Street Legal

I just spent an hour and a half or so at the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles. The dreaded RMV.

My drivers license expired on my birthday, two days ago. I needed to renew it (which could be done online) and I also needed to upgrade to the stupid fascist federal RealID card bullshit (which could not be done online). I had an appointment for 3:30 so I was able to get into the office, but the lines were long and I didn’t actually get into to do my business until around 4:30. Once I was at the window though it went off without a hitch.

When I got home, there was a visitor standing next to our driveway.

Morning Errands

Out running errands in the shitty weather on a Saturday morning. Let’s do it Hipstamatic style, what do you say?

252/365

Also, as a bonus… cats.

Jen gave the cats some medication today. Something to prevent… something… heart worms? I think. It was just a drop of stuff on their skin. Lily was annoyed but mostly okay with it. Robin was pissed. She was not happy. Sorry, cat.

In closing, music to run errands to…

It is Friday

It is Friday at last. It’s also raining. Son of a…

On May 4th I wrote this big gastric bypass surgery update where I said that I am having far fewer side effects then I did a year ago. The bad experiences are less and less common with each new day.

Then last night I had a piece of toast with my dinner. I took a bite, no problem. I took another bite, no problem. I took another bite… uh oh. I knew instantly that I had taken one bite too many. It took about an hour for all the fun to end. The moral of the story being, don’t be over confident. That thing that passes for your stomach these days can still kick you in the nards, Robert. Figuratively speaking, of course.

Here’s a cat to remind you of your place in the universe.

251/365

Smoke

I heard that there was white smoke in Rome today. This was my first response:

If they announce that it's trump, I'm moving to Mars.

Rob (@robj1971.bsky.social) 2025-05-08T16:26:27.819Z

Turns out the new pope is an American. Weird, huh? Dude’s going to speak English with an accent that I can understand. Too bad I’m not catholic anymore. It might mean something to me if I were.

Here’s a cat to celebrate:

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Here’s another cat to keep celebrating. The new pope stole the thunder from my birthday. What a jerk. At least he’s not maga. Civilization has that going for it, I guess.

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54

I was thinking about doing something with this post where I post an image with the old Studio 54 logo. Having lived through the disco era and today being my 54th birthday, I figured that would be funny. Then I realized it would not be funny at all, it would be dumb. So I changed my mind and just went with this.

Today is my birthday. I am 54 years old. I am NOT happy about it. When I was 53 years old I could sort of convince myself that 53 is still your early 50’s. At 54 I can’t do that anymore. I am firmly entrenched in my mid 50’s and again, I am NOT happy about it.

The weather is nice right now. That’s good. Of course the forecast is calling for rain later so that’s fitting. Blah. I filled the bird feeders because I wanted those little monsters to have a nice celebration on my birthday. I took a couple of pictures. This one is with the aperture wide open, f1.8. Blurry background, babie!

250/365

This next one is the opposite. This one has the aperture closed down as far as it goes. f22, which means the shutter speed is super slow which is why it’s a little soft on the focus. Image stabilization helps, but it’s not perfect. Note that the background is not blurry at all.

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Now when you compare the two photos you know how your lens aperture controls your depth of field. See? You didn’t realize I was going to give you all a photography lesson for my birthday, but there you go. Happy birthday, hohoho.

Nutz

Today has been insane. I took the morning off so that I could take Miss Robin Sparkles the cat to her vet appointment. I dropped her off, ran some errands, went home, re-watched most of last night’s three episodes of Andor, went back to the vet’s office to pick her up, came home, ran another errand, ate lunch, and punched into work at 1:00pm.

That’s when it hit. I had meetings scheduled from 1:00-5:00. Bam. All of them. One after the other. At the same time I was getting hit with all sorts of customer issues and questions and hectic stress and wow… It’s 5:31pm now. I can punch out. I need a nap!

Here’s a picture of the clock downtown. It’s not a good picture, and don’t let anyone try to tell you that I thought it was a good picture… because it’s not a good picture. Whatevs, I’m going to go cook dinner for the love of my life and then go to sleep.

I Am Trying

I am trying today. I am doing my best. My best, however, ain’t gonna be good enough.

I am trying to not get mentally bogged down by idiotic shit going on in the federal government. I just want to have a day where I ignore the morons and concentrate on work for a change. Something tells me I am not going to be terribly successful in this endeavor though. Don’t get my wrong, my work is getting done. No worries there. I just find myself distracted by all the other bullshit.

I am in the office again today. This makes four business days in a row for me. Ugh. Yesterday I left the house at 7:30 and got to work at 9:10. Today I left the house at 7:20 (makes sense, right?) and got to work at 9:10. Oh for crying out loud.

On the way out the door I told the cats to take care of my wife while I am out. I always tell them that. I don’t know if they ever listen though. They aren’t really team players, you know? They just do their own thing and mostly ignore anything I say. They’re cats that way.

248/365

Another Painful Week Ahead

You know… some days… I really wish I could just stay in bed and wait for something to come along that magically picks me up and moves me and my family to somewhere in Europe.

I mean, what the fuck?

First, the orange shit clown announces he is going to reopen Alcatraz and use it for what he says is the worst criminals in the country but what we all know is to use it as a concentration camp for people who don’t like him. We all know that, right? Why ship immigrants to El Salvador when you can ship them to Alcatraz? Forgetting the fact that it failed as a maximum security prison once before and that it is just a museum now… Seriously… what the fuck?

I was hanging my head in embarrassed shame after reading about all of this and that’s when I heard the second idiocy of the day. The orange shit clown has announced a 100% tariff on… wait for it… you’re not going to believe this one… movies. That’s right, you read that correctly. He just doubled the price of a movie ticket. He took an industry that has been on death’s door since Covid and doubled the price of admission in order to… checking my notes… save it.

Again I ask, in all seriousness… what the actual fuck?

Here’s a photo of two cats with stunned, disbelieving looks on their little cat faces. Both of them have asked me why we’re not packing up to move to Europe where people are less certifiably insane than they are here in the country formerly known as the united states and currently known as fucking moron land. I don’t know, cats. I just don’t know anymore.

A 100% tariff on… movies… yeah, that’s going to make america great again for sure. Finger right on the pulse there, you fascist schmuck.