Yup, and another Houston day. 85F to start, 95F in the middle, and a little cooler to end. Repeat.
Spent the day in bed. Back is killing me, but the cold is responding to the supplements and the sleep.
So today the plan is to get up and move around. Make a pickup even. I’m not liking it, and I wouldn’t want to spread sickness, but this auctioneer is completely inflexible on pickups. So I’ll cough all over their office while mentioning that, and maybe they’ll make a change. Or not.
another opportunity for y’all to choose a topic, not that you don’t anyway…
n
do some stacking!
That can’t be good for the battery.
Ford prints explicit warnings about overusing superchargers in the F150 Lightning manual then the owners act surprised when the battery warranty claims get nitpicked.
Plus, 15 minutes stuck at a “travel center” in a remote location can be 15 minutes too long.
There is a reason Buc-ee’s bans 18 wheelers.
I’ve also come to the conclusion that there is an off-the-books reason they call it Love’s.
We only have the one car, and it is fully paid for.
Since retirement is coming up, we’ve been running budgets. I don’t think we live extravagently – we haven’t taken a big vacation in years, we don’t often eat out, etc.. Still, the amount of money that goes out every month seems crazy.
Yet we have neighbors, both retired, and I know they don’t have a huge income. Yet they have *four* vehicles. Purchase costs aside, the maintenance and taxes add up fast. I don’t understand how they afford it.
Maybe I need to drop my cat’s catnip budget…
Speaking of pets, the first comment on this thread is a great story about “Fugly the Octopus”.
Up and moving, albeit slowly…
Head feels much better today, and even my back feels better. (I cracked a vertebra about 30 years ago in a fall from a ladder into auditorium seats, I’ve been dealing with the resulting issues since then. Laying still, or sitting for long periods, aggravates my back pain.)
Coughing still sucks, and it sounds horrific.
W is taking D1 for the in-person driving test this morning. D1 coughed and mentioned she has what I’ve got. I was thinking last night that of all the preps, I don’t have a good ‘sick room’ air filter. I will be getting something with a hepa filter and UV germicidal properties. I wanted to add the UV light to our HVAC when we replaced the old system but the contractor couldn’t get one at the time, and it was pricey. I let it slide after that, but shouldn’t have.
————-
Not feeling 100%. Maybe not even 80% but definitely feeling better. Time to finish my breakfast, drink some coffee and return to bed for a while.
n
If the contractor installed a PerfectFit filter box, the UV/electrostatic system can be retrofit, but opinions from AC companies are all over the place with regard to effectiveness.
I’ve had two companies in to do maintenance since firing the original contractor who installed the downstairs AC. Each had contrasting opinions about the fancy filtration,
One constant is Nexia smart thermostats. That is probably an Oncor driven item.
I don’t understand how they afford it.
– this. I occasionally look at a neighbor or acquaintance and run some loose numbers and things just don’t add up when I compare to our spending. Secret inheritance? Drug money? Sex work? I don’t know, and massive borrowing is the most likely answer, but you can’t borrow forever. Even Margret Thatcher knew that eventually you run out of other people’s money.
Of course, where we live, it could be that I am grossly underestimating someone’s income. There are a lot of people around here that live much less flashy lives than you might expect and who downplay their jobs and earnings. Even before I left the workforce I noticed an apologetic tendency whenever spending came up in conversation. And since we got ourselves a “lakehouse” we have learned that quite a few of our kids’ classmates’ families also have lakehouses… It’s like fightclub only for people with economic success…
n
We saw a 25th anniversary screening of the restored “Dogma” print yesterday at Alamo Drafthouse.
The Alamo pre show was lame, keeping with the trend established since Sony bought the chain, but the movie really holds up.
Pre weed, Kevin Smith could write.
Rumors are flying that “Black Snape” was fired from “Harry Potter”. Maybe someone saw Alan Rickman in “Dogma” and remembered why that he was Snape long before the film series started.
Gonna need a new Snape.
Rickman is awesome in “Dogma”.
re: lingering coughs
I’m susceptible to coughs that linger long after the underlying cause has ended. A former doctor explained it as having trained my body to cough, and needing to break the cycle.
He prescribed an Albuterol inhaler. Just one, and just used for a couple of days.
It’s worked for me a couple of times since. It’s not like an annual thing, just when I get a coughing virus every decade or so.
Yay! Amish Snape kills it for me.
The LA “peaceful protests” include the usual burning and looting. Throw in flying the Mexifukin flag and spitting on Ole Glory and it’s SOP in Kakafornia. The Flaming Meteor of Death can’t come too soon.
I was significantly concerned about spending during retirement. I did not have a retirement income from any job except for that paltry amount from my time at National Bancshares in San Antonio. We would have to rely on SS and the VA. Since that time the VA money has increased.
It was scary retiring and not having that steady source of income. What helped was the reduced medical premiums as we got Medicare. I did not drive as much so the gas bill dropped significantly. We didn’t eat out as much so the food bill dropped. The kid was no longer in college so we weren’t paying that money.
We actually do more, and probably spend more on stuff we enjoy, than we did while working.
As for people with all that stuff they are one disruptive event from major financial disaster. Don’t use these people as a comparison.
The one thing that still annoys me was being sold on the premise that putting money away in tax deferred accounts was a way to save on taxes when I retired. That has proven to be a significant falsehood. Legally avoiding taxes, and paying the minimum in taxes, has become an ongoing challenge.
We could live on nothing but SS. Some spending would be curtailed, but we would live OK. The biggest help is having no debt. House is paid for, vehicles, while 10+ years old, are ours, credit cards paid weekly, etc. Getting rid of debt takes a large load off the wallet and the mind.
I would settle for a massive earthquake that splits California in two, vertically, like the butt-crack state they represent. The problem with that is that California would be begging, and probably get, lots of federal money to repair the damage and build lots of bridges, at significant cost overruns, to bridge the chasm.
The crazy thing is that the rest of the casting ranges from good to truly inspired.
Nick Frost as Hagrid and Lithgow as Dumblefire stand out.
I have the first episode of Mobland to see Janet McTeer, the actress selected to be McGongall, arguably the toughest shoes to fill.
And just like high speed rail, most of the country would never use them, but pay for them.
Engage rectal orifice mode.
The recommended approach right now is to use a Roth after maxing out matching in the 401k at work.
Of course that assumes you qualify to use a Roth, but, more importantly, also believe that the Congresscritters won’t change the rules about the withdrawals being tax free.
Plus the Roth is subject to RMD.
Doh! I’m on my phone.
Damn autocorrect.
California real estate props up the fixed income part of your retirement plan, hence even the Orange Man accepts that they need another bailout with the lifted SALT deduction with more to come.
Those of you here dependent on an annuity should pay even closer attention to what happens in California.
Roth IRA’s don’t have RMD’s for the owner. When inherited, they do.
As of 2024, Roth 401k’s don’t have RMD’s either.
I have access to a ROTH 401k at work. I was only contributing to traditional in years past (no Roth option). This year, of the money going in, I adjusted so I’m doing roughly 60% to traditional and 40% to Roth.
Our tax code is so broken for normal people. Of course, this is by design. Figuring out what my taxes are going to be 20 years from now is crazy.
+googolplex
Our goobermint wants us to save, then tax you anyway on your “Golden Years”. It would have been so easy to have a retirement savings plan, only so much can be put in, no taxes, take out 65+. But no, make it as complicated as possible. Just like SS, Medicare, etc.
I often half joke here that we are living a “Star Trek” future except on Ferengenar instead of Earth, but a wild rumor making the rounds on fan sites this weekend has Trump making fixing “Star Trek” one of the conditions for FCC approval of the Skydance merger with Paramount.
All hail the Grand Nagus.
Maybe I need to drop my cat’s catnip budget…
One of my neighbors now has a young kangeroo that they have added to their menagerie. I live in a wild and crazy neighborhood of 500 homes on 1 to 10 acres. Lots of chickens, a dairy cow, several horses, etc.
Ford prints explicit warnings about overusing superchargers in the F150 Lightning manual then the owners act surprised when the battery warranty claims get nitpicked.
The first Ford F150 batteries were badly designed in South Korea with hot spots that caused several trucks to catch on fire after the initial charging. There is a kit to spread more refrigerant around but it is best to stay away from that battery. There is a class action suit pending, Ford is idiots and will lose as the batteries are failing before 50,000 miles.
All hail the Grand Nagus.
All Hail !
We’ve only ever used a fast charger once, and only for 20% or so. Otherwise, we charge at home, around 4kw or so.
At the commercial charger, not only were the electrons expensive, there was also a significant difference between the power the charger delivered, and the charge added to the batteries.
Ford ”lost” the lawsuit over the Ford Focus/Fiesta transmissions, but the court set such a narrow window for damage claims that the financial hit was negligible compared to what it might have been.
The Lightning owners will have to get in line. Ford has lots of lawsuits pending.
Great New Idea: Hike Remittance Tax Rate ASAP
https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2025/06/09/great-new-idea-hike-remittance-tax-rate-asap-n3803618
As I’ve said before, 50% is a good number if there is no proof that taxes have been paid, along with documentation about working legally.
After last weekend, the BBB should have a provision added making it legal to shoot dead anyone waving a foreign flag during a violent insurrection. That’s an invasion, folks, and fedgov had better stop that shiite promptly before things start to get sporty.
Israel has a fitting punishment for Greta Thunberg and her fellow ‘Hamactivists’
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2025/06/israel_has_a_fitting_punishment_for_greta_thunberg_and_her_fellow_hamactivists.html
How about she meet with the parents of hostages, and be asked on camera if she would be willing to offer herself in exchange for someone whose life is in danger due to deteriorating health?
Or just ask some of the Hamas soldiers if they’d like to visit with a Swedish virgin?
Walmart would never allow more than a token tax on remittances.
HEB would fuss too, but they don’t offer a transfer service outside of Western Union AFAIK.
If you want to understand the magnitude of the issue, visit a Walmart in an agricultural area on Friday afternoon.
https://acecomments.mu.nu/?post=415174
You assume Herr Greta is a virgin. I doubt that.
As soon as she hit legal age of consent in Sweden, one of her older male benefactors would have got his strange on with her.
“You assume Herr Greta is a virgin. I doubt that.”
No, I assume that the Hamas soldiers are willing to investigate themselves.
“Walmart would never allow more than a token tax on remittances.”
I’m willing to let Walmart pay the tax if they don’t want to require the correct documentation.
>>Roth IRA’s don’t have RMD’s for the owner.
There’s also an option to convert money in a traditional IRA or 401(k) into a Roth IRA by paying the taxes upfront. Lots of variables to consider before you go down this road, best reviewed with your CPA and financial advisor. (YMMV and IANACPA)
LOL. I prefer Dominar Rygel XVI of Farscape fame, but Grand Nagus works, too.
”The lobes on that guy…”
The IDF should have sunk the Selfie Yacht. Let them swim to shore and lock them up in shipping containers until someone comes to get them. At least confiscate the yacht and sink it to make a new reef.
We even get the feuding between the FCA Liquidator (Musk) and the Nagus, straight out of DS9.
Welcome to prison, Turdberg, no, you weren’t kidnapped:
Greta Thunberg is locked in an Israeli jail for migrants and will be dragged to court with other ‘freedom flotilla’ activists, her lawyer claims – after snub from Sweden
And, LOL, snubbed by Sweden. Who’s going to bail her…
I don’t understand how they afford it.
– this. I occasionally look at a neighbor or acquaintance and run some loose numbers and things just don’t add up when I compare to our spending. Secret inheritance? Drug money? Sex work? I don’t know, and massive borrowing is the most likely answer, but you can’t borrow forever. Even Margret Thatcher knew that eventually you run out of other people’s money.
Credit Cards and home equity charged to the max. Scary stuff.
For me that would be thousands of dollars. Enough so that it would push me into a much higher tax bracket as the amount converted is taxed as ordinary income. The IRS will find a way to get their money regardless of the variables that exist. I have been working with my financial advisor with my primary goal to protect the principle, a secondary goal of avoiding the IRS. That second goal is proving difficult to accomplish.
Maybe self-inflicted.
I had a friend that was always complaining about not having money. They had a new baby and were struggling to pay for formula. I was working on a project and offered to let him do part of the work for which I would pay him. He did, and I did.
Then he promptly took the money and put a down payment on a new dining room table. So much for helping, I just made his money problems worse.
A week later he was bragging he had paid his credit card down and was $20.00 under his limit. The next day he went and purchased a new mixer on his credit card.
Some people there is just no helping.
Deferred student loan payments for the last five years to the tune of $80 billion/year, roughly.
As I’ve written before, the “shortage” in current generation video game consoles ended within a week of the Supreme Court denying Biden’s repayment scheme.
By November 2023, when interest accrual resumed on the loans, the tourist industry recovery outside of Florida and Texas got cut short. I spent the last week of October rescheduling and rebooking much of our trip to Wisconsin as tourism venues and hotels announced early seasonal closings or restricted operations during weekdays.
We were in the last tour group through Taliesin on Sunday, Nov. 5. They had planned to stay open through Thanksgiving 2023 with big capital spending happening through this year remodeling the estate’s theater and rebuilding the property’s pond.
Home from my pickups. I did the one that had to happen today and the one that was on the way home from that. I’m feeling worn out just from that, so I’m going back to bed.
I should be looking at the riots in LA, but I can’t bring myself to care. They are sponsored and supported by SEIU, which made a big push into illegal immigrants working sh!te jobs about 20 years ago. They saw a whole new worker class to exploit in the face of declining ‘organic’ union membership. Now they are using them as muscle in their extortion racket. Illegals doing the work that micks and degos won’t do anymore.
Let LA get some cleansing fire.
I do have relatives still in the area, who are more than capable of moving if they wanted to. I think they are getting what they voted for for years, and can’t feel too sorry. If any of them come out of the closet as conservatives I’ll feel a bit more for them but in the end, I moved out of Cali because I couldn’t see a future there.
n
Coming soon to a city near you.
On our last trip to that part of Texas I didn’t drive past the major intersection in Fort Worth where we saw the palette of bricks in the median of one approach in May of last year.
Someone had plans for the Summer. I wonder if the bricks are still there.
“S&P Global: US facing steeper-than-expected oil production decline next year”
https://www.ogj.com/general-interest/economics-markets/article/55295817/sp-global-us-facing-steeper-than-expected-oil-production-decline-next-year
““The oil price is currently defenseless. Seasonal demand in the northern hemisphere summer may obscure the impact for a bit, but eventually there will be too much crude oil in the market absent a change in production trends,” said VP Jim Burkhard.”
Boom or bust, boom or bust, the oil patch continuously lives in boom or bust. We are in bust right now since 2009.
“Agitators Are Planning and Organizing Mass ‘Protests’ For Flag Day June 14th, STAY ALERT & CALM”
https://rumble.com/v6uj8ud-agitators-are-planning-and-organizing-mass-protests-for-flag-day-june-14th-.html?e9s=src_v1_upp
Mass riots ?
Hat tip to:
https://thelibertydaily.com/
Just wonderful news about the upcoming riots. </sarc> I’m traveling to the St. Louis area for father’s day.
I think it’s time to upgrade to a higher capacity sidearm. Unfortunately, Illinois has outlawed all practical long guns so my truck gun stays home.
Thunder and lightning atm… not rain yet.
n
“Equity Means Sharing”
https://areaocho.com/equity-means-sharing/
So it is ok to murder people for equity ?
“Peaceful Protest Season”
https://areaocho.com/peaceful-protest-season/
“And all of a sudden, California doesn’t care about pollution anymore.”
Those burning vehicles are unreal.
Trump is thinking about calling out the Marines. He has a dozen or more battalions at Pendleton and 29 Palms.
A nice read: https://eko.substack.com/p/the-kingdom-within
“US Deploys Marines to LA as Trump Tensions With Newsom Intensify”
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/la-set-fourth-day-unrest-150754445.html
“(Bloomberg) — The Trump administration escalated its response to anti-deportation protests in Los Angeles with the mobilization of 700 Marines, deploying active-duty military on the ground and deepening tensions with California officials.”
Well, that was quick.
Ah, they are calling Waymo cars to the crowd and torching them. Well, isn’t that special?
Whole lotta cream in that “black” girl’s coffee. Just sayin’.
I’m guessing John Fluvog shoes. Pricey Canadian hipster footwear.
Someone has Daddy’s Nordstrom card.
Waymo is Google. The cars’ telemetry back to home base probably includes every Bluetooth ID within range of the car’s transceiver.
God only knows what they can do to an Android phone.
At a minimum, the car sent where it stopped and geolocation data of a phone is a maintenance record, available without a warrant.
As Trump demonstrated with Fanni Willis’ phone, just ask nicely and the carriers may give it up.
The organizers want a pretty white coed to get shot by police. A half black girl with expensive clothing on TikTok sells the delusion that being involved is safe.
Trump is done when the pretty white coed gets shot by the police or, worse, the National Guard.
“U.S. Health Secretary RFK Jr. Fires Entire CDC Vaccine Advisory Panel in Stunning “Clean Sweep””
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/06/u-s-health-secretary-rfk-jr-fires-entire/
Now the rest of the CDC.
I can’t speak for the blacks, or the hispanics, but I’ve observed before that the demographic shift isn’t benefiting the blacks. Most hispanics have very little love or tolerance for black misbehavior, and zero white guilt. Also zero white savior complex.
Hispanics are now officially 40% of the population in many areas and far more than that in some places.
The ability of the american black community to extort free stuff from white america is about done.
n
“A potential solution to the riots in Los Angeles?”
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2025/06/a-potential-solution-to-riots-in-los.html
“Israel provides the example.”
“I know exactly how many knees I’ve hit, says Eden, who completed his service in the Israel Defense Forces as a sniper in its Golani infantry brigade six months ago. For much of the time, he was stationed along the border with the Gaza Strip. His assignment: to repel Palestinian demonstrators who approached the fence.”
““I kept the casing of every round I fired,” he says. “I have them in my room. So I don’t have to make an estimate – I know: 52 definite hits.””
Wow, kneecapping to the extreme.
It would work.
>>I have the first episode of Mobland to see Janet McTeer, the actress selected to be McGongall, arguably the toughest shoes to fill.
We’re about halfway through MobLand and liking it. Check it out if you have all the episodes.
Also, if you remember, McTeer played the mob lawyer Helen Pierce in Ozark. Another ‘not to be missed’ streamrr.
>>Sex work?
OnlyFans, and now many clones, is SW without getting your… umm… uhh… “hands dirty.”
The recommended approach right now is to use a Roth after maxing out matching in the 401k at work.
Of course that assumes you qualify to use a Roth, but, more importantly, also believe that the Congresscritters won’t change the rules about the withdrawals being tax free.
I don’t trust the Congresscritters any further than I can throw them.
Someday, maybe soon, they will be so desperate for money that they will snatch any private funds that they can find. And there is always chipping everyone with the transactions going through SpaceX’s new network of satellites.
“Here’s the Guy: Neville Singham Is Funding the Riots”
https://thelibertydaily.com/heres-guy-neville-singham-is-funding-riots/
If true, this guy needs to be taken out.
“Star Wars – Return of the 80s Miami (Parody Music Video)”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86CnDxHjHMs
“This video is an AI-generated parody. No real people or minors are shown or referenced. All characters are fictional. This is not intended for children”
If you want to read about People’s experiences with Tesla Powerwalls, here is a good place:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Powerwall/
I was interested and disappointed to find out that if the grid drops, the Powerwall takes 1.5 seconds to restore power to your home. That is much longer than I thought it would take.
Terry Moran is out for good at ABC News.
Years too late.
Prep the “Disgraced former ABC employee finds employment at MSNBC” headline.
Browsing on my phone this morning I saw a report that a social media account that had been doxxing ICE and other federal agents had been purportedly traced to a Navy JAG. Can’t seem to find it now. Anyone else see it?