If you’re in the market for five shirts (say, to donate to your local homeless shelter or something), today’s Woot is for you. Five random sport shirts for $13 ($7.99 + $5 shipping). As for me, I’d just as soon not even have to wear a shirt today (at the risk of looking like a refugee from COPS, except I’m not drunk), ‘cuz it’s already hot. They’ve revised their forecast for today, and are predicting a high of 100°. A great day to not have to go to work (but then, what day isn’t?).

I’m having doubts that Granny would be able to protect me from a potential shaving cream pie attack (not that she wouldn’t be willing; I just don’t think she has the cat-like reflexes of Rupert Murdoch’s wife), so I’m looking at getting myself an Asian bride who’s 40 years younger than I am. However, in doing the math, it occurred to me that that would make her 10 years old. That just might, possibly, be slightly on the disgusting side (unlike the Wendi/Rupie nuptial situation, which of course doesn’t make the mockery of the institution of marriage that, say, two dudes who love each other would).

However, I think I have a solution (and maybe this is what Rupert did). If you wait ’til you’re an old fart, I’m reckoning that a young woman is pretty expensive to hook up with and, let’s face it, I just aint gonna have Rupert Murdoch’s money. So why not just adopt a Chinese (or a Hispanic or African-American) kid now? From what I understand, if they aren’t white and aren’t babies, you can get a pretty good deal on one (plus, if they’re a little bit older, you can put ’em to work right away).

So I’m thinking I can not only retire early, but will have somebody to take care of me in my old age.

Sadly, there might be some legal issues to work through (damn government regulation; why not let the free market work the way it’s supposed to?) none of that will help me right away. So I guess that means I’ve gotta go to work.

Stay cool.

It’s really, really quiet around here now. Quiet enough to be kind of depressing. Strange, I hadn’t expected to feel sad about that. Go figure. Maybe it’s just because it’s back to work again today.

Yesterday was kind of cool here – at least relative to how things have been lately. It didn’t even hit 90°. That’ll change today, of course. Not that we’re complaining, of course, because it’s a lot worse in other places (as OKat mentioned yesterday). Not only is it too damn hot down there, but it’s also very dry. In fact, as I heard on NPR yesterday, they are neck and neck with the 1933 record for the least amount of rain. That era, you may recall, is rather well known for a famous football game called ‘The Dust Bowl.’

Good luck to y’all. I hope there’s some relief for you soon. I’d pray for you, but I’m sure when it comes to talking to God, you don’t need any help from an East Coast Heathen Librul like me (assuming being almost 300 miles inland qualifies as being on the coast, that is).

Today, our munchkins are going away. A sad day for us, but a happy day for the critters who are quite unsure about these noisy little people. Sad, too, in that the Space Shuttle will be undocking from the ISS for the last time today, in preparation for its final return to Earth on Thursday (weather permitting). It’s also sad because this is my last day off, and I have to go to work tomorrow (this, clearly, is the saddest development by a long shot).

On the bright side, I got my computer parts yesterday, and crammed everything into the case, though I decided not to fire it up as it was getting on towards night time, and I didn’t want to get myself all aggravated right before bed (nothing like blowing up your new motherboard to ruin a good night’s sleep). So we’ll see if it boots up later on today.

For those of you with critters, I will give a tip of the hat to a little company called Little City Dogs. I was turned on to them by my sister. You can by dog and cat wormer for tape worms (Praziquantel) – beef flavored for the doggies, chicken flavored for the kitties, vanilla flavored liquid wormer (Pyrantel Pamoate) for hookworms, roundworms & pinworms, and Nitenpyram (for killing adult fleas while your Frontline or Advantage has a chance to work). By comparison, store bought Nitenpyram (Capstar) set me back $45 for six (unflavored) pills. Little City? $15 for 14 beef flavored pills – including shipping.

The come via first class mail from the Bronx, and the company was created by a single mom who raises Papillons, and who got tired of getting screwed on the price of meds. And she takes Pay Pal. I ordered some on Friday, and it came on Monday. Sadly, they sent me the wormer by accident, but when I e-mailed her, she told me to keep the wormer, and she was sending out 2 things of the flea stuff for my trouble.

So, anyhow, that’s my testimonial.

Alright, time for more coffee, and to try not to think about work tomorrow. Don’t forget to see if they make old Rupert squirm today (my guess, not so much and, anyway, squirming is natural for a slimy snake).

Seems to be another one of those days when I woke up with someone else’s blues, despite the fact that I not only don’t have to go to work today, but I don’t even have to go to work tomorrow. When I got up at 4:00 or so, the moon was (mostly) full, it was still close to 80° out, and I decided I might as well drink my coffee in the pool. The pump is off at night, so the only sound was the wind rustling through the trees, and the bats were swooping around silently gobbling up bugs. An extraordinarily nice way to start the day.

If you’ve ever been invaded by a 4 and 2-year-old, you perhaps can appreciate how nice the silence was. Or is. I’m still the only creature stirring here (though the cows over yonder sound a bit restless now that it’s daylight). The bats have gone to sleep for the day, and even the dogs have stayed in bed this morning. I may just have to go jump back into the water.

But, sadly, the day dawns, and clouds and sprinkles have moved in.

Yesterday, I responded to a tractor emergency, as my friend John found what has to be the only mud left in the County (seeing as it hasn’t rained in quite a while), and got his tractor stuck – really, really, really stuck. Fortunately, he has another tractor, but broke a couple of chains and a strap trying to pull it out (needing a great deal of length, so as not to get the second tractor stuck). So I went over with a long strap that I had, and between pulling and getting the farm jack underneath it and throwing 2x4s and anything else we could find under the wheels, he was eventually able to drive it out of there.

It was fun for me, because it wasn’t my tractor.

Sadly, on the way home, one of my idiot lights lit up. I thought it looked like the little oil can light, and, as everyone knows, once that one comes on, you pretty much need to stop right there. So I kept on driving. No pressure gauge on that car, so I had no idea if I was out of oil or what. Turns out, no. The oil was fine, and, upon further review, it was the ‘Malfunction Indicator Light’ (which I’m guessing is something like the Korean translation of “Check Engine.” So, I put my code reader on it this morning, and it appears to be something to do with the O₂ sensor (a “slow response”). Which, in the scheme of things, is a lot better than driving with no oil.

So, anyway, I took the gas cap off and put it back on, then reset the code. The light is off for now, but we’ll see what happens when I drive it.

Now I guess it’s time for a swim. Or a nap. Just not both at the same time.

Here’s something we’re not used to around here: yesterday, according to Accuweather, Syracuse was the hottest spot in NY State, coming in at 91° And today is supposed to be both hotter, and more humid. I’ll try and remember this come January when I’m sitting out on the tractor plowing snow and kicking myself in the ass for not building a cab for it over the summer. For now, I’ll just enjoy the fact that the tractor is getting a well-deserved rest, as I think we’ve had about a tenth of an inch of rain in the past month or so, and the grass is not only not growing, but it’s getting downright crunchy. This seems to bum some people out, but it doesn’t bother me one bit. The less I have to cut it, the better (though it’s decidedly much more fun than using your standard walk-behind mower).

The deer flies seem to have reached their peak (at least I hope this is the peak, ‘cuz if they get any worse, I’m gonna have to wrap the dogs – and my head – in duct tape). There are bugs that are just pests, and then there are bugs that I just plain detest (which kinda rhymes. Cool). Deer flies are on the “detest” list (along with black flies; mosquitoes do not even come close), and I not only want to see them all dead – I want them to suffer. I know, that’s not very nice, but, hey, it’s just how it is.

Having grown up with old people, the poor dogs are not used to having noisy little high-pitched stomping munchkins around the house (they seem to be rather unsure as to just what the hell they are, other than some sort of demonic, little two-legged critters). Fritz, especially, is terrified of them, and has been hiding behind me at the sound of their approach. Poor fella.

Oh well, I wonder if Maron’s politically incorrect statements from Realtime the other night will make it to Fux News today. Funny how you can call for the murder of a “baby killer” doctor, put crosshairs on the faces of congresscritters that need to be “eliminated,” and suggest that if people would only hurry up and die, there’d be no Federal Budget deficit. but if you say something about a repressed gay man taking out his pent-up agression and self-loathing by angrily f*cking is wife, Michelle Bachmann, well, by golly, you’re goddamned (literally) depraved.

I forgot to mention this yesterday, but it was 30 years ago that Harry Chapin died on the Long Island Expressway in a rather spectacular, fiery crash at the far-too-young age of 38 (on his way, typically, to give a free concert). I hope it’s not insensitive of me to suggest that, if Harry had to die in a car accident, it shouldn’t have happened on the LIE, but on Route 81 on the hill that leads to Scranton, Pennsylvania. So many great songs in such a short lifetime. Makes me wonder why this God fella would do shit like that (you’d think maybe if He was gonna kill Harry, maybe he coulda spread a little of that talent around to, say, me.

First, they cancel Men of a Certain Age. Then, I sit down this morning to watch the series finale of Friday Night Lights, and a goddamn baseball game was on for, like, the first 10 minutes or so. Not just a baseball game, but the friggin’ Yankees. Consequently, I didn’t get to see the end of the series finale. It better goddamn well be on the Internet or on-demand. At least nothing screwed up my recording of Real Time, and it was nice to see Maron get a break and be on the show (though I’d like to see him on “the panel” one of these days).

Anyhow, after suffering through a miserable five day week, I now have a four-day weekend. As usual, I already don’t wanna go back to work, but I reckon I better, ‘cuz I finally broke down and ordered some parts to build myself a new computer. I’d rather have thrown my money away on a tablet, of course. That way, I could add it to the pile on the table next to “my” chair (it would piled atop the MacBook, which is piled atop the Inspiron, ever-ready to be pressed into service when the MacBook decides to flip out). But I really need something I can work on.

Since I already have a perfectly good (and rather monstrous) full-sized case packed with hard drives and DVD drives and whatnot, I opted to order a new motherboard, Athlon Phenom Quad-Core CPU (almost went with the 6-core, but the difference in price was about $70-$80, and I of course already regret cheaping out), and 8 gigs of RAM. I also “need” dual displays, and, rather than have something mismatched, I decided to get a second 23″ widescreen to match the one I already have, and all that still came in at about $450, which is pretty much cheaper than a tablet that I don’t really need.

So that’ll give me something to do on Monday if I get bored.

First off, this is really cool (though it would be better with an Android tablet). While there, I noticed this story about a new “porn-only” search engine that’s set to launch. Good thing, too, because it’s so darn difficult to find porn on the Internet. I also wonder how many requests to do people’s voicemail messages this guy has now gotten (and how soon can he do mine? Eat your heart out, Carl Kasell). I just got done watching Jesse Jackson on KO. I get a kick out of Jesse, ‘cuz listening to him reminds me of Bald Headed John from the Zappa classic, “Dong Work for Yuda.” I know, I know. I’ve gotta lotta chootspah saying a thing like that.

I’m getting to the point where I really need to bite the bullet and build myself a new computer. My “good” desktop is just getting way too old and slow. I mean, I think it’s, like 8 years old now, which is something like 80 in “tech” years. Like.

I don’t really want to spend the money, but I need something I can work on while watching HBO GO so I can catch up on Treme before I watch the finale that I recorded.

But first, you know, off to work.

Not only do I have to go to work today (which, it goes without saying, sucks), and not only am I the designated support “schmuck” for our team this week (which of course makes a sucky week even suckier), and not only is the person who knows everything out on on maternity leave, but my team leader and his counterpart in our “sister” team are both out today and tomorrow, leaving me, basically, hanging me out to dry if anything goes wrong (and shit always goes wrong. So today’s just plain gonna suck. But not as much as tomorrow, because shit always goes wrong on Fridays at about 4:55. Oh boy.

Our house has been visited by the pitter-patter of little feet. OK, well, their feet are actually too big to pitter-patter – it’s more like slap-slap-stomp-stomp-stomp. But, anyway, my stepdaughter and the grandkids came in last night. I heard them, but as it was something like midnight, I couldn’t quite drag myself out of bed to say hello (that is way, way past my bedtime). Should be good for the dogs – they like having company (especially the kind that drops a lot of food). Everything’s quiet, now (too quiet, one might say), but I expect to run into them at some point over the next week or so. Not this morning, I’m sure, as it’s an early day for me, and I’ll no doubt be long gone and at work before these creatures are stirring. Speaking of creatures, I reckon I’d better go and check the pool for critters. Dead varmints floating around would probably make a bad impression on the kids (though it would give them something to take back to Alaska to remember us by).

Got my good, life-affirming (and preserving) deed for the day in already. As I went to roll up the solar cover on the pool, I noticed a little critter hanging out in one of the folder-over areas. Appeared to be a mole. So, I had to finagle him into the net and then back out again (which turned out to be the hard part). He was a little soggy, but otherwise no worse for the wear, and he scampered away. Let’s hope the little dummy learned his lesson (and posts a warning on his Facebook page – “stay away from the sea-ment pond). Now I can go to work confident that I’ve done my small part to make the world a better place for rodents.

And in that way, I feel kinda like Barack Obama, because he seems to be doing everything in his power (which appears to be negligible, at least to his apologists) to protect and defend rats like John Boehner and Mitch McConnell. Oh, I know what you’re thinking. Mitch McConnell is a turtle, not a rodent. Fair enough, but he’s a mutant turtle with rodent-like tendencies. In fact, I’d go so far as to say he is a rat in turtle clothing. Or shell.

Anyhow, the point is that our President (love him, hate him, proud of him, or just a wee bit disappointed in him) has done more to resurrect and empower the down-and-out, headed-to-the-same-place-in-history-as-the-Whig Party Republicans than Fux News and the Wall Street Journal combined. Um, well, come to think of it, Fux News and the WSJ are more or less combined these days. But, whatever.

And for that (and for President Romney/Bachmann/Palin, and for the impending cuts to Social Security and raising the Medicare age – imagine, there was a time when some fools actually thought this Socialist Manchurian Kenyan Candidate would usher in the era of Medicare for all, and instead he appears ready to bargain it all away in order to protect tax cuts for billionaires and so, um, I guess so Republicans will be nice to him), we all owe him our enduring gratitude.

Quite a list of accomplishments for a one-and-done President. George “The First” Bush will ever be known for “read my lips,” but Obama will be known for “aw, c’mon guys. Please?“.

Oh well, off to work, which I once thought perhaps I could get out of in another 14 years or so, but which I now figure I’ll have to do until I drop dead. Or win the lottery. Whichever comes first.

BREAKING NEWS FROM GOOD MORNING AMERICA: It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity. :omg: