The horror.

Quite frankly all the maintenance that needs to get done can be overwhelming at times. I mean there is just the stuff that should done on a regular basis as a part of day to day life. Then there’s personal maintenance to stay on top of as well as all the things that need to get done on the house.

Everywhere I turn I see a job or something unfinished that needs to get done.

The big thing is time goes much, much faster and the well of energy produces so much less than it did before.

Last week, something stupid happened that sprung up from one of those unfinished tasks that led to a cascade of catastrophes. I had at one point had some kind of leak from my kitchen sink which seemed to have resolved itself. However, I did want to clean under the kitchen sink and lay out wax paper just in case there was an issue in the future.

That meant removing all the bins I had stored under the kitchen sink with first aid, toiletries and the like. Then it became a matter of reorganizing everything and at one point or another the bins fell over and in the meantime I just stacked things somewhat haphazardly. And since it started getting cold and not wanting to actually turn the heat on I had taken to using the stove to provide a brief blast of warmth along with the space heated that runs more or less constantly from the beginning of October through to April these days.

And the door to the oven was open. I was in the other room when I heard a noise and figured the pile of things from under the stink that had been staked had fallen over which was not an emergency because I was in the middle of something for work.

However, shortly after that I began to smell something burning? I got up and looking in the kitchen and it appeared the stack had fallen into the open hot over where some things had actually caught fire (q-tips are amazingly combustible) and it was quite the sight.

So, I shut off the over, put out the small fires (there was more than one) and got everything moved out of the oven. There was a mess but really, when isn’t there a mess these days it seems.

Later after I got things back to some semblance of order and had things pretty much squared away, I turned on the over again and within little time noted the nice acrid smell of plastic which likely was part of one bin that had melted on the element and still was there in the over.

Great.

So that now was something else to deal with.

And I got to thinking about it. I thought to myself, ‘what’s the best way to handle this?’ I got a razor blade scraper and scraped off what looked to be most of the plastic but while I was doing it, it struck me it likely would be good just to give the oven a cleaning to be safe.

This forced me to confront another issue… when WAS the last time I cleaned the oven?

Mmmmmmm… never? I mean I may have sprayed it with oven cleaner at some point but I couldn’t remember if I did. I did try using that cleaning setting which I found out in the video I’m posting with this entry is something you really shouldn’t do. In any case, I set about cleaning the over which likely hadn’t been cleaned in two decades.

This sounds really, really gross… I know. Honestly though, it’s not like the over had a bunch of built up waste and the like on the bottom or anything. When I use the oven I’m very careful and don’t use it in a way that means there will be a lot of schmutz floating around in it. I line baking pans and if I do have something that can cause a problem I’ll place a sheet of aluminum foil on the lower rack to catch any debris and just toss it when I’m through.

I did some looking and found this video:

 

MAN! You can find just about anything on YouTube these days!

So right now the project of the last several days had been cleaning the over.

The interior of the over is lathered down with the baking soda mixture and I am slowly making my way around it scrubbing away and then using the damp cloth but I can only do it in ‘bites’ because this is no small tasks.

I got the over door off and today, I finished the interior of the door for the most part and have the exterior to do and then do the vinegar spray. I had the grates in the tub with the Cascade and then I did one side of one grate and soaked them some more. It looks like there’s a difference.

At least the thing will be clean when I’m done and then the next step will be the glass counter top itself which I hope will be a little easier! 

I never cease to be amazed by people’s stupidity.

What’s incredible is the amount of disrespect the Police have to endure today because of Democrat’s lies.

What do I mean about Democrat lies? Well, ever since George Floyd there is the bullshit narrative about Police being dangerous to Black men.

Homicide (predominantly committed intraracially, meaning Black victims are most often killed by Black offenders) is the leading cause of death for Black men aged 15 to 34.

While Black men face a much higher rate of fatal police encounters compared to white men (roughly 2.5 to 3 times higher), the total number of deaths caused by police officers nationwide each year (roughly 1,000 to 1,138 total deaths across all races, with a fraction of those being Black men) is vastly lower than the thousands of homicides recorded annually within Black communities.

No Significant Racial Disparity in Shootings (Some Studies): In his widely cited empirical analysis of police data from multiple cities and New York City's Stop-and-Frisk program, Roland Fryer found no racial differences in officer-involved shootings in either the raw data or when accounting for contextual factors.

However in terms of total numbers? For example in 2025 the date shows this: 

• White: 564 deaths
• Black: 302 deaths
• Hispanic: 236 deaths

WOW! Almost DOUBLE the number of deaths caused by Police were white!

Anyway, when I deal with the Police? Look, I am not happy to get a ticket if I get stopped but I am always respectful and really, it’s quite simple… why would you be rude to someone? Rudeness only welcomes more rudeness. It won’t ever get you what you want especially in a situation where someone can really screw with you.

I watch all those shows with Police in the field, COPS, COPS Reloaded, On Patrol Live, Bodycam all of them and I think about them as a primer in stupidity.

Here are some examples of women who just think that being a woman entitles them to act out. What’s great about this is that it just goes to show how women really DON’T WANT TO BE EQUAL. In the case of men, they WOULD NOT get the same amount of rope by the Police. 

23 years later it’s still good. (actually it’s really 27 years later)

Sometimes, I’ll put the TV on in the background just to fill up the quiet. There are a lot more times lately when it’s just quiet which I seem to do more and more of while working but I do have that habit. There’s a movie I think it’s one of the best movies I’ve ever seen.

I had it on in the background today and there’s this one scene (out of many) with a monologue and the dialogue is heartbreaking and raw, I mean this actually gets me teary but it’s done so well and is such a testament to the actor delivering the lines:

K - You don't want any water?

No… I just… (starts crying a bit) I’m so fucked up here Alan, I don’t know… there’s so much… so many things…

K - Are you on drugs right now?

If I talk to you… y’know… if I tell you things… then you’re a lawyer, right? You can’t say things, you can’t tell anyone, it’s like the privelage, right? Attorney-client, you understand?

K -Not exactly, Linda. I’m not sure where you’re going with this…

Like a shrink, like if I go to see a shrink, I’m protected, I can say things… fuck! I don’t know what I’m doing

K - Linda, you’re safe. Ok. It’s alright. You’re my friend. You and Earl are my clients and what you need to talk about won’t leave this room, you have something you have to say… 

I have something to tell you. I have to tell you something. I want to change his will, can I change
his will? … I need to…

K - You can’t change his will. Only Earl can change his will.

No, no… NO, you see… I never loved him! I never loved him, Earl. When I started… when I met him… I met him and I fucked him and I married him because I wanted his money! do you understand?

I’m telling you this now… this I’ve never told anyone… I didn’t love him! And now… I know I’m in that will… I know, I was there with him… we were all there together when we made that fucking thing and all the money I’ll get… I don’t want it! Because I love him so much now! I’ve fallen in love with him now… for real… as he’s dying! and I look at him and he’s about to go… Alan, he’s dead… he’s moments…

I took care of him through this, Alan. And… What Now? Then?

I don’t want him to die! I didn’t love him when we met… and I’ve done so many bad things to him that he doesn’t know… things I want to confess to him… but now I do: I love him! I love him so much and I can’t stand… he’s going…

K - What kind of medication are you on right now, Linda that’s…

This is not any fucking medication talking… this isn’t! I don’t know… I don’t know… Can you give me nothing?

You have power of attorney… can you see him… can you? In this final fucking moment… go see him and make sure… change the fucking will! I don’t want any money… I couldn’t live with myself, this thing I’ve done! I’ve fucking done so many bad things… I fucked around. I fucked around on him! I fucking cheated on him… Alan… You’re his lawyer, our laywer, THERE!

I’m his wife… we are married. I broke the conract of marriage! I fucking cheated on him… many times over, I sucked other men’s cocks! and fuck… fuck… fuck… fuck… Other Things I’ve Done…

The scene goes on a bit after that but that’s the thrust of it before it winds down and she leaves. Julianne Moore gives one of the best performances of her career in Magnolia. This was Paul Thomas Anderson’s follow up film after Boogie Nights (another great movie) and before Punch Drunk Love (an amazing movie). It’s got an amazing cast and an incredible soundtrack by Aimee Mann. If you’ve never seen it, it’s streaming on HBO Max until the end of October and it’s really worth a watch. 

The things that fascinate me.

I’ve already said I spend an inordinate amount of time cooking. If you live alone, you have the choice of eating premade frozen food or making your own food. If you eat premade frozen food, you’re eating a lot of chemicals you likely shouldn’t have as part of your diet as well as not being able to manage your intake of salt.

Things like this get ever more important the older you get.

So, I find myself watching the oddest of things because I keep trying to expand my repertoire and skills. I watch and learn how to cook different recipes and prepare different foods and then I wonder to myself why I waited so long in my life to learn these things.

One of the things seeing these videos has made me think quite seriously about is buying a whole cow but that’s a discussion for another time. I landed on that after watching this video:

I have to say, these videos and the channel are absolutely wonderful to watch. I don’t have a Kitchen Aid mixer, I had purchased one many years ago with all the attachments and let Madame X take it with her when she hightailed it for better surroundings. I have to imagine she still has it and doesn’t or won’t even acknowledge where it came from but again, something to cry about another time.

In the video below the guy makes sausages and again, just absolutely riveting.

The only problem I’ve been having is that you make something and then in a one person household it is something akin to overkill so I have taken to sharing it with my octogenarian proxy mom and she has been truly delighted and brags to her own daughter about my cooking skills so there at least someone benefits from my efforts besides me. 

Check out the man’s channel, it’s really worth the time: https://www.youtube.com/@lewisofsunningdale

Well they were the best of time and the worst of times…

Yesterday, I made my way into Manhattan. I had to really think about when the last time I’d gone into the city was. Now, two things here… you’ll notice I said ‘the city’ because if you grew up in the New York metropolitan area, you don’t say you are going into Manhattan you say you’re going into the city.

New York City is big and has five boroughs… the Bronx (the only part of New York City connected to the continental United States) and then four other boroughs that are stand alone islands or part of an island… Manhattan, Staten Island, Brooklyn and Queens (the last two part of Long Island).

If you go to any of the other four boroughs you call them out by name… Manhattan? That’s ‘The City’ to the natives.

Our language moment out of the way, I realized the last time I had ventured in, I took the train in on my annual celebration last year to go and visit the Statue of Liberty with a friend and then to have the most amazing dinner in the Green Room at the Grand Brasserie which was wonderful. It was truly a good day but I was indeed tired after it all.

This time I drove in and parked on the Upper West Side and then took the subway down to where I needed to go (Hudson Yards).

The drive was… well, they have done all these things in the city now to make driving impossible. It’s a joke really. Aside from the stupid congestion tax, they’ve blocked lanes, put up these stupid dining sheds, changed the timing on lights, lowered speed limits, basically EVERYTHING YOU CAN FUCKING DO TO MAKE A CITY NOT A CITY!

If you want to live in the country? MOVE TO THE FUCKING COUNTRY!!!! It’s amazing. The people in charge are just assholes. I spoke to a friend of mine who lives in Brooklyn, teaches in Manhattan and has refused to take the subway for the last several years so he drives in and pays the stupid Congestion Tax and even he admits the Congestion Tax HAS DONE NOTHING! A trip that would take him 20 minutes by car now takes 40 minutes. SO MUCH FOR AIR QUALITY!!! It’s amazing to see disingenuous politicians and rich Manhattanites try to mask their NIMBY BULLSHIT behind supposed loftier aims… they’re reducing pedestrian deaths (try again), they’re reducing congestion (they aren’t)… the only thing they are doing is making life idyllic for rich people living in Manhattan who EVEN THOUGH THEY HAVE A MULTITUDE OF PUBLIC TRANSIT OPTIONS OWN CARS!!!!

This is some true lefty bullshit here.

Working people? People who work off hours and live outside of the city without adequate public transit options? People who need to drive in because the public transit commute would involve too many facets? Well, TOUGH, you’re just FUCKED and a casualty of liars.

Okay… so with my screed out of the way. The drive was a pain in the ass because certain roadways were backed up and then any workaround or bypass you can use just becomes tortuous because of what they’ve done.

I did get down to the city and the first thing that happened as I was at the light coming off the exit to local streets was that there was a shirtless man hanging out at the light trying to intimidate people into giving him money. WELCOME TO THE BAD OLD DAYS!!!

Rudy Giuliani got rid of squeegee men, panhandlers, homeless on the streets and at least Bloomberg didn’t let the city slide backwards but with a parade of Democratic idiots? DiBlasio, Adams and now the Communist… we’re right back where we were in the nineties but instead they’ve made it so it’s impossible to escape.

Think about it… I haven’t gone in in over a year and I’ve stopped going in even though I’ve lived here all of my life and the very first thing when I do get into the city is getting into a confrontation with some clown trying to grift and because I have my window open on a hot day and make it clear he should stay away the response I get is a tantrum where I am looking around in the car for a heavy object to use to hit said beggar with if he gets any closer to my personal space.

THAT’S TODAY’S NEW YORK.

Anyway, I looked for a while for a spot. Looking for a spot is a zen labor. The more desperate you are to find a parking spot the less likely you are to find one. I though I spied a spot close to where the highway exit was but there again was said beggar and I didn’t want to leave my vehicle unattended around him so that was out.

Back and forth I went along side streets and avenues, at one point I was simply too far from where I wanted to be anyway and I turned back to get closer and when I released myself from the whole experience there before me was a car pulling out and I just pulled right in. ZEN.

I walked over to the subway station. Upper Broadway is so different now and the one thing Manhattan proves is that it is in a constant state of change. So, I looked around as I walked and it struck me I did really miss that walking around Manhattan that I used to do. It’s something you can’t really do in the same way outside of Manhattan since it’s so dense and there is a discovery on every block. Then I saw someone who you only really see in Manhattan, a very striking tall blonde (dyed) woman standing talking with a man. Her mien only works in Manhattan, it wouldn’t be the same anywhere else.

That’s what walking around the city is like.

When I tried to use the stupid card to take the train it didn’t work but that’s another story and the token lady helped me out and just used her card to get me through the turnstiles which was nice of her. The train ride was really the same standard subway ride I’m used to and it was only three stops to get from where I started to where I was going. The ride itself was super quick (another benefit of being a native). It was one of the reasons I parked where I did.

Got off the second express stop, headed downstairs and caught the 7.

I laughed waiting for the 7… I was looking at the mosaic. It’s Times Square but throughout the 7 line stop the walls have a big TS emblazoned on them. Meant nothing years ago but sure does today. Ironically this is after Times Square has been scrubbed of the wonderful seediness of times gone by.

And after a moment on the 7 I ascended into the glistening monstrosity that is Hudson Yards. Another part of the city I can remember quite differently.

I went to the Edge which is this glassed in wall for the company meetup and as I said I’m not big on these things but I hadn’t seen anyone in over a year and it was nice. Mind you, I am likely the oldest person there and one of the very few men in attendance. Remind me again how white men have this big privilege thing because I must have been absent when they handed all that stuff out and have spent my entire life eating shit at work.

Male white privilege, more nonsense from people who want to push their craziness on the world.

So, the time on “The Edge” was brief but I really have to say as these things go? Save your money.

It’s nice and all but the whole thing is set up to take your money from you… you enter through a store where they want to sell you stuff. They take your picture (which they want to sell you later), everything up top is more high priced tchotchkes and the like and overpriced snack bar crap (I kid you not, $7 for a hot dog, A FUCKING HOT DOG!!!!). On your way out you exit through ANOTHER STORE and before you even get to the store they’re trying to sell you that photo thing.

Some people went to have early happy hour and I did attend after taking advantage of the highly discounted company store where I stocked up on some things and after doing so saving $40 bucks on over $60 bucks worth of stuff! So that made the trip somewhat worth it but then as I was with the other folks at the happy hour I got the second best annual celebration present as I was told they were renewing my contract so at least for now as much as I may complain I don’t have to worry about having a job for at least another 14 months!

YAY! 

I haven’t really been writing much lately.

It’s disappointing really because I can’t say I’ve done much of anything outside of work, work and more work.

In the meantime, the disaster that grows around me just continues to grow and I am reminded of the Shelley poem: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

There aren’t ‘works‘ though in any sense, just a house that continually falls deeper into disrepair and amasses more clutter. I simple have been lacking the energy to do anything these days and there is just so many things I should be doing that I have allowed to slide.

Tomorrow, there is a work event that requires me to go into the city and truth be told I’m just not looking forward to it.

Why?

Well, I had set up an Omnicard which they use now instead of the Metrocard but they fucked around with that even though they took my picture and my money to fund the card. They sent back my application but oddly enough didn’t send back the money I had loaded on the card just creating another problem to deal with.

So, if I go into the city, there’s an opportunity to rectify that but I really don’t care to be bothered to tell you the truth.

I have to desperately get a haircut before I go in, simply because days and weeks and months of working from home and not really needing to go out means that I am unkempt. I need to clean myself too having developed bad hygienic habits over the period of time. I have to do laundry as well.

Work has been such that it’s been a clusterfuck of disaster as the people within my own company just continue to fuck up and then fuck up more and fuck up even more after that meaning I have to pick up their slack and things keep coming to me late and in groups which they shouldn’t. Then I have to track down people to look at things and approve then and deal with vendors as well but everything instead of happening in a smooth flow all has to happen at once because my company KEEPS FUCKING UP!

My own annual celebration was recent but I didn’t even take time off and even though I was offered the opportunity to be feted didn’t do that either because work is simple exhausting.

And then I’m worried too about next year and being renewed.

So, I just work, make food, vegetate and watch the tube and really don’t accomplish anything else. It’s not a great life but I’ll take it.

The other day, I reached out to a few people. I don’t know why really other than maybe being a bit lit at the end of the day and the mind wandering.

I reached out to a friend who I worked with and who I just simply hadn’t had any contact with and the next day early my phone was blowing up with messages from him.

Younger than me by almost a decade he relayed how he has Stage 4 cancer. We had a long conversation shortly afterward, it’s sobering really but the truth of it is and the thing you don’t realize when you are a young person is that you are not invincible nor are you eternal. You may have grandparents but there isn’t a guarantee that you will match their number of years logged on the planet.

He’s a good guy too… that’s what’s really sad about it. Not that there ever is a situation to be happy about these things.

Since, I started this job, two of the women in our group have died. I’m not talking about dying of old age either, both of these women died before they hit 55. One was the woman that hired me at my previous job and she was really a nice person and the other again was a super nice woman who had stepped back from work. The thing of it was over the summer I had reached out to her via email and told her how much she was missed and never heard back but she died shortly afterward making me feel a little foolish,

I guess this is my roundabout way of saying, yeah… life can be fucked up. There are times when you feel you are in a rut and nothing is happening or maybe things aren’t going the way you want them but even though that’s the case? You really should be counting your lucky stars because in all honesty there are no guarantees, every fucking day that you are on this planet is a gift, every new day opens up before you with possibility and don’t take it for granted because there are a lot of other people who would willingly trade places with you. 

Oh my god!!!!!

I had said I’m loving Lanterns and last week I already said that I suspected Noah, the Manhunter’s grandson is the one who killed Hal. This is something apparently I was not the only one noticing but I was just rewatching the preview for Episode 7…

Episode 6 kind of dragged but was a necessary evil to get you to a certain point in the story. Yes, Hal Jordan IS DEAD! This bothers me quite a bit because I like Kyle Chandler’s Hal Jordan and want to see more of him. I also like Aaron Pierre’s John Stewart… when they get casting right it only makes the thing even better.

Anyway, back to the preview of Episode 7. There are a bunch of cuts but one has John Steward punching someone. The someone he’s punching is wearing a cowl.

Does that mean they have found the new Spectre of the DCU?!!?!? Remember… James Gunn is calling this phase of the DCU, GODS AND MONSTERS!!