I Took A Covid Compliance Test

 Results?

1.  Gotten a Covid test?  PCR test.....zero.  The cheapo mini-test?  Probably over forty occasions...none ever positive.

2.  Worn a mask?  OH YEAH.  The Germans hyped this to the max.

3.  Been vaxed?  Yes.

4.  Been vaxed twice?  Yes.

5.  Never walked opposite the Covid arrows in the store?  To be honest, never paid attention to them....I probably walked the wrong path over 300 times.

6.  Kept family away?  No.

7.  Been upset at unmasked people?  No, not really.  I might have spent 8 seconds praying for them.

8.  Driven with a mask on in the car?  NO. 

9.  Waited in a three-hour line?  HELL NO.  Even when Covid did not exist....I refused to wait for anything longer than 30 minutes.  I just don't have patience like that.

10.  Cancelled an event?  No.

11.  Stayed indoors for a week?  My max is maybe 48 hours of indoor activity (mostly because of weather).  

12.  Sprayed groceries or wiped them?  NO.

13.  Posted some social media about a positive test?  NO.

14.  Believed what I was told by the authorities or media?  Well....in the first 30 days...100-percent belief.  By day 90, I'd say my skepticism level was maxing at a '5' (scale of 1-to-10). By day 200, my skepticism level was maxing near a '8'.  

15.  Wearing the same mask more than 40 hours?  I kept one mask in my jacket pocket for all of 2021, using the same one for probably 160 hours (when in stores or riding the bus).  Effective nature?  Probably near zero by the half-way point.  I'm pretty sure that 20-percent of all men did the same thing.

How Did We Get Stuck With The FBI?

 For a number of decades (at the beginning).....we didn't really need to worry about crime crossing state lines.  It probably existed, but with a warrant from some county judge, you as a county sheriff/deputy...could cross the border and apprehend the suspected criminal.

Around the 1850 period, we had a new category to developed....called the 'Pinkerton-Men'.

This was a commercial group of folks who served two purposes.....detectives and private security guards.  You could make the case that railway traffic and related crime brought them about. 

The federal government procuring their services?  Yes.  In 1861, Lincoln hired them, to provide services during the war.

For about forty years, the Pinkerton-Men were a organization that were commercial in nature, with federal powers granted to them.

In 1908, the federal government decides to take the basic idea of the Pinkerton-Men and form the FBI.  

Can we exist today without the FBI?  I would say mostly 'no'.  Because of the terror business, and cross-state-line crimes....you need some type of agency to handle these.  

Could the US Marshalls perform half the functions of the FBI?  That's continually brought up, and probably worth a long review.  

Domestic terrorism requiring a dedicated force?  That's also continually debated, and one could imagine the US Marshalls handling the bulk of this mission.  

Once we reach 2024, I would imagine a whole year will be spend in disassembling the FBI...into something of a compact nature, with the US Marshalls likely to gain more purpose and missions.  

Quote

 "Equity as a concept says recognize that everyone has the same capacity, but in order for them to have equal opportunity to reach that capacity, well, we must pay attention to this issue of equity."

-- VP Harris, yesterday

What it means?  

I have no idea.  Maybe someone has a bucket or box of extra equity to handout when some folks get short on things.

I will state this as a fact....people don't all have the same capacity.  You can't arrange this outcome.  

Five Things I Now Believe

 1.  People who wear Covid-masks these days....on the annoy-scale (1-to-10)....are typically '8' or more.  

2.  Liz Cheney will lose her primary election by 20-plus points.  Here's the thing....if she'd avoided the Jan-6 hearing business....it might have been only a five-point loss.  She really didn't see the 'train' approaching in her level of stupidity.

3.  The crowd who came in and invested in ZOOM....basically have to accept that half the money is gone, and probably will never get that portion back....unless some idiot company like Google buys them.

4.  NY City probably will hire a bus to take 40 migrants back to Texas.  Upon arrival at the border of Arkansas....I expect the Rangers to be standing there....pulling the bus over, and asking for an ID....forcing them to stay in Arkansas.  At that point, Arkansas will hire a bus, and return the forty to NY City.

5.  In 2024's West Virginia senator election.....I don't think Joe Manchin will win.

Ten Things They Did Find In Trump's Vault

 1.  He had the agreement between Eisenhower and the aliens in the vault.

2.  He held the 40th book (unpublished) from the Old Testament....all in Latin....describing the end of the world, and some guy named Hunter in the middle of things.

3.  He had a Bigfoot claw.

4.  He had seven-hundred 'get-out-of-jail' tokens from Long Island.

5.  He held Obama's actual real original birth certificate.

6.  He had the original Death-Star plans.

7.  He had a coffee cup with 'Holy Grail' on the side.

8.  He had the sword from Jon Snow in Game of Thrones.

9.  He had a birthday card from Hillary Clinton (from 1998).

10.  He had a hammer and wooden stake (to be used for vampires).  

Five Skills For Life

 There are five skills that you ought to have by age 30:

1.  You ought to be able to read through a ten-page summary, and be able a eight-line summary of value.  In simple terms....the simple facts.  

2.  You ought to have sense of seeing through chaos, and point the path to some positive outcome.

3.  You should sense the nature of those around you, and if they are 'nuts', or likely to lead you into trouble.

4.  You ought to be able comprehend matters enough.....to say this is false, and this is true.

5.  You ought to have enough wit about your daily affairs, that you aren't offended by some criticism.  If it's false criticism....you ought to be able to repel it upon the other party.

A Math Story

 I noticed this story coming up from San Francisco.

This revolves around fourth-graders who sat in a math class and were given this problem: If you have 14 stickers and desire to give three to each friend, how many friends will get stickers?

The kids were frustrated and didn't see any outcome.  

The true answer?  ONLY four friends would get stickers, and you'd have 2 stickers left in your hand at the end.

Now, my brother (the electrical engineer) would have answered....none of his friends care for some damn stickers.....so he'd just keep the stickers.  Maybe down the road, with enough stickers....he'd trade them for some magic beans at the local co-op.  

Others might have answered that they'd come to some agreement in selling the stickers for a nickel each, and made 70 cents.

Still others would have answered that the final two left-over stickers should be cut-up and given out as partial stickers.  

The purpose of this stupid math problem....a discussion in the distribution cycle...nothing more than that.  It's not really a defined end (x plus y must equal z).

It's a love-hate relationship with math.  You need some math skills to survive in life.  The majority of us probably need a max of 8th-grade math for the requirements in life.  A few us need Einstein-like skills.  

With word problems....the hate view outweighs the love view.  I had some 9th grade math instructor who gave out a 5 question quiz, all worked up in word problems.  He figured we'd all be done in 20 minutes.  Most were still working on this at the ring of the bell....sixty minutes later.  

Even now....two weeks after this stupid sticker problem, there's probably a dozen kids still have math-PTSD issues and worried that more intense sticker problems will be given to them in September.