Hunkered down. Laying low. Keeping things tight until this darkness passes. But staying positive and knowing there is light on the other side. Feeling pretty good actually, all things considered. This is probably the longest stretch of time that I have not been on an airplane for 20 years or so. That’s a little weird, but it’s strangely okay for this nomad.
The goat is Pixie. She wandered in to Brian’s garage while he was working on our prototype. We took it as a sign from god that we were on to something divine. I asked Brian to speak with her handler and see if we can get a contract to incorporate Pixie into Earth Explore marketing. She’s beautiful and I can’t wait to meet her next weekend.
If all goes well, and the gods smile upon us, we should have a good working prototype this time next week. Brian has been working hard to get the manufacturing process tight and finalize design details. It’s getting exciting now.
Not a lot going on besides work-work and focusing on Earth Explore. I have work to do on the website and need to start some marketing materials. But really need pictures of the finished unit first. But also registering the business in the various states we think we will start in. Setting up all the banking etc. It all takes time.
I have been getting increasingly optimistic about the chances of EE getting some traction. There is definitely nothing like it on the market, especially at our price point. The main question is, what is the market like. As soon as we have a model done, I will start offering some discounted early editions to see how people react.
While it was probably apparent long before, there could be no question after November 3, 2016 that the world was fucked. It’s not possible now to even imagine how to outcrazy the crazies. Every day the papers are full of the lunatics, nearly all white and privileged or white and hillbilly, saying and doing stupid-ass shit.
After months of being assured that Hillary Clinton was a lock for president, of course the unthinkable happened. I was up all night that night, unable to quit checking the papers every 5 minutes as the bad news kept rolling in. I spoke to my sister around midnight. We texted again at 2 am and then again at 6, when it was all over. I texted all night with several other friends who also were shell-shocked and unable to sleep.
A few weeks later, I checked in on one of the websites which peddles all the crazy conspiracy theories. As expected, they are simply a digital equivalent of the grocery store checkout tabloids that are forever telling us that Cher is actually a Martian or that Dolly Parton runs a global mafia enterprise.
I have a friend, someone I once was close to many years ago, who believes all this nonsense. That Prince was killed by UK royal family. That 9/11 was masterminded by our own government. Sandy Hook never happened. George Sonos is the devil incarnated. Et al. But people seriously believes this shit. Lots of people–if polls are correct, somewhere between 42% and 48% are severely intellectually impaired. And those people unfortunately are allowed to vote. And procreate. How did we ever raise a generation of so many dummies?
I got into a vicious shouting match with a crazy woman on the Friday after the election at a nice restaurant in Columbus. I was with my little sister. My eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep and I was still suffering from the torturous clutches of PTSD. These two ladies sat at the bar next to us. They were around 40 and both dressed like white collar professionals. It seemed like they were just having a drink after a long week at the bank or media firm or whatever.
I made what I thought was a safe comment about the election results and quickly and aggressively was informed that the United States could finally start to get some dignity back now that the Donald was at the helm. Things escalated quickly from there and we barely avoided getting tossed out of the place. I remain convinced I could have taken them both down, although they were likely heavily armed.
Among the many completely idiotic things these ladies told me, one was, that they could not vote for Hillary because she did not leave Bill after the Lewinski episodes. Well, I thought, I did ask why they voted for Trump over Hillary and at least they had a reason. Fucking stupid reason, but I did ask.
So, fast forward 4 years and it appears very much as if we are on the planetary equivalent of the Bataan Death March. Politicians are more ignorant and cowardly than ever–completely unwilling to address the racism issues in our country. Global warming is accelerating and the pandemic seems to be hunkering down and taking on a long-term lease. So, we have the democracy in this country we deserve apparently.
I know I got on about these things. But we mustn’t forget the massive damage done by Republican administrations these past 30 years. Not that democrats are innocent. They are just far less destructive. But remember, that every single young child torn from her mother’s arms during the Trump administration, and there are thousands, has likely been traumatized, very possibly for life. Every single one of those children and their mothers and fathers has a story to tell. These are human atrocities unfolding before our eyes and as painful as it is, we must keep talking about it. Same with BLM and Corona and global warming and the corruption and disgust of the justice department and our dysfunctional foreign policy and our completely corrupt tax code and the continual erosion of our social services for whom so many of our move vulnerable depend. We mustn’t get too tired and turn away.
I’ve been carrying my tomato plants from the back patio to the front of the house most days so they can get maximum sun. My patio is just too shaded. They are not getting enough sunlight and while their stalks are growing, they are not bearing fruit. This reminded me of my childhood. We had a big garden growing up. Not because we enjoyed it, but because we needed the food. Badly. And mom is a fiercely committed provider. The garden was big, but was actually in the backyard of a neighors’ place two houses down. We had a small yard, so in exchange for letting mom make a garden in their yard, she provided them with vegetables all summer long.
I remember periods where there was no rain. Mom would carry 5-gallon buckets of water from our house to water the plants–a distance of probably 400 yards or so. I remember sometimes seeing her, from a distance, where I was playing some sport or the other, but rather than go help, I would just keep playing. I’m of course not proud of that. She did not want to ask the neighbors to use water because she had too much pride even though they were far more well off than us. They were technically middle class probably. We were not. But mom took care of us in a way that we never fully understood the precariousness of our position. She is a rock star in a world of rock star mothers.
Work is very busy at the moment, so I was tethered to the home office more than I would have liked this weekend.I had to digest 5 large ERP implementation proposals, each between 50 – 80 pages and build up some analysis spreadsheets to allow some equitable viewing of all the data.
Also did some work on Larry and Terri’s restaurant website. But I did manage to have coffee this morning with a nice friend. Lovely lady I only met recently. We sat outside and chatted for a couple of hours and it felt remarkably somewhat normal.
I’m glad we have survived another 4th of July. The fireworks and noise are ridiculous. Lots of patriots around apparently. Of course, if statistics can be trusted, most of them rarely wander into a voting booth, or when they do, I suspect have their heads up their ass and pull the Republican lever to make sure they never have to give up their god-given right to blow shit up. Occasionally even themselves.
I managed to beat the pants off everyone in poker last week. So had to capture that image as it does not happen often.
The canoe is right side up and in the cradle. She’s not getting much attention between work-work and Earth Explore, but a little here and a little there. She has decent lines. I think it will be fine to one day sport about in this little beauty.
I made some very nice vegetable stock today and a mushroom galette will soon be on the table. I cooked down some vegetable stock so will get that in jars.
Just finishing up a nice vodka/tonic on the patio now.
No other news of note.
The Martini Tales 