Monthly Archives: July 2022

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random thoughts of the day

1) I’m on extended travel, and for the first time in my life (I’ve stayed in hundreds of hotels) I bailed. I didn’t expect five star anything, the price was the point. But when the room is clearly not cleaned and bugs greet you at the room door, it’s time to bail. The poor clerk up front totally understood, I guess this happens a lot. She did everything right, and then told me to complain to the company. As in, not her boss, who it’s quite clear doesn’t care. She probably hates going to work. I can sympathize. The problem is I’m well compensated for my day job misery, whereas she is not. Be kind to service workers, in 98% of the case they make less than you and suffer for the privilege.

2) Muhammad bin Salman is proving to the planet that money matters. And he has a lot of it. So he can buy out crass golfers, get Biden to grovel, and now is doing the same to a recently legislatively impotent Macron. This guy didn’t just murder a man, he had him dismembered and melted in acid. He’s a monster. Yet he knows the same thing that Putin knows, that Xi knows, which is that significant portions of the West are for sale. You just have to pay the right price. I was in Boston yesterday and they had a Miller Lite ad at street level with one of the LIV sell outs. A person had scrawled in sharpie next to his face “Saudi Blood Money”. Yep.

3) Speaking of selling out, Brittney Griner will eventually get home, because the Biden administration did what the West does. They caved to most of Russia’s demands. Only on Ukraine does the West show strength against a country that has a GDP close to Spain’s (one of 27 EU nations). And Vlad is just buying time until he hopes the alliance cracks (see Italy’s upcoming election). But to me the question becomes, why was Griner in Russia anyways? Easy: $. It’s why golfers play for LIV. I’m just gonna go ahead and say this, if you’re an athlete or business person, or even just a tourist: If you go to Russia, or China, or about a half dozen other places on the planet and they put you in jail as a political playing card? You deserve it. You asked for it. Don’t go to these places and then be shocked that you have no rights, your own government has very little power to help you, and the leaders of these nations spend human lives like currency. Just don’t go to them, it’s rather simple.

4) I’m traveling for the first time in years and it’s been great. I’m seeing so many sights, driving around, sometimes planned, other times random. It feels great. I missed it, more than I remembered. Get out there and make it happen. Explore, see neat things, talk to interesting people, live life.

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your Python wisdom for the day

The older I get the more I enjoy Monty Python in any form.  I guess that says something about the kind of person I’ve become.  Here was a quote from a Season 3 episode I saw last night which generated wry laughter from my brain:

We would like to apologize for the way in which politicians are represented in this programme.  It was never our intention to imply that politicians are weak-kneed political time-servers who are more concerned with their personal vendettas and private power struggles than the problems of government, nor to suggest at any point that they sacrifice their credibility by denying free debate on vital matters in the mistaken impression that party unity comes before the well-being of the people they supposedly represent, nor to imply at any stage that they are squabbling little toadies without an ounce of concern for the vital social problems of today.  Nor indeed do we intend that viewers should consider them as crabby ulcerous little self seeking vermin with furry legs and an excessive addition to alcohol and certain explicit sexual practices which some people might find offensive.

This was from 1972.  That means [tries to count years on fingers and toes; fails; reverts to pen and paper; realizes how garbage my math skills remain] this was from 50 years ago.  Not much has changed.  I wonder if it’s essentially always been like that without exception.  It’s a wonder we haven’t blown up the planet yet.  We somehow have always managed to muddle through.  That’s kind of neat.  Because we live here.