on. So Anthem comes back with, and the advocates approved, rate hikes of only 13-18%. You know, only above the inflation rate by a factor of 10. To all who think that markets should regulate themselves without obstruction of the government (ie. the Free Market), and propose that companies have their consumers' best interests at heart, that should be a warning bell that they don't and that they shouldn't be allowed to regulate themselves.

More proof? Okay, see all those eggs being recalled? You may have missed that during the previous administration much of our food safety programs were gutted in favor of "industry self regulation/policing." You can see how well those programs have worked for us. Or say all the drugs now being pulled from the market that had FDA approval during the highly politicized and "business centric" years of the FDA. It's the liberal bias of reality rearing its head again.

Two tu-es walk into a bar.

Sometimes writing is a matter of carving out the time, and sometimes it's a matter of just getting the damn words out of our heads and onto paper or into a file. Here's a little book that might help called, Making Ideas Happen. I haven't read this book, so I can't recommend it, but I know that I certainly fall into the write up about it.

Okay, now this is funny. Seems that some people, especially those who shout about how they want a Constitutional government, are now sponsoring readings of the Constitution. Understand, I fully endorse this action. Heck, they might want to also invite Constitutional Scholars to speak on it. I hear the President is pretty good at it, being a Constitional Scholar himself and having taught Constitional Law at the graduate level for a prestigious law school. So, since they're reading it as "originally written," I wonder if they'll actually include all the amendments in their reading, or just the original document. I also wonder how many people will be shocked that our Founding Fathers didn't think Senators should be elected directly by the people? Doesn't seem very democratic, does it?

If he didn't say he would deliver it, I wouldn't be on this high horse

John Boehner says the Republicans are ready to lead, that they're the party with the new ideas on how to make the economy work, get people back to work, and end big government. Well, since he helped break it, he should know how to put it back together.

Teacher: So, John, have your report on all the new ideas you have for making the government work better?

John Boehner: Um, my dog ate it on the way out this morning. I'll print you out a new copy next year. But I do know we shouldn't do this stimulus.

Teacher: Your dog? You don't have a dog. But, okay, I'll give you an extension.

the next year

Teacher: Okay, John, you're extension is up. Do you have that paper?

John Boehner: My printer was out of ink this morning. I do know we shouldn't do this Obamacare bill. And I've decided that we need more research on what the people really want.

Teacher: Having you been saying you're the party of people, shouldn't you already know? ::sigh:: All right. I'll give you another extension.

the next year

Teacher: Okay, John, it's been a year and a half. Do you finally get an ink cartridge?

John Boehner: Yes, and it turns out the people want tax cuts, ending social programs, reduce regulations that protect them, and have the Republicans back in power. You know, instead of this horrible stimulus that hasn't done a thing.

Teacher: Do you have the paper?

John Boehner: Um, no, because all this is so new we and haven't had time to figure out how to make it work this time.

Teacher: ::sighs:: You know with each extension I'm lowering your grade by a full letter? Okay. Well, those aren't really anything new are they? We've had a decade of those ideas and had wage stagnation and the worst GDP growth since the Great Depression. But I'll grant you one more extension. You know you now need to write an "A" paper to even get a passing grade, right?

the next year

Teacher: Okay, John, it's been two years now. Do you finally have that paper of new ideas ready?

John Boehner: I'll turn it in after the election. But the President should fire all his advisors because they're just mucking up our story telling. He should hire in all the bozos we had who couldn't organize a two car parade. Because government can't work for the people. I mean doesn't work.

Teacher: ::head desk::

Really, John? It's been two years and no real new ideas than the same tired rhetoric that got us into this mess. After all you tell us that these major bills that have been passed have no Republican ideas in them (even though they actually do). You're medical reform bill was all of two pages, a half page of which was "tax cuts." You're like the joke "Horse Doctor Manual."

Broken Leg: Tax Cuts

Sick: Tax Cuts

Split hoof: Tax Cuts

Broken Withers: Tax Cuts

Needs Bath: Tax Cuts

You've had two years to do your home work, John. And nothing to show for it.