Thankfully that’s one of the first things I uninstall with every Windows computer I set up.

Downside is that this update might force a reinstall. Shit.

OpenOffice wanders into the chat

Some, like ImageGlass, provide workarounds. Like, they provide a separate install but it also comes bundled with the Opera browser (which itself has become two shakes away from raw spyware as of late), so you do have to be careful to deselect that option.

The 2017 full version of SketchUp is similarly free, FYI. You just have to dig for it on the website.

I can’t believe that marketing people are this fucking stupid.

Like, full-on knuckle-dragging morons.

They intentionally drive away more paying customers than they could ever “channelize” with this method.

Because most people realize that prices are only ever hidden for malicious, anti-consumer purposes.

gmail is the only provider still sending me directly to spam

Do you have a gMail account? Start a convo with yourself by sending from the gMail account first. Also add your other eMail to the gMail address book.

It’s been about two decades since I had to do this for myself, but it worked well at the time.

No-one.

Absolutely no-one.

If I get widowed tomorrow, imma gonna stay single for the rest of my days.

Not only am I edging into that age where I am becoming increasingly cranky and unwilling to change for someone else (I have changed enough for my wife of 30 years), but I have also been keeping a light finger on what’s happening out there between the sexes, and holy shite that’s become one hell of a mess that I want absolutely nothing to do with.

I mean, the door isn’t going to be barred and locked. But it is going to be firmly closed and with a cinder block in the way. If someone wants through, they are going to have to demonstrate real effort in their pursuit of me.

But then again, I would be shocked AF if any woman thought pursuit of any kind wasn’t beneath them. So I guess my peace and quiet would be quite safe. Thank the lord.

Even at my sickest, I was always able to make something to eat, even if it was simple like cracking open some of my own canned spaghetti sauce and boiling some noodles.

Being sick has always been a wholly inadequate argument for not making something healthy to eat.

Now, an evening where a sit-down supper would be impossible - Halloween being our only consistent pizza night - that is a different story. But those happen only a few days a year.

No, I have always phoned ahead to order, but I have always picked up the order personally.

The savings having done so have always been more than the fuel spent to retrieve the order.

The only things I have delivered to me are packages and envelopes through the mail.

Granted, I am GenX, but I can’t recall a single time in the last half a decade where I’ve had anything like food delivered. Or used the services of any kind of gig company.

And I simply can’t think of any benefit of doing so. It’s horrendously expensive, and simply not worth the expense.

I’ve looked at some tentative projections, and it’s downright apocalyptic.

At our current “business as usual” path, we should be expecting wholesale collapse of countries by 2035 or shortly thereafter, with +4℃ temps causing agriculture destruction that leads to a 60-80% drop in human populations by 2050.

And when people are desperate to live another day, they will absolutely tear apart any infrastructure they can get their hands on in order to survive. We’re talking about reverting to the Iron Age or even the Stone Age.

And when almost 100% of all resources required for building or even maintaining high tech civ are no longer accessible without high tech civ… there is no coming back from this collapse.

Epstien files exhonorated Michael. Apparently it may have been a smear campaign against someone on the spectrum that wouldn’t work with them.

I haven’t looked further into it myself, but I also heard much the same.

Props to him if this is anywhere close to being real. He was one hell of a damaged person carrying a shitton of psychological scars, but it sounds like he really did care about the kids.

And he was one hell of a good singer. I’ve got most of his albums on vinyl and MP3.

I absolutely approve.

I would do it, too, if I could get over the squick of even dealing with them in the first place.

When young people face a system explicitly designed to extract as much wealth out of them as possible, nerfing their economic potential well into adulthood via crushing debt, is such a response really that unexpected?

Even Wozniak has said that while Jobs wasn’t a good engineer, he did know enough to be strategically savvy.

Edited in hindsight for clarity.

Finally, the bean counter steps down so that an engineer can take the reins again.

I mean, at least he didn’t fuck things up like so many other bean counters have. But he was only ever a bean counter.

Congee. It’s a Chinese rice dish. It’s not bad tasting, but it has all the looks and texture of regular boiled rice with equal parts runny snot. It even more closely matches the “runny snot” impression if it’s correctly salted.

Pork Shumai. Also Chinese, but actually delish AF. But like so many other Dim Sum foods, it also looks - if made correctly - like it’s dripping with gelatinous snot.

Chicken’s feet. Also Chinese, these are braised in soya sauce until they look like little clawed grave markers of an incompletely-buried avian body. You’re not Chinese if you don’t eat these with absolute gusto. Meanwhile I’m thinking if the barnyard poop indelibly buried in each crevice of that clawed monstrosity.

Sauce: married to ethnic Chinese first-gen for the last twenty years. I’ve been exposed to a lot of Chinese foods, especially those from the Canton region.

As a Canadian: fuck, no.

Poutine isn’t visually unpalatable in the least. It’s just fries with curds and gravy. Unless the kitchen did a total hash of the dish and fucked it up six ways to Sunday, there ain’t no way it looks bad.

It’s even better with extras in it, like pulled pork, wiggly bacon chunks, or chopped onion greens.

Sheep’s head, or sheep’s brain?

The former is fine.

The latter screams spongiform encephalopathy.

Dogs only exist in the moment. Any correction that isn’t delivered within 1-3 seconds is going to have greatly diminished effectiveness, and anything beyond 5-10 seconds (depending on breed) is going to not be connected with the behaviour that caused you to provide the correction.

There are many breeds where, in general, the drive is so high that “force-free” training will be the fastest path to the euthanasia table. German Shepherd, Belgian Malinois, and many other herding breeds in particular. Sure, you might get lucky and score a “low drive” dog, but that is relative to others in the same breed – by comparison it will still make any golden retriever look like a high-as-a-kite stoner slacker. But a high-drive dog can and will get itself into situations where treats, toys, and other positive incentives will be utterly ignored. Trust me when I say that under those conditions, there is nothing in the “force-free training” arsenal that can or will reach these dogs to break them out of their focus. And when that focus involves aggression against pets or people, balanced training is the only thing that will keep your dog from being euthanized by the authorities.

Start training at an early age. Even as young as 8 weeks. Sit, heel, recall and others are vitally important in being able to control your dog without a leash, or if they slip the leash. Try to find a MSRP-priced version of Successful Together, as it will do wonders in laying down a good foundation of training.

Look for the videographer MK9Plus (can’t tell if British or Australian), they have lots of excellent reels on how to understand your dog’s body language. Method k9 is another one.

Manhandle your dog, especially when they are young and easy to handle. Don’t hurt them, but do get them used to being strangely handled, especially in cases like when they are at the vet.

Do not take your dog out on extended runs for the first year of life, their joints will thank you for their entire life.

Do not spay or neuter your dog, their lifespan and overall health will thank you for their life. Instead, consider vasectomies and hysterectomies instead, as these leave the hormone-producing gonads in place, leading to longer and much healthier lives.

I hope this helps.