Month: August 2014

Fate's Interesting News Bits v.11

Death Valley Rocks – I remember talking about this in Science class… Now, no more fun with endless hours of speculation…

Movies Suck – “Worst Summer Since 1997” of movie sales. Why? Rehashed garbage. Guardians of the Galaxy / Lego, did make up some ground though.

That “Other” Shooting – No real coverage for this guy in the media, probably because of where it happened. But… there’s actual evidence and he wasn’t fresh off robbing a store. Can we pick our cases for outrage a bit better?

Second Cold War – EU v. Russia, aided by a lukewarm foreign policy in the States. I really hope I don’t end up seeing World War III.

8TB Hard drive – That’s a lotta movies… Or about 4 1/2 days of high-def pr0n…

Updates aka Where the Heck Have I Been

It’s been awhile. 

Fate keeps saying “you should write a blog post!” He’s right,  I should. That’s what I keep thinking anyway. Then I just don’t. 

I have a whole back log of things I want to write about.   Some successes, some failures,  some modifications made.  The reality is,  I don’t know if I will get around to writing about all of them before something else comes along and bumps it off the list. 

It’s been a hard year. 

I’ve been suffering from some pretty major depression in the last several months. There are a lot of things I’ve been wanting to do that have gone undone due to that this summer.  Which is just shitty since we’ve had some pretty amazing weather this summer (with the exception of the heat warnings this last week.)

My dad,  since my grandma died last November,  had been sick quite a lot.  He has been off and on having this pretty serious rash pop up over his body for the last year us as well.  It seemed like since last November he’s caught every little thing that has gone around:  cold,  flu,  you name it,  he got it.

Then in April he started peeing blood.

Not in the red tinged pee category either,  he was peeing straight up blood,  with clots even.

He’s been to multiple doctors at this point,  had just about every test under the sun,  and everything comes back clear of cancer and everything else they test for.  The only thing they are seeing is that he has some irritation in the tubes that lead from the kidneys to the bladder.  There is nothing physically wrong that they can find. 

Recently he went back to his primary physician for a recheck on his blood work to see how his cholesterol levels are doing.  In that blood work came the news that his kidney levels are poor. 

In fact,  so poor that they have diagnosed him with stage 3 kidney failure. 

And they don’t know why his kidneys are failing. 

He has yet another specialist appointment to go to soon,  another different one.  I guess we will see what happens with that one.  In the mean time he went to see a naturopath in Springfield, MO.   She did some testing and was able to come up with the issues he’s been having with out him telling her at all.  She recommended some diet changes and supplements for him,  which he’s been taking,  and it seems like it’s helping.  It is amusing to me that he’s now a believer in the things I’ve been saying for so long just because he heard a “professional”  say them,  but hey,  I’ll take it.  Anything,  along as my dad gets better. 

My dad and I are very close.  We do a lot of things together,  both at my house and at his.  Gardening,  canning,  estate sales,  tons of stuff.  This summer we haven’t done any of that,  since he’s been sick.  We’ve done a bit of canning here lately since he seems to be having some good days,  but everything else is still on hold.  I really miss it,  and him.

I really hope he is on the mend and they can figure out what the hell is going on with him.  Don’t get me wrong,  I’m extremely grateful it’s not some sort of cancer,  however I wish they could pin down what it is.  That’s been one of the scariest parts,  just not knowing why.  

There have been other shitty things this year that have added stress,  but that’s the biggest one.  I sincerely hope the end of 2014 is better then the beginning. 

————-

I’m not going to say that I will get back to posting on a regular schedule again,  however,  I am going to try to be better about it,  especially as I’m trying to force myself out of my depression.   I’ve figured out how to get my pictures easily shared between my phone and my tablet finally,  so that should help.   Part of my frustration before was the fact that my phone,  which takes decent photos,  wouldn’t play nice with my tablet,  which takes terrible photos, but I use to write blog posts.   It always turned into a frustrating process that was easier to just not do,  and therefore,  I just ended up not posting anything. 

I’m planning on starting a posting series on the blog about nail polish.   This isn’t something that will take over the content,  just something that will fairly regularly appear.  There are tons of really awesome blogs out there about all the different kinds of nail polish,  and this will not turn into one of them.  I’m planning to do nail polish “wear testing” reviews.  I haven’t been able to find anyone out there blogging about doing all the physical things I do talking about how good or bad all the different nail polishs preform under…. Stress testing,  if you will.  Maybe I can save someone who is as hard on their nails as I am some money on polish that just wears off in the first day you use it.

I will make an introductory post soon detailing why I started wearing nail polish again after all these years and some of the things I’ve learned to save time but still get nice polished nails. 

There’s no reason you can’t hold down a very physical job while still being a bit girly. 

-Fin

Fate's Interesting News Bits v.10

The long running stories of ISIS and Ferguson are still going on. Otherwise, not much catching my eye this week, but I’ve been more busy than usual.

Mythbusters Cuts – Mythbusters is going back to just Adam and Jamie. I’m guessing due to reduced ratings. Don’t watch it much anymore, but … I’m less likely to now.

20140 Hugo Awards –  Fresh of the press

Police Lawsuit – This just in, police can’t arrest you for recording them, though, apparently they don’t care if you’ll win the lawsuit. Maybe they should have to?

Forwards Forwards Forwards! – Balmer’s left Microsoft to do the whole NBA thing. I guess he’ll be more at home throwing chairs with Mark Cuban than in the tech sector.

C++14 Released – Given the general uptake of C++11, I’ll probably get to work with C++14 sometime around… 2024…

China Nukes GMO – apparently China is getting out of creating / allowing GMO crops

ISS Plankton – It’s alliveeeeeeee

 

Fate's Interesting News Bits V.9

Ferguson Unreset – Police brutality, rioting, and racial tension make for a good media shit-storm. Vox has some relatively unbiased / fact based coverage.

Iraq Airstrikes – Continuing fights against ISIS, the new villain for 2014.

Spray Cake – From fridge to cake in 30 seconds. And this is why you’re fat.

Internet Crash – Ok, they call it a “hiccup”. While we’re creatively seeking ways to avoid switching to new protocols, the continued expansion of the internet is hitting some real limits…

First Female Field’s Medalist – Not much more to say, pretty cool story.

New GM Crops – Immediately on schedule as multiple patents begin expiring, a new round of GM crops will save the pro… er… increase value for farmers.

Reporters Protest – A group of reporters stood up for journalistic integrity and the ability to have anonymous sources. We’ll see if Obama really does deliver any “change” as his justice department threatens to prosecute.

Internet Pope -Now that the Vatican has a twitter feed, the Pope is telling young people to not waste time online.

Google Can See You – New satellites with greater resolution abilities are being approved and released into space. While the media might indicate that these are good enough to ‘make out faces’, a “face” in that case would be a single pixel. So, you could watch someone run, but not really see who.

Last, but not least, the world lost a great comedian, and by many accounts, person. Rest in Peace. This past week, we also learned of a new ongoing battle with Parkinsons, in addition to the repeated previous battles with Depression.

Fate's Interesting News V.8

Well, Fin and I were out on vacation for a bit. I’m back now and ready to catch up on some blogging, so here’s the interesting stories from the past week.

Your Password’s Broken – yet another large data breach. Some people (I will call them idiots) are proposing a centralized password database as a solution. Web admins – please learn about the joys of salt, kthx.

Missouri Constitutional Amendments – “Right to Farm” passed, giving a boon to Big-Ag, but nothing really for gardeners.  75% of us value our electornic privacy.  And no-new sales tax for roads.

No to Toy Street Car – I’m glad I don’t live or work in KC proper, given the bullshit they like to spend that nice 1% cut of annual income from everybody. Voters actually developed some stones and told the city to not waste thousands on yet another expensive boondoggle while infrastructure crumbles.

Back to Iraq – Air strikes, and renewed conflict. ISIS is the new Taliban.

Near Miss – So, apparently, a solar flare barely missed us. Had it hit? Well, we’d be largely without GPS, internet, and a good part of the grid would be down.

Personal Audio on the Ropes – I’m not a big fan of Adam Carolla, but maybe he can knock this company out for good.

Ebola Outbreak – WHO has declared the Ebola Outbreak an international emergency. Scary shit.

SkyNet Comes – IBM has created a new ‘brain’ processor. If you put a couple million of these together, (ignoring the interconnect issues), you’d have something resembling a human brain. This comes only months after a super-computer modeled 1% of the human brain.

Legal Cellphone Unlock – At least, for now. Let’s hope the right to own our devices continues.

Nintendo Still Sucking – I kinda regret the Wii U, Fin and I loved the new Mario game, but there’s little other content, and I refuse to invest any money in the virtual console until I can transfer my account to another unit.

CIA Spys on Congress – Or, I should say, finally admits to it.

Post ACA Medical Bills Still Stupid – Hey, my nasty cut finger only cost $1200 for the insurance company. $8,200 for a bandage? Yeah… that makes a lot of sense.

Sprint Breaks up with T-Mobile – The on-again of-again merger talks are now off-again, and probably for good. Sprint is still loosing customers. Given Sprint’s efforts to destroy net neutrality with an H-bomb, I’m not to broke up about them getting “adjusted” by the market.