Thankful for…

Safe arrival of friends!


Beth arrived a little before 6, while I was dusting the dryer. It’s been almost non-stop chat since then, with a small break as we all went and grabbed a little supper.

And we’re thankful for rain, too: Beth brought some rain with her. The trees have been shedding leaves for the last couple of days; they’ll probably all be gone by this weekend. She’s gone to bed, understandably exhausted after the long drive and fighting a cold. I’m going to bounce around the tubes a little tonight, and type up the next episode of FAR Future (wrote the first draft at lunch, it’s about 75% done).

(Late) Fall Colors

Mid-November, and we’re still seeing some fall color...

FAR Future, Episode 15 (or 14b if you prefer)

In the FAR Future-verse, this episode & the last one are only a day apart, so I thought it would be proper to post them a day apart…

---

Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Wow

Words fail me, but I’ll try. I’m still way too worked up about what happened. I’m sure footage will get to YouTube or VideoNation soon — if you didn’t see it, you really have to. I’ll try to describe it here, but you have to see the video. You just have to.

Mrs. Fetched had the TV on — didn’t matter what channel; all the Atlanta stations were carrying this. The “militia” were camped out around the Capitol building itself, and up and down the streets — except on MLK Blvd, which tells you pretty much everything you need to know — and spilled into the parking deck. The National Guard blocked through traffic and let the militia camp in the middle of the street — one of the officers said they had consulted with the city government, and they agreed that it would be the best way to avoid disrupting a wider area. The reprehensibles weren’t bothering to come in; they teleconference most of the time like everyone else anyway, but some said they were “hearing the message.”

On the evening news last night, they interviewed street vendors who were selling food, drinks, sweaters, caps, even socks and underwear, to the campers. It doesn’t matter what happens, someone will find a way to turn a buck off it, right? A lot of the vendors are black, and they think the campers are bleep bleep and bleeeep, but the money is still green. I guess. The campers didn’t seem to care either way; they were just glad someone was making it easier on them.

Again, I digress. The counter-demonstrators convened at the Georgia State campus, just up the road, and planned to march down Courtland, around the square, then back up Piedmont to the campus. Some of the TV crews (including the news personalities) set up on the roofs of the Capitol Museum and the State Supreme Court building, but some camera crews put themselves right down in the action. One of the newsies said, “we’re hearing the counter-demonstrators are on their way now,” and everyone started standing up. The Capitol Police had cleared the middle of the streets to make room for the marchers, and the militia types were thronging the edges, trying to get a look.

Then they came, in their hundreds and tens of hundreds. Carrying luminaries and singing, “God Bless America.” Go find the video — it was just stunning. Not the marchers themselves, but the effect it had on the militia. You have to remember, these guys were brought up on God and Country — and whatever beef they had with the latter, they hadn’t been completely de-programmed. Some of them stood at attention, others sang along… and they all put down their guns. I hope you get to see the clip where one red-faced yahoo started chanting whatever they’d planned on, and everyone around him turned and stared him down until he just left. There’s another clip where you can see some of the guys shouldering their arms and… well, changing sides, joining the marchers. Mrs. Fetched and I both teared up, and so did a lot of the militia guys. The leaders were camped in front of the Capitol, across from the Supreme Court building, and the crew across the street got a “priceless” shot — those guys looked like they were watching their best friends wearing pink tutus and practicing ballet. The newscasters were somehow imbued with a clue, and just let the cameras roll. Or maybe they were choked up too.

It was over in 15 minutes. The marchers went through, crossed MLK again, and headed back toward the campus — still singing. The militia guys started packing their stuff. The reporter found his voice and said (I taped it & am transcribing): “This is surely a historic moment. I — I don’t have words to describe what just happened here today, and I’m not sure I could add anything to what we’ve just seen. It appears that the ‘Citizen Militia’ is dispersing — most of them are packing their things and some of them are following the marchers up Capitol Avenue, possibly to the Georgia State MARTA station.

“Wait… we take you now to the militia’s Field Headquarters, in front of the Capitol building.”

They cut over to a young black woman (pretty in that way that transcends race, a must for urban TV news) interviewing one of the leaders. He was already talking: “—a success, overall. I have to admit I was surprised at the tactics of the counter-demonstrators, but the Assembly has received our message and I expect we’ll prevail when it comes to a vote.”

And just like that, the magic faded back into the banality of a typical live newscast.

Unfortunately, the Secession Question doesn’t appear to have been answered — or maybe now it’s less answered than before. The evening news opened with it tonight. A lot of closed-door discussions have been going on over the last week, in violation of who knows how many sunshine laws, and (being run by goplets) probably off the transcripts entirely. Debates are going on across the Old South, at least from South Carolina to Louisiana, and in parts of the mountain west. More rumors, some online, others officially denied: Congress is negotiating with various state reps about home rule; the Guard in certain states are being put under national command; the Navy is stationing task groups out to sea but close to certain seaports; the pipelines could get nationalized or shut down. Despite what happened today, we’re not much closer to holding hands and singing Kumbayah than we were before.

continued…

FAR Future, Episode 14

Second episode in a row posted on a “cold” (low of 0°C or slightly less) night. I’d like to think I’m not going to make a habit of it, but we’re sliding into the bottom of the year now. Gas hitting $3/gal again has soured Mrs. Fetched on SUVs; she went out and traded Barge Vader for a 2002 Civic EX. Very pretty, although I think the instrument console is somewhat cartoon-like.

Thanks to everyone over at Nancy’s blog, Sweet Mystery of Life, for all the encouragement I’ve been getting on this and other projects.

Yeah, yeah, enough with the suspense already…

---

Monday, November 19, 2012
Marching Through Georgia

The media is estimating about 5,000 people — more than I’d hoped, less than I’d feared — “joined the citizen’s militia” and are marching to Atlanta. A few dozen left from here (so much for five), more from larger counties, and they’re meeting up along the way. South of Macon, they chartered buses to bring them up to Atlanta.

The State Patrol said the marchers can carry their guns, as long they they’re unloaded; they threatened to confiscate loaded weapons but I don’t know how they could tell who’s loaded unless someone fires a round. The “vanguard” has already arrived at the Capitol building and the others are trickling in along the streets. The ones who are there have started pitching tents wherever they can find room and are giving interviews with the media. Rumors are flying again: shootouts with gang-bangers (wouldn’t surprise me), the National Guard is being mobilized to keep order (ditto), a bunch of the militia are actually infiltrators (could be), the State Patrol is barricading everything at I-285 (don’t think so), the legislature will convene in Savannah (I’d be maybe a little surprised).

It’s also true that they’ve lost a few people — not dead, just dropped out. Some had to be treated for hypothermia, camping in sub-freezing weather without adequate gear. (The Boy camped out on cold nights, when he was a teenager, but stayed warm enough.) Others caught the flu that’s going around this year, and had to go home or to a clinic. If they got sick inside I-285, the ambulances took them straight to Grady — just to honk their frozen noses, I guess. Some of the older folks started walking from the various courthouses, but caught a ride when hips or knees started to seize up. I’ve had my knee act up like that, especially with the way the weather changes this time of year, so I can relate to that if nothing else. So the least mobile were among the first to arrive at the Capitol… go figure.

There’s a counter-demonstration being planned for tomorrow. I wish I had the guts to provoke armed lunatics too; if nothing else, I'd like to go with a video camera and pretend to be a news stringer or something. Mrs. Fetched, who is concerned about my income if not my safety (and she is), scotched the idea — I have to work, don’t need to waste gas going there & back, and don’t need to be doing anything that dangerous when I’m almost 54 (thanks for the reminder, honey). Oh well. I guess I’ll watch it on TV like everyone else.

continued…

Nearly Another Involuntary TB01

As it was Tuesday, I worked at home today. If gas prices begin their march to $4, as expected, I’ll probably go to twice a week or as often as my boss will let me get away with. Shades of FAR Future, the power was scheduled to be out all morning (and was), although my work MacBook Pro got me through the morning on battery power with plenty to spare. But, as I often do, I digress.

The Boy has not exactly been endearing himself to the rest of the family lately — on several occasions, he borrowed a car, assured us he would be home by 11, then came in some time the next morning… or afternoon. He’s been drinking when he doesn’t think we’ll notice, and generally not bothering to be helpful. I’m not sure what led to today’s fun, and I’m not sure I care to know. I do know that he’d gotten paid (at least partially) for a job he’d done a while back; he waved the $50 bill at me, but neglected to tell Mrs. Fetched that he had it. He got a check from somewhere else (Big V?) and he and Mrs. Fetched went to deposit it. On a whim, she asked for a balance and he had $10 (when there should have been $150 in there) — he’d been withdrawing it for whatever he spends his money on, and so Mrs. Fetched was already a bit miffed. Finding out he had the $50 didn’t help matters any, and she was already loading up to shoot the messenger when I pointed out that this was the first chance I’d had to tell her about it.

I was working in the bedroom, door closed to keep the background noise down. As I was about to get up to fix myself a sandwich, Mrs. Fetched screamed, “GET OUT!” The Boy yelled something I didn’t catch, then went outside through the garage. I got up to see what was going on.

Mrs. Fetched was still pretty worked up: for reasons unknown, The Boy used the “B-word” on her. “He’s outta here,” she said. “I’ve had it with his crap.” (Well haven’t we all?)

Not much to do about the situation — I fixed myself a sandwich and took it back to my desk to eat and work. After eating, I went outside where The Boy was smoking and crying, and (as I sometimes do in these situations) attempted Clue Infusion. As always, CWoT. Nothing he does is wrong, everything I said was wrong, she’s deliberately provoking him, blah-dee blah-dee blah.

Example: “You shouldn’t have called her that,” I said. “Well, she was being one.”

I didn’t tell him this, but I found his response rather amusing. As we were packing up from Granny’s birthday party Sunday, I was not doing much because I didn’t know what to do.

Mrs. Fetched barked at me, “Stop acting like an idiot!” When I brought it up later, she said, “Well, you were acting like one.”

The Boy and Mrs. Fetched, two peas in a pod. They talked a little later, and she rescinded the involuntary TB01. But I think The Boy is ready to bail out on his own; we’re just cramping his style a little too much.

It’s so much fun to work at home sometimes.

Going dim

I probably won't be online much through the evenings this week. Check my Twitter box from time to time, though; I'll be “tweeting” from my smellphone. If I have a while, I’ll post something out of my phone, and if I get a couple free hours I’ll post the next episode of FAR Future this week.

Too Drunk to Type Straight

I'm going to bed. :-P

Just Stuff

The front page says Evil has a New Face, but it looks like the same ol’ evil face I’ve seen for years. However, the breakout game is quite entertaining — try it out and you’ll see why I say so. (No, I’m not one of the high scores. Yet.)

I woke up at 5:30 this morning, and ten minutes later realized I wasn’t getting back to sleep. I actually got to work on time for a change, and (even more amazing) left on time. I’m not much motivated to do much of anything today, besides play a silly breakout game, probably because of the early wake-up. Yahoo’s “Odd News” roundup for today was just packed with items that support my theory that reality is stranger than fiction. Some stuff you just can’t make up and be believable.

Stopping at the Burger King for a veggie burger combo on the way to choir practice, they bobbled my order and I was left standing for a while. Fortunately, I wasn’t in a hurry — I was busy cogitating on a holiday story I’ve been wanting to write for a couple of years — and I got a free pie and upsized onion rings out of it.

And now I’m going to flop into bed, if Mrs. Fetched doesn’t rope me into her slideshow roundup for her Granny’s 95^th birthday party this weekend…

FAR Future, Episode 13

Chilly outside tonight. Will covering the peppers keep them alive?

Hello to Randy Russell aka GhostFolk, who calls FAR Future “an incredibly dynamic way to use the internet.” (Hey, I don’t have a reviews page!)

Speaking of chills, let’s get back to the story…

---

Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Nothing Secedes Like Success

This is worse than election season. That, you could mostly get away from for a while — turn off the TV and radio, and you’re mostly in a campaign-free bubble. Since the Secession Question is also all over the net, and (at least here) dominates discussions even in the office (although the primary concern is whether we’ll all have to move north or not), I guess adding one more blog post to the general clutter isn’t going to push it over the edge.

The dividing line crosses both parties, the usual conservative/liberal divide, north and south, age, income, and just about everything else. Pollsters say beyond southern whites over age 60 (who are 2:1 pro-secession), southern blacks (uniformly against), and anyone under age 30 (2:1 against), there are no clear demographics for either side. The Gainesville paper did one of their “You Speak” columns on the topic; the arguments, both pro and con, can get amazingly silly. Bubba Something, pictured wearing a cap with a Confederate flag on it, said he was against it. “At least wait until football season is over,” he said. “The baseball leagues already play in Canada, so they have passports and they can work stuff out before the season starts.” I guess he doesn’t follow basketball or hockey. Then there was the kid with dreadlocks (but white) and a zillion piercings, who was for it “because we won’t have gas rationing anymore and we can cruise on Saturday nights again.” Lest you think the paper is going for the weirdest examples, they had an older lady who said, “Let’s keep this one nation under God, indivisible. Didn’t we learn anything from history?” and a businessman who said (and I agree), “Secession won’t make anything better. Our infrastructure is too integrated to just rip it all apart and draw boundaries.”

I can’t even get away from the question at FAR Manor. Mrs. Fetched has asked me a variation of the same question nearly every night for the last week: what are you going to do if we secede? She seems to think I’m going to pack my bags and bail for Michigan first thing… like we have enough gas allocations to do that. Sure, I’ve given it some serious thought, but right now I’m leaning toward sticking it out here on Planet Georgia. For one thing, she won’t leave her parents, and they barely leave the county anymore. For another, there’s a really good chance this whole thing is going to fizzle out either before it gets off the ground or shortly afterwards. Emotion rules the day today, but tomorrow people might start really thinking things over.

The talking heads are acting really weird now. It’s like their patrons had given them this idea to let people blow off steam about losing another election, but it got away from them so the marching orders are now to tamp it down. I’d guess Shotgun Sam is actually anti-secession, or he’s being told to be anti-, but most of his audience are pro- so he doesn’t have the nards to come out and say it. When you make a living being as politically outrageous as the FCC will allow, sitting on a fence doesn’t work well, and it’s showing. One of the chats was almost surreal yesterday afternoon: a caller was talking about “putting everything back the way it was supposed to be, before Martin Luther King stirred bleep up and all that.”

Sam stammered(!), “Um… y’know, you need to think about that. First, you don’t know if the union will split up or not. And even if it does, you’re talking about alienating a large group of people who already have a reason to mistrust you. You could provoke an uprising and give the other side a reason to invade — and all the guns you got aren’t gonna do much against what the Army and Air Force can throw at you.”

“Naw, naw, I ain’t talkin’ no Jim Crow. They can have their place, and we can have ours, and we jus’ stay outta each other’s bidness unless we both want to.”

“So you’re talking about a nation inside a nation that just split off from another nation?” I think Sam was trying to be funny, but it fell flat.

“I guesso, if you wanna look at it that way.”

Sam pried him off and went to a commercial right away, then when he came back he was on a completely different topic. When in doubt, change the subject.

Sam’s not the only one having second thoughts. After lots of demonstrations in Boise, and Coeur d'Alene nearly shut down with all the protests, the Idaho legislature is making noises about withdrawing their petition. The only surprise about Utah, though, is that they were a little slow to jump on the bandwagon. Looks like Idaho might give Utah their seat? The mountain West has hosted some of the strangest political shifts in the last 10 years or so, and you just can’t tell who’s going to do what if you don’t live there. The lower plains states (Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas) have secession bills in their state legi’s too, but not even Texas is really showing a lot of support for the idea. (Which is fantastic news, because there would have been a war over the oil fields.)

Vermont cracked me up though: they introduced a secession bill, and then even the guy who introduced it voted against it. I guess they wanted everyone else to know where they stood on the matter.

Sunday’s the day the “citizen’s militia musters.” I called some of the Atlanta stations and asked if they’d be interested in buying video, but they’re sending a crew. Oh well, if I don’t have to get up at 4a.m. that’s a Good Thing. It would have sucked royally if I’d gone down there to video a “division” of 4 or 5 people — the TV stations wouldn’t have bought that, and I would have gotten up for nothing. We’re supposed to have a hard freeze Sunday morning, so I plan and hope to be snug in bed then. With any luck, I won’t lie awake thinking about it.

continued…

Fire

And this is what’s left of my dad’s house. And the house next door. The house to the right caught fire first; fortunately Dad woke up before the fire spread over to his place. He was able to get out with his car, the checkbook, and the clothes he was wearing. The woman next door wasn’t so lucky; she got as far as the deck and that’s where they found her — I would guess she collapsed from smoke inhalation before she could get down the stairs and away. The fire investigators say they probably won’t ever figure out exactly what started the fire but ruled out arson.

Dad, is hoping the insurance company will hold off starting the replacement house until mid-March or so… building a house in Michigan, in winter, isn’t the brightest idea I’ve ever heard of anyway. Climate change may make it possible for people to think about building through the winter, but it still snows. But that hassle will come when it does, or not. Right now, I can rejoice that Dad's OK.

Weekend Cinema

I hope everyone enjoyed the October special — there’s a potload of films on archive.org, and not just horror, so we’ll still make an occasional trip over there from time to time.

But starting with today's Weekend Cinema, we’re returning to the usual fare of short (but still free!) video. This week’s selection is about a man who ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time, and a woman he meets along the way…

405: The Movie

(Bandwidth provided by Spike, you’ll have to get past a 15-second commercial. A friend sent me a WMV with the end credits cut off, which is how I “discovered” it in the first place.)

FAR Future, Episode 12

---

Friday, November 9, 2012
Election Rejection, What’s Your Secession

I’m shocked. Completely shocked.

NOT.

The 99 goplets left in the House are already calling themselves the “99 Percent’ers,” as if they’re fooling anyone. Then again, it worked for the Bolsheviks (“majority”) in 1918, when they were actually the minority. Not that I think it will work for them now. The Senate is in slightly better (for the wingies) shape, with 32 goplets left there… but they’re still working on a catchy name, I guess.

But if Wyoming and Idaho get their way, the 99 Percent’ers will lose a few members right away. The state legislatures must have had this “Petition for Dissolution” all planned ahead of time, because they were submitting it to Congress first thing yesterday morning. Smarmy SOBs anyway, blithering about how the federal government has abandoned them and irreconcilable differences and all that hoo-hah. It’s not exactly a united front on the Wrong Right — not even all the congresscritters in the affected states are on board, but some of the talk radio goobers are making it sound like the Second Coming. The Dems are similarly conflicted… some think cutting Idaho and Wyoming loose would help the budget (more tax dollars go in than come out), others don’t like the precedent. But it may come down to a matter of energy, like everything else does these days. Wyoming has some resources that the US can’t afford to just let go, and I guess both states have missile silos.

The prez’s press secretary suggests that it’s a ploy to get the feds negotiating for something or another, perhaps more reps in the House or more funding for this or that, but somehow I don’t think that’s the goal here. I really think they want to secede and create their own right-wing mountain paradise.

Rumors are flying everywhere: the prez has deployed the National Guard to seize control of coal mines in Wyoming and are positioning to “defend” the offshore platforms; southern governors are having a powwow to discuss “events of the last few days”… all of which have been officially denied, but you know how that goes, denials are just more fuel on the fire.

So I wrote all that because it provides the context for something that really has me spooked. Our allocations came in for the week, and I stopped on the way to work to top up. Someone had taped a stack of these flyers to the gas pump. The scan will be pretty hard to read, so here’s the text (misspellings left intact):

Calling all who LOVE FREEDOM

TO ARMS!

In these troubled times, we mourn the GREVIOUS LOSS of our AMERICAN FREEDOMES, as “our” government has SYSTEMATICALY REMOVED our INALIENABLE RIGHTS and LIBERTIES!

THEREFORE, we call upon ALL GOOD SONS OF THE SOUTH to support the RIGHTOUS WORK of our STATE LEGISLATURE as they debate the MERITS of SUCCESSION from these formerly United States.

On SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 18TH, we ask all ABLE-BODYED MEN to TAKE UP ARMS, meet at the Courthouse by 6 a.m., and MARCH TO ATLANTA to LEND OUR SUPPORT to our TRUE REPRESENATIVES in the Capital!

Please bring sufficient FOOD, WATER, and BEDDING for the march! We shall join with LIKE-MINDED MEN along the way and form the GEORGIA CITIZENS MILITIA to REPEL ALL ATTACKS AGANST OUR SOVERIN GOVERMENT!

If you are unable to march, but wish to LEND YOUR AID, we will have limited TRANSPORTATION on Monday afternoon.

I hope these guys are blowing hot air. Wait: actually, I hope these guys raise an army of about 30 people and half of them “desert” on the march to Atlanta. You’ll know something more as soon as I do.

continued…

Writing, Music, Movies

If you’re following my Twitter feed, you saw that Asimov’s rejected my poem. There were a couple of odd aspects: it arrived about 3 weeks before I expected, and it sure doesn’t look like a form letter (which the submission guidelines led me to expect) — it was signed by hand, or at least with a machine (you can see the indent on the back), instead of the signature being printed. If it’s in fact a form letter, it’s extremely well-done. Kind of makes it hard to follow my original strategy of nailing it to the wall & giving it the finger when I sit down to write. I’m seeing mixed signals, and am probably putting too much effort into interpreting things: but the quick turnaround suggested it got whacked pretty quick, while the letter’s content suggested it might have breached the slush pile but got cut in the second round. Meh. I’ll just move on.

Speaking of moving on, I finished the “Crash and Burn” edit, which now has the working title “Old Guy” (“Road Trip 2058” left me clammy). I printed it out last night and handed it to The Boy. He’s looking through it slowly, but likes what he sees so far. Will he figure out that Old Guy is him at age 70? There are plenty of hints in the story. If he has any thoughts for improvement, I’ll make them if I agree, then let it age for a month or so. I know of a couple of things that need to be smoothed out, but I just can’t figure out how to do it yet.

We were out and about over the weekend, and I picked up Family Force 5’s “Business Up Front/Party in the Back [Diamond Edition]” CD. This is one of the bands they play on TheBlast.FM, and they’re from suburban Atlanta. It’s an odd rap/metal/techno fusion, with a bit of Christian influence, turned up to 11. This is music to dance by, not to write by, and I get a big grin out of it (if not LOL outright at tracks like “Drama Queen”). The Boy would probably enjoy it as well; he likes Skillet, who is on the same label (Gotee) as FF5 and will be my next CD purchase (“Comatose”). If you want to hear some of their stuff, they have a MySpace page (of course they do, what musicians don’t these days?), and freegotee.com has some downloads if you sign up.

Last night was going to be dedicated to finishing the next episode of FAR Future, but Mrs. Fetched started faux-whining about not having anyone to watch “We Are Marshall” with her until I gave up. I pointed out that the last two times I tried to watch a movie at the manor, the phone rang, it was for me, and the girls continued to watch the movie without me… and I really wasn’t in the mood to watch just half of yet another movie. She promised to let the phone ring w/o answering it — although when it did ring, The Boy answered it instead. Fortunately, it was for her, and she paused the movie (and that’s when I printed out the story and gave it to The Boy). As for the movie, it’s very familiar territory if you’ve seen “Remember the Titans” — replace a high school going through integration pains in the 60s with a small college trying to rebuild after a plane crash killed the team and the entire athletic department in the 70s, and go from there. Marshall didn’t have a miracle season (it was based on a true story), but the movie ends on a high note with their first win.

I’ll try to wrap up the FAR Future episode and post it tomorrow night. Here’s a teaser: for the first time, a FAR Future episode includes a graphic. It’s going to be a little scary too, even if it isn’t about Hallowe’en. Speaking of which, Daughter Dearest is out trick-or-treating (at age 18, shameless :-). Here’s hoping you have a safe and fun night!

All a-Twitter

You may have noticed that I’ve added a Twitter box to the sidebar… the site seems to be pretty slow this evening, so if it doesn’t load right away it’s not your connection. If you’re on Twitter, let me know and I’ll add you to my “follow” list. (I’m FARfetched58 if you want to “follow” me.)

I reserve the right to jump to Jaiku, if I decide I like it better. ’Course, I won’t be able to make that decision until Google sends me an invite…

Must be Deer Season

Someone nearby is getting rid of his ammo, at 9pm no less. Almost sounds like Baghdad out there.

I started hunting up rock for the patio this afternoon. I found several rocks of a good size & shape (flat, a couple inches thick, small enough to handle) and several huge chunks. I guess I’ll have to borrow a tractor from the in-laws to get them up to the backyard. One of them will need the tractor just to unearth — I figure it has to weigh close to 500 lbs all by itself. I'll have to bust those big ones up, but if I can split them properly I might not need any more rock.

And if I do, finding rock on Planet Georgia is like finding water in a lake.

Weekend Cinema

Wrapping up the October horror series, I’ll have to admit that I picked this one for the name: The Brain that Wouldn’t Die

(No, not Karl Rove — that would be horrendous, not horror.)

A Rainy Night on Planet Georgia

…with a pretty good chance it’s going to do this all week. Here’s hoping SoCal gets some really soon.

We went to video Daughter Dearest’s chorus (and two other choirs) tonight; the occasion being a 150^th anniversary commemoration for the county. Good thing I worked at home today, because we had to get there before 6 and I often don’t leave the office before then.

We’ve learned that the best place for shooting video in the school is up above the crowd. Fortunately, the front office is like a building within the building, and we can haul our cameras up on the (inside) roof to do our dirty work. Nobody walking in front of us (haven’t seen anyone levitating, anyway), but we still pick up the babies squawking. If and when we shake out some extra money, I have a shopping list for audio equipment.

Mrs. Fetched asked me to get crowd shots toward the end of each song. I’m looking forward to seeing her reaction when she sees the closeup of the young woman who ate a piece of dessert, then showed it to her little brother.

A Weekend Roundup

Earlier in the week, The Register coughed up a rather interesting article. I had a good laugh, then was inspired (if that’s the word) to write a poem on the subject. I decided that Asimov’s might print it, so I let it sit for a few days, made a few tweaks, and got it in the mail (before I lost my nerve). On the way back from the post office, it occurred to me that I ought to revamp the Crash and Burn story for a wider audience, and send that in too. I’ll tackle that this week. If nothing else, I’ll have a rejection letter or two I can tack to the wall in Studio FAR and give the finger to each time I go in there to write.

The septic tank is starting to get full again. At least it went almost a year this time. Mrs. Fetched is going to call the kaka-pumper tomorrow. I’m thinking of re-routing all the non-toilet drains to a garden area… we can use the water twice and that should take the load off the septic tank. Seeing how much cut basil and other herbs cost in the supermarket, a small herb farm might be a pretty decent way to put some of our acreage to use.

With more rain coming in tomorrow, and possibly staying on through most of the week (hooraayyyyyy!!!) I figured I’d better put new wiper blades on the Civic. Then I got tired of looking at the dangling windshield washers, which broke off when The Boy put it in a ditch last year, and got some new ones. Of course, I snapped off a stem when bolting it down, so I took them off and exchanged them this afternoon. Actually, I like the new ones better anyway. Finally, I got the idle adjusted (it was way too low). So now I’m ready to drive in the rain.

The homebrew is starting to mature. Maybe another week. But I need alcohol now…

UPDATES: I can’t believe I forgot these.

This video (“Slam” by Pendulum) was one of the funniest things I saw all week. The music is wicked good too, if you like drum&bass. The album is on iTunes, so if I can’t find it at the store I’ll be grabbing this one for sure.

The in-laws have a muscadine vine that climbs really high. Like 12 feet. I grabbed their big stepladder & got a gallon or so. They have red & white ones growing together; the white ones are little sweeter but the reds are more numerous and have a bit more complex flavor. Muscadines are like the sunflower seeds of fruit: you do a lot of spitting (skins are tough and bitter, and they have seeds) so it’s definitely an outdoor snack. I spent a little quality time out front distributing seeds and skins around the edge of the dropoff to the road.

FAR Future, Episode 11

Starting with this episode, the “exactly five years from today” setting is going away. The future moves at its own speed, after all.

---

Tuesday, October 30, 2012
October Surprises

Not much of one, really. There are so many foreclosures in the works that even some bankers (anonymously) expressed relief that the Foreclosure Moratorium Act went through. The same goplets tried the throw the same roadblocks as always, but what do they have to lose? They’ve been toast for several years, and in two weeks they’ll be burnt toast.

That talking heads haven’t even said boo about it, which (seeing that it’s Hallowe’en tomorrow) is hardly sporting. I guess they realize that FMA is wildly popular among just about everyone, and talking about it is only going to be a distraction. Thus, they’re still pounding the fraud angle on gas rationing, and claiming selective enforcement when their own get dinged for it. The thing that got me worried, though, was earlier this week when Shotgun Sam was talking to a caller whining about yet another goplet blowout on the way. “Don’t worry about it,” Sam said. “We’ll win either way.” Then he changed the subject.

What was that about?

I don’t think they could pull off election fraud on the scale it would take to shift more than a couple of districts, but a whole state? Enough states to swing the electoral college? Not likely. I wonder if it has anything to do with those “Dixie Shall Rise” stickers I’ve been seeing on road signs and gas pumps lately.

Are the wingies planning an armed coup? Frankly, the thought prompted me to think about taking a couple weeks of vacation up north after the election. But goobers are everywhere, even if they’re not numerous in most places (Planet Georgia being an unfortunate exception). Mrs. Fetched thinks we’ll be better off staying put, since they won’t feel threatened where they’re the majority. Maybe. She also said that even if I’m right, we don’t know when things go pear-shaped — it could be next month, it could be January, or even later.

It could be some kind of secession movement. Some state reprehensible candidates started pushing this “new majority” theme last week. I spent some time trying to figure out what that meant — nobody’s crazy enough to think the goplets will have more than 100 reps in the House next year, or 20 Senators, let alone get a majority. (Except, of course, the delusional dude they have running for Prez that claims he’ll carry 40 states and 67% of the popular vote.) On Planet Georgia, of course, the legislature has been a majority for 10 or 12 years, so there’s nothing “new” about that. Unless (again) they’re plotting an overthrow, secession is the only thing I can think of that would create some kind of new majority — and I don’t think you can let that many people in on a plot to overthrow the government without someone spilling the beans. Of course, if they do try pulling something like that, Shotgun Sam’s little outburst back in late August will get him a lot of unwanted attention — he could be doing his show from a jail cell (which would be kind of fun to listen to).

Secession would bring its own problems, though, and energy would top the list. I doubt that the government would let, say, the Texas/Louisiana oil fields go without a fight. Then there’s the question of electrical supply; the grids might tie us together more tightly than the politics. Families scattered in different places, Internet links, phone links… what a mess it would be.

Wow, talk about a digression. The Foreclosure Moratorium is supposed to give people some breathing room. Home“owners” have to put their houses up for sale to avoid foreclosure, they avoid bankruptcy, and the bank sets the minimum acceptable price (although the loan-holder supposedly gets to negotiate with the bank about that). Some banks have been re-negotiating loan terms to give the buyer enough breathing room to pay the loan — the bank eats some unrealized income that they wouldn’t have gotten, and get a performing loan on the books — but some have refused to change their procedures & would up holding a ton of crumbling houses they can’t unload. Sure, if the economy ever recovers they’ll have a bunch of valuable acreage, but that in itself is a gamble. I think the FMA will push them to start taking a more reasonable line… and keep those banking execs from getting shot at or worse.

continued…

Weekend Cinema (October horror continues!)

Long ago, CATV brought wonders of programming that we didn’t get on the Grand Rapids or Kalamazoo stations — like the South Bend UHF station that ran the “Double Creature Feature” on Saturday nights. The Screaming Skull was one of the scarier movies they showed — so it seemed at the time. Looking at the description, I wasn’t even sure it was the same movie until the first scene… nobody ever got that hokey before or since…

Enjoy! I recommend a fine wine, perhaps Thunderbird or Mad Dog 20/20, to go with this cinematic cheese.