My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on April 23, 2021

I’ve used Twitter as my interactive Newsfeed for almost 15 years now and it has been a struggle to decide if it is worth it or not? BUT, like most people who start the addictive habit of using social networks and reading “feeds” (newsworthy or not), it is a difficult habit to stop.

For the “newsy” component, most of what I follow is national business and political news with a smattering of locally fed stories having to do with weather, sports or community. I once enjoyed connecting with Taylor’s teachers and our local schools, but that seems like a long time ago.

The other part part of the feed is the social aspect. Twitter has remained my connection to a few of my hobby friends from aviation and car guys … to photography and technology .. as well as science and miscellaneous jibber-jabber and humor. This is probably the area I could improve on and whittle down who I connected with … and definitely who’s tweets notify me on my phone. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy the back and forth connections and virtual friendships, but besides “social” and learning things in areas that interest me, I do spend an excessive amount of time glancing at my iPhone when it chirps, then reading and often replying (thankfully they are short tweet,s but still I’m shocked how much I use it!)

Prior to social networks, we … or I … connected with others through forums/clubs (Bulletin Board Services – BBS in the early days), Yahoo and Google group lists, directly by email or commenting on individual blogs. Now most of this has moved to social networks like Facebook (I still have an account), Instagram, TikToc, and a bunch of others that I avoid like the plague. I’ve tried to discipline myself to stick with ONLY Twitter since it is my connection to news and people with my interests. Using even Twitter (as well as email, text messaging) as well as keeping up with my daily blog is bad enough … I don’t need any more.

Category: Blogs, Personal, Social Media, Technology | No Comments »
Tags: analytics, networking, newsfeed, social, tech friday, techfriday, time managment, twitter

Posted By RichC on April 22, 2021

After just finishing cutting the lawn on Tuesday night and working on our landscaping this past weekend in anticipation of a cold front with some “expected rain,” it ended up coming down as SNOW! I mean, come on, it is the time of year to be thinking sunshine, warmer weather and flowers .. not snow. 

Of course Brenda reminded me that we do occasionally get snow in southwestern Ohio this time of year (see 2014 post below break) and that this past 2021 winter was mild, so I shouldn’t complain … but perhaps I should push off the additional mulch until May?

(more…)

Category: Personal, Photography, Photos, Weather | No Comments »
Tags: pano, panorama, Photos, snow, spring, weather, yardwork

Posted By RichC on April 21, 2021

Thankfully no one was hurt at this Sprint car race, but this is too close of a call for any flag person’s comfort. Yikes!

Category: Automotive, Video | No Comments »
Tags: close call, fence, flagman, mp4, racing, sprint car, video, wreck

Posted By RichC on April 20, 2021

It seems like a lot of politicians and journalists on the left feed into and retain power by stoking racial unrest? It also appears that the leaders who are fueling the fire also have a Marxist/Socialist ideology, which at its core wants to fundamentally change America. This trend towards disharmony is not unifying for our country and I’m unsure the leaders on the left, and their followers, understand just how destructive this kind of hate is to our country?

Our schools and education system has systematically brainwashed students in Critical Race Theory (CRT)which instead of judging people by their character, judges people by their skin color and ethnicity … and stresses racial justice. Are you and oppressor based on your skin color? So much for the gains during the civil rights movement. 

For others buying into this leftist indocrinations, they see capitalism, competitive free-markets benefitting too few and fueling inequity, although even with a large gap between those at the top and at the bottom of the economic scale, America still offers far more opportunity and freedom to all citizens than any other nation. Why with all the personal freedom and independence in the U.S., would anyone want to give up this precious liberty?

Perhaps I think different because I’ve lived long enough to remember the civil rights struggle during the 1960s, when America seemed to be finally be overcoming segregation. My generation was taught and learned “not to judge people by the color of skin, but by the content of their character.”

Nearly everyone I knew recognized that prejudice was prevalent in prior generations and that it was inherently wrong by any measure. The years that followed saw significant gains in access and opportunities for all  who were willing to learn and work to better themselves. It is as if we had started to heal and were making progress … although the road was bumpy. Many minorities were even given preferential treatment and special opportunities through affirmative action programs … which in my view dampened the gains due to the unfairness and reverse discrimination. It left more divisive bitterness even as minorities  made gains towards equality of opportunity.

Fast forward 40 or 50 years and we’re now facing a new kind of discrimination trigged by cancel culture and Wokeism (something even European socialist are concern about). This time around, people are judged … not by their character … but by the color of their skin. How is this even accepted? Purposely dividing people by ethnicity, race, religion, gender, social economics or any reason is destructive for a nation.

Category: Politics, Quotes | No Comments »
Tags: censorship, martin luther king jr, marxism, Politics, socialism, woke, wokeism

Posted By RichC on April 19, 2021

This past weekend I saw what looked like an amateur musician in a college dorm or apartment video roll across my Twitter feed and thought, “this young man has talent.” It reminded me of a post from 2014 when Jacob Tolliver sat down at a piano in a Portsmouth, Ohio hardware store.

This kind of Bluegrass music hasn’t been my normal Music Monday listening taste or trend, but even a hard of hearing guy like me can see this guy has talent. (I did mention Bluegrass when posting about Pure Praire League and Vince Gill, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Alison Krauss and Catfish John last year – mp3 below).
 

(more…)

Category: Music, Social Media, Video | No Comments »
Tags: amateur, bluegrass, country music, mp4, music monday, musicmonday, talent

Posted By RichC on April 18, 2021

Is there a better way to “dice” and onion?

The Lifehacker “Hack or Wack” crew gave the UK tipster’s method a try … and I’ll probably do the same even though they concluded it was “wack.” Still, there might be a couple modifications that could keep the onion flat on the cutting board and still use the wedge slice idea???

Lyndsey’s technique isn’t as different from the traditional as it appears. She does, however, skip a couple of steps, and essentially makes a bloomin’ onion before slicing it into smaller pieces. If you’ve ever had a bloomin’ onion, you know that the “petals” are slender on the ends and fatter in the middle, so the resulting pieces come out quite uneven.

But not every dish calls for a completely uniform dice, so my larger issue with this method is one of safety: That onion flower is wobbly, unwieldy, and constantly trying to bloom. Without a flat portion to rest on the cutting board, you have to fight to hold the onion together as you slice and dice, which is a recipe for finger lacerations.

(more…)

Category: Tidbits, Video | No Comments »
Tags: cooking, cutting, dice, food, hack, kitchen, lifehacker, mp4, onion, video, wack

Posted By RichC on April 17, 2021

It’s that time of year … cleaning up, getting the landscaping mounds ready for new mulch and of course, Brenda has to burn something … decorative grasses go up fast. Let’s hope she doesn’t burn the fence again.

For my part, I’m digging out older stone (what a pain) and prepping to put down some new river rock and mulch.  I usually use Majors which is close by, but they don’t have any rock at the moment so will give Creech’s in Lebanon a try.  Since I no longer have a Bobcat, there will be more hand-hauling work than I want to do by myself, I’m giving my fence painter and a tree trimming guy a call to see if I can hire them? Once done, pool, deck and patio furniture cleaning time. Ugh!

(more…)

Category: Misc, Personal, Photos | No Comments »
Tags: ani gif, anigif, backyard, brenda, burning, grasses, landscaping, mounds, spring, yardwork

Posted By RichC on April 16, 2021

If you use a computer for any length of time (my “go-to” is an aging 2012 Apple iMac), you’ll find yourself cut, copy and pasting things on a regular basis. Security experts do not recommend using the cut/copy feature for secure items like user names and passwords, but that doesn’t prevent the habit of using ctrl/cmd-X, C and V keystrokes.

What is even more helpful is to add an app that permits saving regularly pasted items (text, images, etc) or just building a history of copied bits so that you can use previously clipped items. My favorite “powerful” app for doing this is one called Copy’Em available in the MacOS app store for $14.99 (2021). A feature that makes it even better is that clips can be cloud saved (iCloud) and shared with other Macs and iOS devices too.

This past week there was an update, now 2.10 … so far, so good.

UPDATE: I’ve made the personal decision not to use the Sync to iCloud feature (paid premium) feature that shares Copy and Paste items between devices (Mac, iPad and iPhone).

Category: Apple, Cloud, Computer, Productivity, Software, Technology, Tidbits | No Comments »
Tags: apple, apps, Computer, copy, copy'm, cut, icloud, imac, ios, macintosh, macos, paste, recommend, tech friday, techfriday

Posted By RichC on April 15, 2021

John Rowe, an automotive friend on Twitter, often shares a “ Today’s Useless Tweet” that I find entertaining. It fit with the idioms tag on MyDesultoryBlog and thought his  “blow your own horn [trumpet]” (see below embedded tweet) would be fitting as a filler for today.

Today’s Useless Tweet : 1972. 5th grade. Parents bought my first horn. I was thrilled. Neighbors, not so much. Here I am breaking windows in my back yard in Sugar Land Texas. pic.twitter.com/hWNWJoBevH

— John Rowe (@JWRIII) April 14, 2021

Category: Friends, Idioms, Social Media, Tidbits | No Comments »
Tags: idiom, idioms, john rowe, tweet, twitter, useless, visual

Posted By RichC on April 14, 2021

Since Ford once-upon-a-time paid a solid dividend, it was one of those stocks I felt comfortable trading in and out of or  just sitting on for a while … but after the company suspended the dividend in March of 2020, I had to re-think $F stock. Owning Ford in 2020 and so far in 2021 has became much more of a pandemic “price-rebound” trade stock than a “I don’t mind if I hold for a while” investment. Will this change in the second half of 2021? Will Ford pay out a dividend again … or will shareholder have to wait until 2022? One thing is for sure, the company saves a lot of money by not paying a dividend, but do they prefer shareholders who will own the stock long term in exchange for a respectful dividend (think retirees, mutual funds and pension plans)?

Ford saved about $2.4B in cash last year by not distributing the quarterly dividend of $0.15 per share.

My guess is that the management and the board will wait for assured profitability (pandemic over) or until borrowing becomes too risky and costly (money gets tighter and interest rates rise). Since selling the shares I’ve held longer than a year in February and March (for long term vs short term profits), I’m still glad to see the demand for vehicles returning – who doesn’t want a growing economy? Hopefully this progress will continue and that President Biden’s tax increases will be tempered by wiser advisors and that the vaccine rollout will continue to move us closer to herd immunity.

Unfortunately the political winds are not gentle these day and the Left – Right divide is as wide as I’ve ever seen. The pressure cooker is constantly bubbling. For now, and for the good and bad, Washington DC keeps dumping piles of money into the system, be it in the form of stimulus checks, infrastructure bill or pork. Besides A LOT of money ending up as inefficient bureaucratic waste, debt and bloat .. the money rolling into the economy doesn’t hurt the demand for new products that employ Americans or create trade in the form of Ford vehicles. Now, how much more borrowed and made up money we can continue to print without consequence?

Category: Automotive, Financial, Politics | No Comments »
Tags: dividend, dividends, ford, herd imunity, infrastructure, investing $F, money, pandemic, porfolio, pork, retirement, stimulus, stock, trading