Howdy internet friend and welcome back to my blog! I am back to posting on Monday and I want to start by writing that Black Lives Matter! Last Friday, after I wrote a tweet about the weekly update post, I saw that Roe v. Wade was overturned and so I deleted my post. I didn't want to be hyping up my own personal crap when we lost the right to privacy in the United States. This post (if you couldn't guess already) is going to be heavy on the politics, so if you don't want to read about that and just skip to the dog picture, you can just click here. I really like this picture of Bark Twain standing on a chair and tilting his head in confusion, so you'll have to check back next week to see a picture of the boys together again.
Alright, as I mentioned in the last paragraph, I am very unhappy about current events in the United States. I'm struck by the irony of five un-elected people calling themselves "Justices" stripping rights away from Americans and granting them to their handguns. I have seen that some people are celebrating having rights ripped away and I am so deeply offended that I don't even know where to begin. It is so gross and wrong to celebrate someone losing their rights. Like it doesn't make you more free to have someone else have less rights! They are not zero-sum like that.
I'm also very offended that politicians had fundraising emails sent out less than an hour from the decision coming. "Just give us more money" and what? Democrats control 2/3 of the US Government and had nearly 50 years to codify Roe into law, and they never did. Now they want more money? Now all we have to do is vote? Hillary Clinton won the popular vote and we are STILL in this situation. How can anyone possibly say that just going to vote is the answer? On what planet is that a serious position? Do these people really think that the Democrats are going to gain 12 seats in the Senate so they have a fillabuster-proof majority after their performance over the last two years?!
Obviously I do not know what the answer is. I've seen (historically) that direct action gets the goods. Over and over again, and without taking the time to wait - which is a clumsy way of saying that it works fast. But it's also scary and difficult. I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I know what the answers are. It's not like I'm not going to vote when the ballot comes in November either, even if I am really offended that some think it's the only way. Anyway, I don't have a point, and I don't know where this is going, so I am just going to shift gears. I mostly just didn't want to remain silent about this issue, although I have been pretty quiet so far.
Over the weekend, I tried to distract myself by watching a bunch of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. While the first season is a bit slow, it really starts to pick up speed pretty quickly. I also spent a bunch of time cleaning the main bathroom in our place. I also mopped the floor of our other bathroom, cleaned the kitchen sink, and scooped dog poop. There is more to do (always) but I put on a few albums by The Cure and just got to work cleaning. I also took my bass apart and figured out what is wrong with it. I've got to improve my soldering skills so I can fix it, and fortunately I've got a few projects that are going to move up in priority now that I have a reason to get better at soldering.
My goal was to work on music over the weekend, but it didn't end up happening. There are only so many hours in a day and the cleaning stuff I did was much more tiring than I anticipated. Something about getting older, I suppose. On a different note, it is getting too hot in the desert to take the dogs for walks three times a day (like they like, even though it is summer) and I've been waiting until later in the day to take them out for evening walkies. Concrete and sand both get really hot and while sand cools down faster than concrete, it still ends up being close to 12 hours between when I can take them out. Bruiser can make it that long, but Bark Twain has a habit of going to the bathroom inside the house. We were supposed to get him fixed earlier in the month, but I screwed up and fed him breakfast the day of his surgery and so it got delayed. Hopefully once he is fixed he'll stop going to the bathroom in the house - it did wonders to cure Bruiser of that bad habit!
I did find some time to play video games, and I managed to win a solo Victory Royale on Fortnite last weekend. I someone took out someone with a victory crown, so I also got a "crowning victory" which is when you win with the crown. That was rad, because I feel like my son is way better at Fortnite than me and usually just carries me. This time I managed to eek out a win by myself, and I was very pleased! Even better for it to have been a crowning victory. It was probably because it was Saturday morning and the more hardcore gamers were still asleep, but a win is a win!
One final note, I finished Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance last week and I am going to start working on the review this week. I want to write it while the book is still fresh in my mind.
Well internet friend, that's all I have to report this week. Thanks for reading. I hope you have a very nice day and a most excellent week. Cheers!