Speaking of falls, we have a Noo Joisey senator being indicted (again) on federal corruption charges; MAGA cultists in the House of Reprehensibles making a meal (more of an amuse-bouche, really) of Squeaker Charlie McCarthy’s withered testicles; and at least one Supreme Court justice with all the ethical bona fides of a hyena on a gutpile.
I’d like to assign blame for all these shenanigans, but it’s a beautiful day and there are bicycles around here that need riding. So I’ll just observe that if we keep locking our mutts in the national pantry, we are liable to keep finding ourselves light on pork come suppertime.
Herself being at the movies with some friends, and Miss Mia Sopaipilla snoozing in her tower, I was nibbling a green chile cheeseburger with fries and checking the TV for something that wouldn’t spoil my appetite when I stumbled upon this John Prine retrospective on “Austin City Limits.”
It’s titled “The Best of John Prine,” but it isn’t, not by a long shot. You’d need a lot more than 54 minutes to cover that vast expanse of musical territory.
But I’ll take it. And don’t I wish we had 54 more years of John Prine. I’ve been listening to his stories for a half-century and I’d be delighted to stick around for an extended encore.
The Wizards of WordPress deliver unto us from their Celestial Canale.
The Wizards of WordPress finally checked their Palantír and noticed they’d failed to respond to my feeble pleas for succor, or as some jaded customer-service types call it, “Sucker.”
But respond they finally did, yesterday. And thus, as your reigning Prelate of Punditry, I bear their scriptures to you, my congregation.
First, since the comments issue seems to affect different users (Mac, Windows, Firefox, Safari) in different ways, the duty wizard suggested that those of you experiencing technical difficulties “post in our public support forums to get help troubleshooting [your] setups.”
Adding a “modlook” tag to your post on forums.wordpress.com will add it to the staff queue for that team, quoth the wizard via email.
Now, I realize this may be a bridge too far for some of yis who are moved occasionally to rattle-can a little snark onto Your Humble Narrator’s virtual railroad trestle. And in any event, crossing it might not lead you to a brave new commenting world.
Because the duty wizard added that the the blog’s theme, like its operator, “is very old and no longer compatible” with many browser setups.
“There are more modern themes that still stay true to the simplistic aesthetic of Kubrick,” the wizard added, suggesting that I search WP’s theme park for a new one with tags like “blog,” “author,” “technophobe,” “senile old hack,” “gibbering eejit,” “Stone Age scribbler,” “nursing-home newsletter,” or “STFU.”
(Actually, the wizard only pitched the first two tags. But hey, it’s my blog and I’ll lie if I want to, lie if I want to, lie if I want to — you would lie too if it happened to you.)
Ordinarily when someone suggests “It’s not us, it’s you,” I snort and holler, “Boooooooosheeyit!” But I’m inclined to buy what this wizard is selling because I’m rocking some seriously old gear here and have been noticing my own technical difficulties doing bits of this, that, and the other in my journeys throughout the Innertubes.
I mean, c’mon: A 2014 MacBook Pro running macOS Mojave 10.14.6? Sure, 16 GB of memory and plenty of room yet on the old internal drive, but still, we’re talking Safari 14.1.2 here. That dog’s so old it won’t hunt WP’s theme park for some of the newer possibilities. Just staggers around the gate sniffing and pissing on the bars.
So, we may be looking at a prolonged period of “upgrades” here at Ye Olde Dogge Pounde. OS. Browser. WP theme. Etc. Get ’er up there on the lift, Skeeter. Sweet holy motherfuck, what we got here? Git a bucket under that! And fetch my .22 wheelgun, something’s built a nest in there. Do Duck! City woodrats have eight eyes?
My plan, such as it is, is to experiment with new themes using an old blog, rather than risk the Main Attraction, which goes all the way back to November 2008. I keep a couple-three shuttered shops in the old unreal-estate portfolio just in case this sort of nightmare ever reared its ugly head(s).
More as I learn it. Please continue to hold. Your call is important to us. A Misery Engineer will be with you shortly. Your wait time is currently …. beeeeeeeeeep.
Herself and I were enjoying the usual weekly quail-spotting ride through High Desert and Sandia Heights yesterday when another cyclist caught up to us and we began chatting, as cyclists do.
It being The Duck! City, we found ourselves collecting one of those odd tales that seem to be included in every random encounter with a stranger.
After discussing the beautiful almost-fall weather, other places we had lived, and the critters we had seen, our new riding buddy told us about a neighbor who objected strenuously to hikers tramping along the arroyo that snakes along behind their houses.
So much so, he said, that one day she hid in the scrub with a Louisville Slugger and took a little vigorous batting practice on one of them.
Now, I’ve ridden this arroyo a time or two, or one very much like it in the general vicinity, and I’ve never seen any signs, placards, fencing, or other indication that it was private property. Which I don’t believe it is.
Nonetheless, I told him I’d keep my eyes peeled henceforth.
“Watch out for an old bat with a bat,” he advised.
Mad Blog Media 