Dream vacation

Last night I came to a decision about whether to spend my vacation, and a big chunk of money, going into the 50 year anniversary of the SCA.

When my sister, who is a saint!, asked if I was going I realize that it would be very pleasant to reconnect with my friends of 30 years ago. Well, 40 years ago. I had this image of me and the people with whom I had had so much fun way back when, and then home for the most part I had lost touch with.

It would be an expense. However, I am somewhat more prosperous now that I am divorced, and what's the point of prosperity if you can use it for connecting with old friends on a nice vacation? My spirit quest to my Law School reunion turned out amazingly well!!

I have tried going to SCA events recently. My sister invited me to  June there a while back. It was a lot of fun, but it was not my fun - it was lots of other people having their fun, and doing it with skill and Gusto. It was like being a spectator at a game, something that I have never enjoyed. It is no dis on the SCA to state frankly that I no longer have any interest in it.

I do have an interest in reconnecting with my friends. And therefore it, it is time for me to get into serious planning and budgeting for the trip to the 50 year. This I have been putting off, and putting off, and putting off. Then I got an email offering a little bit of help with some of the infrastructure, and I had to make a commitment. What to do? Why have I not even research the price of tickets?

This morning I dreamed I attended a countercultural camping event, not explicitly SCA, but I realized symbolically that is what I was thinking about. I worked hard to fit in, but I did not do the Arts or remember the dances or contribute anything except for my exceedingly beautiful self to the proceedings, and I soon wished that I was a different person. Wishing failed to make it so, as so often happens.

I am not a person who enjoys the SCA. I was, at one time, and I wish that I still was, but wishing does not make it so. I have a full and busy life comma and would not enjoy being at the 50-year even if it were free. Since it is far from free to take that time and by that way it is the better part of wisdom to make my apologies. My friends will understand, and the perhaps one or two of them will reach out to me. That's what I wanted anyway, not to intrude on their lives and demand they pay attention to me, which is what would be required for this to be even a bit fun.

The final test of a decision, before it's implementation, is how I feel having made it. I feel relief. I did not want to risk my refinance to be bored for a week, and while I fantasized hooking up with ex-lovers the reality is that wasn't going to happen. Perhaps it may some day, but only after my house is in order, so I have more to bring to the table than the memory of being hot and 20 lol.

Catching stride

I am getting the rhythm of the new job pretty well. Although I wish for a better technology Kama that is the case for everyone so we are all in it together. I now know that I can do this for the time that it takes to refinance my phone, and were I to continue through retirement that would be okay. I am now in the happy position seeking to improve my life, not scrambling to save it.

At home I am also working out how to get done that which I must do efficiently. I am learning how to have fun again Colin something that was not on the schedule during the Kris years. I'm at my friend Jonathan at a pub Saturday and we talked about everything and nothing for 5 hours!

Is my second job can take as much time as I like, doing books and so forth. My third  job, 4freeCLE, I had to neglect while working out the first job but am now getting back to keeping it going at some lower-level. All in all life is coming together.

Gaming the System: Use The Time Allotted

This may be petty but: I recently joined an organization that is so tightly organized that its main motivational extra is choice of seat, and that determined by scores earned during training.

 To my surprise, most fellow student/co-workers always finished their tests early and went into the hall to relax.

I don't know whether they lacked confidence in their ability to check their work or just lacked gamesmanship, but I always reviewed until the end of the allotted time and usually picked up points.

 Now I have the window seat - yay me!

It is petty, yes, but I *earned* that window. If this story can teach one youngster to game the system by checking their work, I'm happy to be called petty!

Enterprise - Looking Back

"Enterprise" - the fifth series in the "Star Trek" franchise - had looked bad when it first came on and I watched a random episode, but since I got Netflix I decided to give it a fair try.

The opening scene (...after the dreadful, dreadful introductory song...) was not promising. A boy uses a racial insult against Earth's benefactors the Vulcans; his dad reproves him; the boy grows up to be a starship captain who hates Vulcans.  Why would Earth give command of their most advanced exploration ship to a man who not only hates the one species who is willing to help us, but lacks the discipline to hold it in? Sure, Vulcans are arrogant jerks mysteriously refusing to give us all the technology we want, but is it really a good idea to pick as your leader in a voyage of exploration and diplomacy someone who proves the Vulcans are right about Earth's emotional immaturity? It just doesn't make sense to have your point man someone who might piss off  a dangerous alien species.

Another disturbing point is that the leadership of Earth's space forces don't know about the Klingons but a junior language instructor is teaching Klingon to her class. Why does she know more about the Klingons than the forces charged with protecting our planet?

The casting is a big step back from Deep Space Nine (...to be sure, a high standard in the Trekverse..) There is the classic pair of eye candy women; Frigid Woman is the busty vulcan, and Needing Rescue is the cute nonwhite female. I'm sure they have names, but does it matter? To her credit, Frigid Woman does make a moral choice following orders to continue the mission, giving the episode is one moment of interest, and prompting the captain to promise not to be a racist jerk. That's character growth, I guess, but nothing compared to Major Kira or the Dax symbiont.

I am using a half-hour of television a night as a relaxation exercise, but I'm not sure this series is going to do it. Maybe I should switch to Babylon-5.
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I have seriously understated the suckitude of that first Enterprise episode. There's a scene in which Sexy Bigchested Vulcan Woman and Good-Ol'Boy are ordered to go rub down with lotion - for medical reasons - they were exposed to something penetrates their uniforms but not, apparently, their underwear. So each rubs down their fronts, then has the other rub their backs, but not quite so much as to give it a PG rating. It's pure fan service and makes no sense at all - if the substance penetrated uniforms, why not put lotion on the boobies and bottoms? I'm totally ok with fan service but it is disrespectful to the viewer to have it so crudely interrupt the story..
The  captain is awful. He does the stupid stuff that Kirk did, but without the acting, such as it is. Captain Archer talks a lot about being angry at Vulcans he's just reading lines. Nor does the actor playing the Vulcan both to do more than read lines. Perhaps Leonard Nimoy set too high a standard, but his emotionless (mostly) Vulcan convene a lot with expression whereas Black's T'Pol is mostly blankfaced.
Just before the captain goes off on an away mission (like Kirk, he doesn't believe in encumbering his ship with Marines) he is given a new "Phase Pistol". While it's nice to see the technology develop, its pretty stupid to go onto a mission with a handgun that you have never seen before, much less ever fired (For all Archer knew, it was a Noisy Cricket.) This is just sloppy writing. The Captain could have been issued a new gun earlier in the program or ... even better ... have been just shown knowing his weapon.
One of ST:TNG's most annoying features was its use of the god Q to frame the series. In contrast, ST:DS9 introduced its framing story (The Dominion) a bit at a time, each bit mostly contributing to the episode at hand, and leading to the grandest story are in all of Star Trek.  Enterprise repeats TNL's mistake with a "Temporal Cold War" frame that does not contribute to the instant story at all. In fact, it diminishes the story - the Trip to the Kingon Homeworld should be a plenty big enough story, given that Earth is a small and insignificant power venturing at last into a dangerous galaxy. The TCW frame basically says that the galaxy is not that dangerous a place after all; it's time travel that will be the problem and - therefore - the danger in the galaxy is not that big a deal.
I'm rethinking the wisdom of viewing the series after all.
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Episode 2 starts badly. The captain makes a first contact speech that he's obviously not rehearsed; a chief engineer has to prompt him. Later the engineer starts whining because he wants to go on the away mission - in a very undisciplined way.
This is just sad.

Is Facebook creative?

I can't speak for anyone else who uses Facebook on their smartphone, but I really have to wonder whether it improves my life, or not. I have had a lot of fun, but I have also put in a lot of time on pointless arguments. I enjoy posting a photo, daily if I remember, and it does let me keep in touch with friends from long ago and far away. I suppose I should figure out some sort of filter to maintain conversation with those that improve my life, and ignore the rest. However at any given moment, it's just too tough to resist jumping in when someone says something remarkably thick headed. It is like a drug, that delivers a quick hot shot of endorphins or something better delivered by working out at the gym or dancing or who knows maybe even interacting with a live present human being. The problem is that you can't get a life present human being and small convenient packages like you can Facebook posting on a smartphone.

A Legacy Of Bullying: Antonin Scalia

Antonin Scalia's reputation for brilliance appears to come from the same place as any bully's reputation for strength: people are simply afraid to publicly disagree with him.

His increasingly unhinged jurisprudence was best displayed in his most recent attack on Obamacare, where he denounced as "jiggery-pokery" the idea that one should read an entire law, not merely one line, in figuring out how the thing works. As others have commented, no-one knows how the Scalia Method let you get past a STOP sign.

Scalia's "Original Intent" claims were just silly. For example, abortion was legal in all 13 states when the Constitution was enacted, but Scalia never seemed to include this in his original intent jurisprudence. To the contrary, he perpetuate the fiction that abortion was illegal then, and few called him a liar.

To use the technical term: the guy was a bullshitter. His bullshit plus his power made him a bully, and that's a lesson for us all.

Perhaps the most egregious example of Scalia's methodology of "Brilliance By Bullying" was the opinion he wrote in the Bush v. Gore stay. This was not the opinion (unsigned due to cowardice) that formed the ultimate decision a few days later; that has been generally analyzed as being unsupported by American law by anyone who took the time to read it.

Rather, it was the decision supporting the "stay", that actually stopped the Florida recount, of which I write. Keep in mind that a recount was actually under way before being stopped by order of the Supreme Court. Scalia explained the "reasoning" behind the order in an opinion that completely rewrites a major feature of the common law.

A "stay" is a court order that says "stop what you're doing until we can rule on the thing." Its purpose is to prevent a possible wrong from getting worse. A stay is not issued casually, because one party's wrong is another party's right, and a court cannot lawfully interfere without carefully balancing the equities involved. It is an ancient part of the common law, far older than the Constitution itself.

Under the law of the stay, a court balances the harm to each party and issues the stay ONLY if the party asking for the stay is at risk of suffering irreparable harm that is greater than the harm the other party would suffer from the stay. Got that? It's really a sensible rule - the court does something extraordinary only if it prevents an ongoing harm that can not otherwise be repaired, and that does not create an equal or greater harm.

Scalia explains that he voted for the stay because the presidency of George W Bush would suffer if the vote count continued. That's his entire reason.

WTF?

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Scalia's analysis depends on re-writing the law of the stay.

1. He does not balance the harm done to both parties, as the law requires. He does not balance the harm done to the Bush presidency with the harm done to the Gore presidency; he merely considers the harm done to one and not to the other, and that alone makes Scalia's analysis simply wrong. 

2. Scalia does not explain how the Bush presidency would be harmed by a recount. If the recount gave Bush the win, then there would be no harm done; if it gave Gore the win, then there would be no Bush presidency to be harmed.

3. Scalia does not specify the type of "harm" or why it is such a bad thing. The presidency would lose none of its power under the law, so Scalia has to be talking about its political power - the balance between the executive and the other branches. Perhaps Congress would be emboldened if the presidency were seen as illegitimate. I can't say if that's what Scalia meant because he doesn't say but merely bulls ahead asserting by bluster, but at any rate it is not the within the court's purview to decide whether the presidency shall be strong or weak. It is a coequal branch, not a doctor, Jim!

4. The harm which Scalia alleges depends on an unperfected right to be President. At the moment that Scalia and the rest issued their stay, the Electoral College had not met. Under the original vision of the Founders, the Electors meet and debate among themselves who of all eligible citizens shall be the best choice for President. Maybe it would be Bush, maybe it would be Gore, maybe it would be Scalia himself; the Founders did not intend that Electors should be chosen by Party nor that they should mechanically cast their ballot according to a vote of the People. Until the Electors deliberated and cast their ballots, no-one has any right to the Presidency and so no-one suffered any harm by letting Florida recount its ballots.

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Under Scalia's purported love for "original intent" Bush had no right to a Presidency in defense of which a court might issue a stay. This is yet another case where Scalia ignores the clear intent of the Founders to advance his political views.

"Original Intent" was merely a club Scalia waved around because, since we don't have term limits for judgeships, he could bully without consequence. (As the saying goes, "They are not Supreme because they are always right, they are always right because they are Supreme".) The joy he showed in bullying cheered his supporters and rewarded his patrons so that, if you ignored the harm he did to American law and to America itself, anyone may smile at his roguery.

At this time, it is right and appropriate to feel compassion for the family and surviving friends of this titan of jurisprudence, but we must remember that the Titans, like the other great figures of Greek mythology, were respected more for their power than for their wisdom or justice. 

Let the legacy of Scalia be a warning to us all that when we, in our turn, acquire power, we must not enjoy getting our way too much, we must not mistake bullshit for brilliance, for if this leads us to bullying it will lead us to error.

Wednesday got shift

Wednesday we all received notice of the shifts we had been assigned, & I got the early morning on that I had wanted so much. This will allow me to get back to doing Zumba in the evening and perhaps even late night Barre. I had made of solid try at doing early morning exercise, and it's just not working out. I am looking forward to getting back to the exercise, and in the meantime I'm putting in extra time on house. It was a little bit sad that my friend Jonathan did not get the shift that he wanted, we went out to lunch and talked about it. He's a retread like me, starting over after a career ended, and it is hard to be a retread.

Sunday book store reality

Today at my favorite bookstore I heard one of the employees gently explain to an enthusiastic applicant that the competition for a position was very great. The applicant went away sad, but what can you do? It is only the truth.

Later, my friend explained to me that they get something like one resume today. So many people want to work at a bookstore, it is such a wonderful thought to be surrounded by books! However the work itself is very different from the fantasy. There is very little time for reading - inventory and sales are what keep the store open.

I suppose this is referring to me, that I did not make a mistake in frantically applying to every book store in the area in the hopes of getting such delightful job. Better it is to stop in, give them a little trade, give myself a lot of enjoyment talking about books. Selling books is like raising chicken ; you may like them, but not too much for one way or another, if you are to succeed, they must depart.

MacWhat?

Last month my Windows laptop finally died.
I hauled out the Windows 10 machine I'd gotten early in 2015 and set aside in frustration; it worked for about a month and died.
I decided it was time to give Apple another try. It was possible that Windows machines were simply made from cheaper components, so in the long run, a Mac that lasted 10 years would be cheaper than buying 5 laptops over the same time span.
So far, it's been a difficult experience. Text editing is different; there is only one option for character deleting - delete left and no delete right - so a lot of habitual shortcuts just go away. I'd much rather had a delete-right button than the ridiculous backslash that I never use.
I imagine that there are a lot of keyboard shortcuts that I'll have to learn, but it just seems silly to have function, control, option (alt) and command keys.
Scanning and image manipulation is disturbingly complicated; there isn't a simply utility like MSPaint preloaded, and the scanning process has gained a few steps.
It also sleeps strangely, although it may be that I just haven't figured out the awaken ritual yet. I think that I may just be spoiled by the elegant simplicity of my android phone.
Really, all I need the laptop for is its nice keyboard.