canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
In ep. 6.02 of Better Call Saul we see the Kettlemans, Craig and Betsy, again. They were part of a subplot in season 1 of the series. Craig was the (fictitious) treasurer of Bernalillo County, NM, who embezzled $1.6 million from his own office. Betsy is his domineering and, frankly, delusional wife who kept denying they had the money even as she literally held a duffel bag with $1.6 million cash in her hands, and thought they could somehow avoid jail time without returning the money.

Kim was their lawyer for a while and arranged a plea deal for Craig: 16 months in prison if he returned the money. He faced a sentence of up to 30 years if he went to trial, and there was plenty of evidence to convict him, as he wasn't particularly good at hiding his tracks. He wrote, and cashed, numerous checks to himself! Betsy torpedoed the deal because she wanted to keep the money. Jimmy did a bad thing for noble purposes. He stole their stolen money to give it back to the county, forcing them to accept the deal.

The Kettlemans come back into the story in ep. 6.02 through Kim and Jimmy's con to destroy Howard Hamlin.

Jimmy uses Betsy and Craig Kettleman in a con (Better Call Saul ep. 6.02)

Jimmy visits their new place of business— they run a small-time tax preparation service out of a trailer on the outskirts of town—and tells them they could get Craig's conviction overturned by suing Howard Hamlin, their lawyer of record, for ineffective counsel as he was using cocaine at the time. (The notion that Howard is a coke addict is the core of their con to destroy his reputation.)

Curiously, while Craig is pleasant toward Jimmy, even congratulating him on his recent marriage, Betsy is nothing but bitter. She blames Jimmy for Craig's conviction. Never mind that Craig actually stole the money and almost certainly did so at her behest. Never mind that she fought against effect lawyering that would have gotten Craig a much lighter prison sentence than he deserved. To her it's everyone's fault but their own. "Our kids have to go to public school now because of you," she hisses at Jimmy. And that's where I found myself rooting for Jimmy in this stage of the con.

You see, the con's a con, and the Kettlemans are patsies. Jimmy asks them to sign him up as their attorney but doesn't actually want them to hire him. He wants them to hire anyone but him. He wants them to go shopping for lawyers all around Albuquerque, saying, "We think our former lawyer, Howard Hamlin, was on cocaine when he represented us."

Interestingly while Betsy is completely delusional about responsibility for the money her husband stole and she tried to conceal, she figures out Jimmy's con. She doesn't figure it out right away, though. She marches in to various lawyers' offices— we see her being a delusional jerk with Cliff Main, head of white-shoe law firm Davis & Main— and makes her allegations against Howard. Only after being laughed out of several offices in a row does she realize she's been played for a chump.

Jimmy using the Kettlemans to spread false innuendo had the potential backfire. Betsy, once realizing she's been played, could go back to all the lawyers she visited and say Jimmy put her up to it. Howard could sue Jimmy for slander. But Jimmy— and Kim, who's really the architect of this con— thought of that. They were prepared to shut down the Kettlemans' shot at revenge.

Jimmy goes to visit the Kettlemans' office again. Betsy confronts him with having figured out his con and threatens to turn him in. Jimmy offers a small wad of cash to buy her silence. Betsy is righteously indignant at the bribery attempt and refuses the cash. Then Kim drops the boom.

Kim figured out, perhaps as a lucky guess by knowing Betsy Kettleman is a narcissist crook, that their little tax prep business is a sham. She calls a contact at the IRS, in front of Betsy and Craig, and threatens to turn them in for defrauding customers with fake tax returns. Kim alleges that they file real paperwork with the IRS while giving fake paperwork to the taxpayer, pocketing the difference in the returns. Kim's lucky guess seems to have hit a bullseye, as Betsy hangs up her phone call and agrees to keep mum about the con.

And just to be nice, Jimmy gives them the bribe anyway. Maybe he feels bad for Craig, having a life sentence with Betsy.
canyonwalker: Better Call Saul starring Bob Odenkirk (better call saul)
Better Call Saul episode 4.10, the season 4 finale, is where Jimmy McGill finally completes his transformation in Saul Goodman. ...Well, almost. He announces that he's going to file a DBA to start practicing under the name Saul Goodman.

For Saul Goodman to be "born", of course, Jimmy has to "die". Jimmy gives his own eulogy, in a fashion, in an impromptu bit of unsolicited advice— that's partly a rant— to an aspiring college student, Kristy Esposito.

Jimmy's Advice/Rant/Soliloquy

Kristy applied for a scholarship under a grant created in Charles McGill's name. Jimmy is on the board of the scholarship committee that's chaired by Howard Hamlin and filled with a bunch of HHM people. There are 3 scholarships available, and maybe 10 students have made it to this final round, where they answer questions in a group interview with the committee members. The winners are chosen but not informed yet.

Jimmy catches Kristy outside the law offices. "You didn't get it," he tells her. "You were never gonna get it." He explains that it's because the people in circles of power make decisions very quickly about whether a person will ever be allowed into their circle. Kristy has a minor crime on her record, a small shoplifting offense from a few years ago, and the people with power will only ever see her as a person with a criminal record, he says. It doesn't matter what the circumstances of that one bad act were, nor does it matter what good she does after that; most people will not look past it. Thus he encourages her not to play by the rules, to "cut corners", and to "do what they won't do" in order to get ahead.

Jimmy's really explaining himself here. It's like Hamlet's "To be or not to be" soliloquy scene. Kristy is Ophelia, who hears what Hamlet is saying even though really he's talking to himself as he rationalizes the choices he's making. Jimmy's trying to convince himself that all the corners he cut were actually a noble thing and that becoming a person who, as a rule, doesn't play by the rules is the path to success.

Then Jimmy's car dies.

No, seriously. He goes to the garage, gets in his car, and the car won't start. Jimmy starts crying.

No, he's not crying about the car. I mean, literally he is, but the car not starting is the straw that breaks the camel's back. Jimmy is releasing his emotions about his brother, Chuck, who died a year ago now, and releasing his misgivings about whether he should even try to play by the rules as a lawyer.

Jimmy Comes Back from Suspension— As Saul

In the last part of the episode Jimmy goes back before the board of the State Bar to petition for his license back. He's already been denied once; this is an appeal.

In the denial at Jimmy's first hearing, the committee chair explained to him that he wasn't "sincere" enough. Jimmy was actually very sincere and gave a fantastic answer when they asked, "What does the law mean to you?" But it wasn't what they wanted to hear. They wanted to hear about Chuck. It was well known that  Jimmy's suspension was because he committed a wrong against Chuck. As Jimmy explained in his soliloquy, that's all they saw in him. Chuck, Chuck, Chuck. Thus for him to do anything other than gush with praise and remorse about Chuck was "insincere". Because, again, to them, he's nothing except what he did to Chuck.

So Jimmy comes back to the appeal hearing and talks about Chuck, Chuck, Chuck. At least one of the committee members is moved to tears. Kim, who's in the audience, is moved as well. She's also beaming with pride, as she counseled Jimmy heavily on his presentation for this appeal.

Out in the hallway while the committee is deliberating, Jimmy and Kim are jubilant. They're sure he's won. But Jimmy starts laughing. Did you see those suckers? he sneers. That one asshole was crying, he had actual tears! Jimmy reveals that nothing about this new, more "sincere" presentation was actually sincere. It was just the right amount of tug-the-heartstrings emotional claptrap to fool a bunch of arrogant people who expect to hear a particular story and nothing else.

Let me come back to that point in a moment.

Minutes later Jimmy gets word from the committee that they're reinstating him. As he goes to sign the papers he asks the secretary for a DBA document— because he'll be practicing law from now on as Saul Goodman.

RIP, Jimmy who sometimes cuts corners McGill. Long live Saul sneering disdain Goodman.

Why Jimmy's Speech Resonates with Me— In a Bad Way

Jimmy's speech to the committee resonates with me— in a bad way. I feel like there have been a lot in my professional life where I've been denied something I wanted. There was 1 of it to go around, and it went to someone else. I came in 2nd or 3rd place. Or 4th. Whatever; the ranking didn't matter. I didn't get it. But what rankled was that the person who won didn't do as well as I did, objectively. They didn't have as much content. They didn't have as many numbers. They didn't have as many facts. What they did have was some emotional appeal, some bullshit that wasn't even relevant to the matter at hand. Like, we're selling software, and they told some probably made-up story about an 8 year old girl with cancer. And the people above me, the people who maintain that they're better than me because they're there and I'm not, chose the bullshit.


canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
Earlier this week I read yet-another Buzzfeed listicle/quiz for amusement, "There Is No Way Anyone Has Done More Than 25 Of These Things Unless They're Over 65". It's in the same vein as a similar Buzzfeed listicle I read (and wrote about) a few months ago. I suggested Buzzfeed retitle that article as It's Official, Gen Z Thinks Anyone Over 40 Is A Boomer.

Remember that the Boomer generation, aka Baby Boomers, are those born from 1946-1964. The youngest Boomers are turning 60 this year. Yet most people over 40— meaning not just Gen Xers like me, but also older Millennials— have probably done many of the things on the list. I'm years younger than the youngest Boomers and I've done 36 out of the 50, including all 20 of the top 20. Here's my hot take on several of them:

1. Adjusted rabbit ears on a television
I did that into the mid 1990s. My parents and adult relatives pretty much all had cable, but as a college student and grad student, my apartment mates and I didn't want to spend for cable TV. Boomers would remember when cable was $10/mo. We younger generations saw it spiral upwards of $100/mo and had to make decisions.

2. Played Pong in an arcade or at home
Okay, this is more of a late 70s/early 80s thing vs. "common into the 1990s". But I'm pretty sure a large number of Gen Xers get this one. I remember seeing a Pong game in my local Pizza Hut as a kid. But I never played because $0.25 was too spendy for my Boomer/Silent Generation parents.

3. Played pinball in an arcade
Mid 1990s, again. All Gen Xers and older Millennials have probably played pinball. Also, arcades didn't really become a thing until Gen X were adolescents.

4. Video stores with walled-off Adult sections
Video stores were at their peak all the way to 2004. I'm sure literally every Gen Xer and most Millennials remember cruising the aisles at video stores, looking for what to rent. As for the specific trope, though, of a walled-off Adult section.... The last one of those I saw personally was in 1996, but that's because that's the last time I had a membership at a locally owned video rental store instead of a national chain. The national chains deemed X-rated material off-brand and didn't offer it.

5. Kept phone numbers in an address book
Late 1990s. That's when cell phones became common for the average adult to own. Once again, all Gen X and older Millennials.

7. Used/seen a working cigarette vending machine
I recall these being commonplace until the early 1980s, present in every supermarket and drug store, so likely most Gen Xers have seen them. Even after that they were still around, though they disappeared from places like supermarkets and would be found in restaurants and bars into the 21st century.

8. Shopped at a five-and-dime
Dude, inflation. Yesterday's five-and-dime morphed into Dollar stores. ...Where, today, almost everything is more than $1.

13. Done a duck-and-cover drill at school in case of nuclear attack
This is one I actually never did. Dunno if that's because "Hide under your desk because bombs don't affect desks" was phased out by the time I began school, or if it's just that the schools/districts I attended had opted out. OTOH, as a Gen Xer, I was fortunately done with school by the time lockdowns and active shooter drills became a thing.

21. Have you ever balanced a checkbook?
I still do. Does your mom buy your food and clothes?


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Blue Ridge Trip '24 #22
Jonas Ridge, NC - Thu, 5 Sep 2024. 4:30pm

Upper Creek Falls turned out to be more than we expected— both in terms of the size of the main falls and the length/strenuousness of the trail. At the bottom of the big falls we weren't thinking about the latter, though. Yet.

Upper Creek Falls, North Carolina (Sep 2024)

Yes, this is the same falls I finished with in part 1 of this hike. Here I'm photographing it with my ultra-wide zoom lens. This is at 10mm with my camera's APS-C sized imager; it's a 15mm equivalent on a traditional 35mm camera. I slowed the shutter speed down to 1/5 second with a neutral density lens. And, yes, the camera is hand-held because I didn't lug a tripod down here and didn't even have my hiking pole monopod to use.

As you can see in this photo versus those in my previous blog entry the sun was in and out of clouds, but mostly behind the clouds, this afternoon. Changing light makes photography challenging... but also more fun, as it exposes different views of the same scene.

Upper Creek Falls, North Carolina (Sep 2024)

Soon enough it was time to head further downstream. There are more falls down there and a pretty clear path, marked with reflector blazes on trees, to get there.

On the way to these falls (photo above) we saw the couple who were previously enjoying the big falls 50' away from us coming back up the trail. Why come back up the same way? The trail loops around back to the parking lot. We said as much in chatting with them, wondering if maybe the creek crossing was too dangerous to ford.

"Oh, the trail crosses the creek?" they responded. "We didn't even think of that!"

"Yeah, it shows it right here on my GPS-enabled trails app," I said, pointing to AllTrails running on my iPhone.

"Oh, I'm using AT, too," one of the hikers said, showing me his phone with the same app open.

How can you use the same app and not see the trail marked in bright green?! I wondered to myself. This dude is literally holding the map in his hand and can't figure it out. Sheesh, it's like holding in your hand a device with access to the sum total of human knowledge does not make everyone smarter, it just makes the average person more confident of their dumb ideas.

Anyway, back to the falls. 🤣

Upper Creek Falls, North Carolina (Sep 2024)

At the crossing there were more falls both above and below. I explored down the creek a bit further, but not too far as I was starting to get a sense of how much climbing out there'd be. And, more importantly, Hawk was already aching pretty badly from a long-term issue flaring up. I wasn't going to leave her in the middle of the wilderness to go hiking on my own.

Upper Creek Falls, North Carolina (Sep 2024)

We enjoyed the falls at the crossing a bit more before beginning the arduous climb up out of the canyon. And yes, it was arduous. It was 8-10 long switchbacks up the canyon's sloping side.

Back at the car, now, we're discussing what's next. Earlier in the day we were thinking to do a bit more driving to another remote falls but at this point, with the clouds overhead, it looks like it might get dark too early to want to do a lot of driving before a hike. There's just enough signal here at the trailhead to search for other trails on AllTrails, so I'm checking out Linville Gorge and Linville Falls. That's a big falls, and it's really not that far from here; maybe just 15 minutes of driving.

Stay tuned; the adventure continues!

canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
I have a habit of clicking on Buzzfeed listicles in my newsfeed. They're generally light, vaguely amusing reading, perfect for browsing when I'm sitting down at lunch. Occasionally they're even very insightful, such as the listicle that inspired me to write The Unwritten Rules of Being Poor. But most of the time they're just vaguely insipid. Today, though, I clicked on one that was actively stupid.

"Non-Rich People Are Sharing Subtly Obvious Signs Of Wealth, And Honestly, It's Pretty Eye-Opening" the title blared. "Eye-Opening" isn't the term I'd use to describe it. In fact the whole headline buries the lede. It should be something more like, "Online Randos Mock a Question We Post on Reddit, And We're So Lame We Can't Tell We're Being Mocked."

Here are just a few of the things Buzzfeed included in its list of things of subtle signs you're rich:

  • You own a refrigerator with a water dispenser
  • You buy new furniture rather than used
  • You visit the doctor or dentist for non-emergency health care
  • Your mom eats dinner with you instead of pretending she's not hungry because she can't afford enough food for everyone
  • Your Crayola Crayons come in one of those boxes with a built-in crayon sharpener
  • You have a basketball hoop in the driveway
  • You live in a house with stairs
  • You can afford a new mattress
  • You take a vacation that's not visiting family

I grew up in a working-class family (lower-middle class) and had two-thirds of these. Including a mom who could afford to eat. Because, yeah, that's a sign of wealth. 🙄


canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
I clicked on a BuzzFeed listicle today with a click-bait headline, You're Officially A Boomer If You've Done Half Of These 40 Things (4 Apr 2024). It was pretty amusing... but not in the way I expect the authors thought. It was amusing because of how stupid it was. Most of the things on their list have been done by typical Gen Xers, and quite a few are not so old that even Millennials wouldn't have done them. I'd rewrite the headline as It's Official, Gen Z Thinks Anyone Over 40 Is A Boomer. 😂

For reference, Boomers are commonly defined as those born between 1946 and 1964. The youngest Boomers turn 60 this year. Thus when articles like this say "Doing A, B, or C means you're a Boomer," they're arguing that A, B, C really haven't been popular since the 1960s, maybe the early 70s— or are only done anymore by people age 60+. But oh, how wrong these clueless (and likely young) writers are. Here are just the first 3 items from their list, with my notes about how much more recently than the 1960s they've been commonplace:

1. Drinking Coke out of a glass bottle.
Sure, depictions of glass soda bottles conjure images of the "good old days" of the 1950s and 60s. But depending on where you lived, regional bottlers were distributing Coke (and Pepsi) in glass well beyond then. I routinely bought Coke in glass bottles in 1992-1993 when I lived in New York. It's what one of the local grocery stories carried. And anyone who prefers Mexican Coke today— the stuff still made with cane sugar rather than high fructose corn syrup— still buys Coke in glass bottles today.

2. Singing the "I'd Like to Buy the World a Coke" jingle.
Okay, I can get how a person whose idea of ``research``is scanning the first page of Google search results would think this is a Boomer thing. The classic Coca-Cola commercial was produced in 1971. The top several search results all say that. But I can tell you that I was born after that commercial being released, and I remember people singing it at least into my 20s. Indeed, do a little more ``research`` than just skimming the first page of Google hits, like just read the damn Wikipedia article on the song, and you'll see that the remakes were done up through the 2010s. Frankly you'd practically have to be a child today never to have sung this song— or at least heard others singing it.

3. Seeing colored toilet paper in the bathroom.
Yes, toilet paper used to be available in colors other than white. In commercial use? No. But in homes, definitely. I remember up through the early 1980s it being common for people to color-coordinate their bathrooms with paper in pastel hues of pink and blue. And if your grandma was like either of mine, you saw it in their houses well in to the 1990s.

These are just the first 3 items from the listicle. What else is on their list of supposed 1960s relics? Would you believe:

  • Using a phone book
  • Sending a fax
  • Using a photocopier

FWIW that last time I did each of those, or had someone do it on my behalf, was after 2000. And it wasn't because I'm an old fogey, it's because the world didn't suddenly become all digital in 1970... or even in 1999.


canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
We're having great weather here in Silicon Valley this weekend. Yesterday the temperature hit about 70° at my house. Today is almost as warm. It's sunny and clear, too. We enjoyed yesterday's weather by getting out for a really enjoyable hike in the East Bay hills. Today we met a friend for a leisurely lunch outdoors on the patio.

The pleasant weather isn't just local. Much of the US is seeing warm and dry weather this weekend. A few days ago I saw articles in my newsfeed posing the question, "Is this 'it' for winter?" Sigh. What alarmist claptrap. This is not 'it' for winter. A simple check of the 10 day weather forecast— do people who write news articles know how to read news articles?— shows that next weekend is going to be cold and rainy, at least around here. So, no, this is not "it" for winter. And I'm glad, because as much as I do appreciate the warm, dry weather I also appreciate getting enough rain to refill our lakes and groundwater tables so we're not fretting about drought in six months.
canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
North Cascades Travelog #3
Washtucna, WA - Sat, 2 Sep 2023, 1pm.

We got off to a somewhat lazy start this morning from our hotel room at the Spokane airport. We weren't rolling until almost 10, which meant we didn't get to our first real stop of the trip, Palouse Falls, until nearly noon.

Palouse Falls, Washington (Sep 2023)

Palouse Falls, named Washington's official state waterfall after a letter-writing campaign by local grade schoolers, is a plunge about 200' high. The official designation is a bit weird considering the falls is in... the middle of freakin' nowhere. I've marked the dateline this blog entry as "Washtucna, WA". If you've never heard of Washtucna, don't feel bad. It's a village of about 200. Our drive from Spokane airport was 103 miles.

Palouse Falls, Washington (Sep 2023)

Palouse Falls and Palouse Creek cut a steep canyon through basalt cliffs. One interesting thing here, geologically, is that this canyon is fairly young. During the last ice age, this part of Washington was tableland covered by glaciers. When the glaciers started to melt their water flowed along a different course down to the Snake River, which feeds into the Columbia. But the volume of water from the melt was so enormous that it pushed through a different route, finding a fissure in the volcanic rock, and quickly widened out that fissure into the enormous canyon we see today. So this entire canyon might only be 12,000 years old.

Thwarted Twice

Our return visit to Palouse Falls today was a revenge trip. We visited these falls 2 years ago, at a time when the air was thick with smoke from wildfires. The weather that day wasn't great, either. It was extremely hot (100+) and sprinkled rain. Because of all that we limited our hiking to walking around the top of the cliffs and skipped taking the more adventurous scramble down into the canyon. We'd come back another time and do the canyon descent, we agreed. Except now it's closed.

The state has closed off the trails down into the canyon, and stationed rangers in the park to monitor them, because apparently a few dumbasses got too close to the edge of the cliffs and fell to their deaths. Look, I agree that places that are truly dangerous should be made off limits, but nature is inherently dangerous. In mountainous parks there are any number of places where if a person takes one wrong step too far over an edge, it's a deadly plunge. I hate that the rest of us are confined to bunny trails just because of a few stupid people. This is why we can't have nice things. 😡

canyonwalker: Uh-oh, physics (Wile E. Coyote)
North Cascades Travelog #6
Winthrop, WA - Sun, 3 Sep 2023, 9am.

I remarked in my previous blog that this trip to Eastern Washington and the North Cascades is revenge, revenge for things we were not able to do in years past because of car trouble or poor weather. Well, where once poor weather kept us from appreciating Palouse Falls more fully, this year it was the government. All the trails down into the canyon are closed now because some dumbasses fell off the cliffs. Partly the closure is to protect other dumbasses from falling to their deaths— not that dumbasses actually pay attention to warning signs anyway— and partly it's because the local governments are fighting about whose budget has to be used to go and haul their bodies out. So that's why the other 99.9% of us can't have nice things.

Ah, but Palouse Falls was only the minor (thwarted) act of revenge travel this trip. The main part of the revenge was North Cascades National Park, where we cut our trip short six years ago when our car broke down. Now we'd come back for a few days and hike all those trails we were cheated out of hiking before! Except Mother Nature was ready for us. That bitch.

This morning we opened our guide books and websites to recheck the places we'd go hiking today and tomorrow. Whoops, there is a fire in North Cascades. Almost all the trails we wanted to hike are currently closed.

We made specific plans for this trip 6 weeks ago. That was relatively recent by vacation plans making standards! Everything was all clear then. This fire only started within the past few weeks.

I don't think the trails are literally on fire right now; I think the fires are mostly out, but things are closed until crews can make sure. And then there will need to be checks to make sure that everything's safe. You wouldn't want some dumbass shaking a dead tree and dying when it falls on their dumb ass. I mean, whose budget would even pay to haul their dumb ass corpse out of the woods?



canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
There's an old joke that people make. "I don't drink 2% milk," they say, trying to make themselves sound smart, "Because what's the other 98%?"

Yeah, that's amusing if you're a stand-up comic and your audience hasn't heard it before, let alone dozens of times before. But what if it's a real question? Well, as a real question it has a real answer... and that answer isn't even hard to find. A few seconds on Google turns up numerous resources, including this Wikipedia article, Fat Content of Milk.

"Whole milk" in the US and a few other countries has 3.25% butterfat by weight. So 2% milk still has 61.5% the fat of whole milk. And it's not "98% what" because it isn't adulterated by adding some mystery ingredient. The milk is spun in a centrifuge to remove some of the fat content, leaving simply... less fatty milk.

Merely Asking Questions is not Intelligence

Some people proclaim themselves smart because they ask questions. I see that a lot in politics. Merely asking questions, though, does not denote intelligence. The mark of intelligence is a person who goes through a 4 step process: (1) Recognizing there is something one doesn't know. (2) Asking a question. (3) Seeking an answer from reputable sources. (4) Incorporating the new knowledge into one's understanding of things, including revising or even discarding previous beliefs where the new information contradicts them.

Some people do none of these yet consider themselves intelligent. Many do 1-2 and stop there. Few do all 4. It takes all 4 to be intelligent.

canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
A week ago I wrote What is "Woke"? Ask an Idiot! about a conservative author/speaker who, in moment that went viral, completely choked when a streaming interviewer asked her to define the term, woke. My use of the label "idiot" was ironic. The woman interviewed, Bethany Mandel, is coauthor of a 2022 book all about woke-ism and its supposed perils. She is also a frequent guest speaker on conservative programs and at conservative events, where she is invited specifically to talk about the subject. It would seem that far from being a (literal) idiot she should be among the world's experts on what "woke" is, right?

Here's the rub: She didn't stumble defining "woke" because she doesn't know. She stumbled defining "woke" because she does know... and she also knows that actually defining would make a lot of people go, "Wait, what's so wrong with that? Being woke sounds like a good idea!"

Indeed conservative media figures all united on a common message by the second day after Mandel's viral choke. Defining "woke" is not possible, they argued. It's a feeling, a mindset, they continued. ...Ooookay, well feelings and mindsets can actually be described. For example, I can define "white nationalism" is and how it describes them.... and I'm not even a book author and frequent public speaker on the topic!

Asking us to define "woke" is a trap, cooked up by the Left, the conservatives contended.

You know what? They're damn right it's a trap. It's a trap to expose their hatred, lies, and misrepresentation.

The truth is conservatives just want buzzwords they can repeat to keep their audiences angry. Angry about what? It almost doesn't matter. In fact, they're deliberately vague. Psychology shows that it's easier for people to stay riled up when they use their imaginations to fill in the specifics of what they're so angry about. Basically everyone's got their own personal boogeymen. Keeping it vague also makes it hard to for opponents to respond. Make a specific counterargument, and the conservatives dodge and say, "It's not about that, you clearly don't understand it!" Yes, that bullshit is bad-faith arguing. Welcome to modern conservative politics.

canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
Several days ago I wrote about the intellectual bankruptcy of conservatives blaming the failure of banks like SVB on them being too "woke". So what is "woke"? you might ask. The term has actually been bandied about quite a bit on the political right. The recent failure of a few banks was hardly the first time conservative political leaders and pundits have used it. They've actually been railing against "woke" this and "woke" that steadily for two years. It's pretty clear it's something conservative leaders want their followers to hate, but what is it?

Briahna Joy Gray, a streaming interviewer with news outlet The Hill, popped that question to conservative author Bethany Mandel on her streaming show. In a moment that went viral Mandel stumbled over the definition. Watch the first 1:45 of this video retrospective by Gray, or watch the whole thing for greater context:



Ironically Mandel herself says, "This is going to be one of those moments that goes viral," as she gets stumped trying to define the term.

Note, this was not "gotcha" journalism. This was not a journalist ambushing a minor politician with a question about, say, issues causing political unrest in a tiny nation 10,000 miles away. Mandel co-authored the 2023 book, "Stolen Youth: How Radicals Are Erasing Innocence and Indoctrinating a Generation". It's all about the alleged sinister perils of woke-ism. In that book Mandel wrote an entire chapter defining what "woke" is. She is clearly an expert on the topic. Yet when asked to give a concise definition she stumbles and says it's not possible.

BTW, after Mandel's inability to define "woke", a term she co-wrote an entire book about and speaks about frequently in interviews with sycophantic media, went viral she posted multiple times rejecting the question as completely unreasonable and basically had a meltdown about The Left was "attacking" her.

So, what is "woke"? I'll act like I am getting interviewed and offer an extemporaneous answer— not researched, not checked against a dictionary, not even wordsmithed. This is basically off the top of my head:

Woke, adj.: a state of awareness that centuries of systemic oppression against minorities create inequalities that persist today and must be addressed to create a fair society.

See? That wasn't so hard.

Again, I wrote this in one pass, no editing, no research, not even consulting a dictionary. How did I do? Followup coming soon; share your thoughts now in the comments.



canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
After the rapid collapse of Silicon Valley Bank nine days ago everyone was looking for whom or what to pin the blame on. GOP culture warriors quickly aligned on a simple, stupid, common explanation: The bank was too "woke".

Politicians such as Florida Gov. and apparent presidential candidate Ron DeSantis and Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley have gone on the talk show circuit blaming the bank's diversity efforts for its failure, as have countless right-wing pundits. And you thought I was joking when I quipped right after the failure that these sorts would snivel, "Isn't that just some community bank for liberal techies who care more about whether the lollipops in the lobby are cruelty free and LGBTQIA+ positive than what the interest rate is?"

One of the first examples of the too "woke" blame game came from WSJ columnist Andy Kessler a week ago. Link: Full column. He wrote:

“In its proxy statement, SVB notes that besides 91% of their board being independent and 45% women, they also have ‘1 Black,’ ‘1 LGBTQ+’ and ‘2 Veterans.’ I’m not saying 12 white men would have avoided this mess, but the company may have been distracted by diversity demands.”
Wow. There are so many things wrong in just two sentences. I'll limit my fault finding to Five Things for brevity:

1) If ever there were a time the disclaimer, "I'm not saying..." meant literally "I am saying..." this would be it. He is literally saying that diversity is the problem.

2) Unpacking his syllogism, is he saying that the BOD members who were ‘1 Black,’ ‘1 LGBTQ+’ and ‘2 Veterans’ were unable to spot a not-too-hard-to-understand risk that "12 white men" would have spotted? And really, dumping on veterans as less smart than "white men"?

3) ...Or, continuing to unpack the syllogism, is he saying that the bank expended so much effort on its diversity program that it neglected to manage its financial risk?

4) Pretty much all banks strive for diversity. They all tout diversity programs on their websites. Go check any of the big ones: Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Capital One, US Bancorp, etc. None of them are failing.

5) Meanwhile, study after study has shown that diversity promotes business success rather than hinders it. A 2020 report by consultancy McKinsey found that "[T]he relationship between diversity on executive teams and the likelihood of financial outperformance has strengthened over time."


canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
I was an attendee on a webinar today when someone, one of the moderators I believe, used the toilet with an open mic.

At first it sounded like someone was running water, kind of like filling a coffee maker, in the background. It wasn't either of the active speakers because they were on camera. Though it could have been someone next to them, off camera. I posted a comment in the chat, "Mmm, I can smell the coffee! Or are you pouring water?"

The water-pouring sound continued, followed by what was evidently a toilet flush. "Sounds like someone took a mic in the toilet," I commented. There were LOLs.

Then came a loud fart. O-M-G. "Is this seriously your first videoconference ever?!" I wrote.

There were more LOLs. And at least one other person was thinking what I was thinking— that a movie warned us about this problem 35 years ago!


Link: The Sound of Relief, The Naked Gun (1988)

There were a few other jokes about the open mic in the bathroom, and which movie it was in decades ago. I went to screen-shot them to include in this blog, but minutes later the host had deleted most of the comments about what happened.

BTW, I noted above that this was a webinar. It was configured so that only the host and the two invited speakers could share audio. This wasn't one of those, "Oh, crazy stuff happens when there's 200 people on a Zoom" situations. It was a professionally staged presentation with a (supposedly) experienced host moderator and two speakers representing their companies— one of which is a household name in the US.

Oops.
canyonwalker: coronavirus (coronavirus)
My boss at work is getting over a case of Covid. He was hit pretty hard with it all last week. It's his second time sick with it. Meanwhile I'm still a Covid Virgin or Covid Draft Dodger or whatever the latest semi-insulting nom du jour is for people who are responsible with their health.

My boss caught Covid from a team on-site meeting two weeks ago. I think there were about 12 people there, for 2 days. At least one other person got sick, too. There may have been more; those are the only two who informed others.

The fact it happened at a company team meeting bothers me because we've got our annual Sales Kickoff (SKO) event coming up next week. It'll be 200+ people from the worldwide sales team and adjacent departments packed into a conference room in Las Vegas for 2 days. And this year, unlike last year, there is no live video link. Senior management has stated that in-person attendance is mandatory.

"What health precautions is the company taking?" various people have asked.

"We're following all recommendations of the CDC and the state and county departments of health," is the official answer.

That answer is a massive dodge. The recommendations are recommendations, not requirements. And they're not even following the recommendations. If they were following the recommendations they'd require vaccines, tests, and/or masks. Instead they're simply repeating the recommendations, and leaving it entirely up to individual employees to decided for themselves. (Except for deciding not to attend.) I know for a fact some of my colleagues are unvaccinated and refuse to wear masks, ever. I know because they're quite proud of it & find ways to work it into conversation regularly.

Edited to add: It's not my boss I'm concerned about, per se. He's vaccinated (we've discussed it) but got it anyway... a second time. His case serves as a reminder that vaccination and even prior sickness don't completely inoculate a person; exposure still matters. Other people in the company are higher exposure risks because of their irresponsible choices. With 200+ people flying in from around the world it's a statistical near certainty that someone there will be contagious.

canyonwalker: WTF? (wtf?)
Representative-elect Kevin McCarthy has been trying to get elected Speaker of the House of Representatives. He's now pushed through 11 rounds of voting... and lost all of them. There were three rounds on Tuesday, three more on Wednesday, and a whopping five on Thursday. I posted on Wednesday afternoon after round 5 when I thought they'd take a break for the day. Nope, they went for round 6. And earlier today I posted after round 9, figuring they were keeping a pace of only 3 failed attempts per day.... Nope! They went for round 10... then round 11!

BTW, this is part of why I rarely blog about political current events on this platform. Politics today moves at the speed of Twitter. Sadly it also moves at the depth of Twitter. Do something to go viral, and for fucks' sake fit it in 280 characters or nobody'll pay attention.

Among the core of McCarthy's opposition are several Twitter-optimized Congresspeople. They've structured their whole political personas around generating maximum headlines. Matt Gaetz, for example, is said to have made more appearances as a TV guest on Fox than in committee hearings last season. The few bits of legislation he's bothered with in the past few years have been headline-grabbing stunts. Then there's gun-toting Lauren Boebert. She uses her office mostly for trolling.

This really makes me wonder why McCarthy and other leaders are engaging in a standoff with these opponents. They've put McCarthy forward 11 times now (and counting!) expecting the other side to blink first. Who's supposed to blink first? The people who blink first would be those who care most about finishing the selection of Speaker so the whole Congress can get to its main job, legislating. (Congress literally can't do anything else until its Speaker is selected. Those are the rules.) But the lunatic fringe extremists opposing McCarthy don't care about legislating; they never have! McCarthy and his supporters have badly misread their fellow party members. ...Which is doubly pathetic because those nuts haven't been secretive about it; they've been doing what they've been doing very loudly & out in the open.
canyonwalker: Cthulhu voted - touch screen! (i voted)
US Senator Raphael Warnock won reelection in a run-off vote in Georgia last night. The unofficial tally with 99% of precincts reporting has him leading 51.6% to 48.4%. It's a margin of almost 100,000 votes.

I am glad that Warnock won and simultaneously bothered that his challenger, former football star Herschel Walker, came so close. Walker is a clown. He embarrasses himself every time he speaks in public. The man can barely string two sentences together! When challenged on every policy position he claims to hold he quickly reveals he doesn't actually understand anything he supposedly stands for. He falls into word soup of non sequiturs, outright false statements, and conspiracy theories.

It's so obvious that Walker's nomination was a cynical exercise by Republican party leaders. They picked someone with name recognition— and, better yet, a Black man with name recognition to "prove" how they're not racist— who would talk the conservative talk, even as story after story emerged that he didn't actually walk the walk. And nearly half of Georgia voters fell for the transparently obvious ruse.
canyonwalker: I see dumb people (i see dumb people)
Billionaire Elon Musk, the world's richest man, completed his purchase of Twitter this week for $44 billion. It's widely believed that he paid way too much. Even Musk believed that his offer was too high— as he tried for months to get out of it after making a formal offer. He only went through with the purchase when Delaware Chancery Court turned aside his requests to halt a lawsuit filed by Twitter for non-performance of contract. Obviously he thought he would lose... worse than lose, actually. He would have been forced to purchase the company for $44 billion and been embarrassed by public release of various documents about his behavior. So he paid his $44 billion to stay in control of the narrative.

As "Chief Twit" one of his first narrative choices was announcing that Twitter verified accounts, those marked by the blue check mark, would cost $20/month to keep.

Lucille Bluth, stereotypical out-of-touch wealthy person (Arrested Development)

Musk was stung by criticism that he was out of touch. Memes flew, including variations on this classic quip from character Lucille Bluth in the TV series Arrested Development, poster woman for unempathetic rich people.

Musk lowered the proposal to $8 and fired back with a meme of his own, as seen in this tweet:

Elon Musk, honorary Lucille Bluth family member (Nov 2022)

In case you can't see the picture, Musk compared people whining about $8/month for Twitter Verified to those thinking $8/cup for a Starbucks coffee product is a bargain.

Aside from whatever sneering disdain one may have for $8 Starbucks drinks and/or people who spend $8/drink at Starbucks, there's a fundamental mismatch in this comparison. When you spend $8 at Starbucks, or even $1.95 at Dunkin' Donuts, you're the customer and you're buying a product. That's it.

With Twitter, everyone who tweets is giving Twitter the product, i.e., their content, for free. Twitter then uses that free content to attract audiences that it sells to advertisers. Verified users with those blue check marks are generally those most frequent contributors vendors giving Twitter stuff for free. Now Musk wants to charge these vendors without whose unpaid work the company literally would be nothing.
canyonwalker: WTF? (wtf?)
In my Tier Tuesday slot last week I wrote "Player 2 has entered the game" about how a growing epidemic of Monkeypox cases is not being taken seriously enough and is subject to controversial, misleading messaging. In my Tier Tuesday slot this week (yes, I know it's a day behind) there's sadly now a Player Three that has entered the game... and it's an old scourge. Polio.

Yes, Polio, a disease thought basically eradicated eradicated decades ago. Polio, the disease that prior to widespread immunization in the 1950s killed people or paralyzed them for life in repeated epidemic outbreaks. Former President Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of its victims. Through 90%+ uptake of a vaccine that was 99% effective we went from tens of thousands of cases a year down to, like, one case every 10-20 years.

Now there's a case in New York. It's a young adult who's unvaccinated. And who hasn't traveled... which means community spread is already happening. And in in New York the vaccination rate is no longer the 93% we once had as a nationwide average but is as low as 37% in some counties. Dumb, vaccine-denying people are making themselves sitting targets for a harmful, deadly disease.

Even worse, vaccine deniers are hurting not only themselves but the rest of us. Virus need human hosts to reproduce in. That's part of why high vaccination rates are important. Unvaccinated people are safe harbors for the virus, places where it can rest, replicate... and even mutate into new strains our vaccines and medicines are less effective against. In the war against viruses, the unvaxxed are like countries that give aid and comfort to terrorists.


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Last Friday was our first day of hiking on a three-day weekend trip to Washington. After we left our hotel in the small town of Chehalis, WA we drove first to the Covel Creek trailhead northeast of Mt. St. Helens in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. We'd cross referenced hiking descriptions for a couple of waterfalls on this trail between various sources— including, yes, Professor Smedley Q. Boredom's Very Dull Book of Waterfalls. But really it was the hiking website AllTrails.com that was the most lucid. ...Which was helpful, because this hike was pretty far out in the boonies.

Signs on the Covel Creek trail are... not really helpful (Aug 2022)

Despite being "out in the boonies" there was some kind of event people in the area were preparing for. Some kind of leadership event. All we encountered were people who were clueless, unfriendly, or both. People who think that a stupid little placard reading "RIGHT TURN to some waterfalls" is a way to mark a trail. I'm not sure what these people are going to be leading. I'm pretty sure, though, I don't want to be a part of it.

This "trail closed" sign was 1 mile in from the trailhead.... (Aug 2022)

Weird and marginally unhelpful signs were kind of a theme on this trail. In addition to multiple of those "some falls" signs printed out by someone who apparently thinks they're being really funny (they're failing at it) there are also several signs stating the trail is closed because the bridges are removed. "Bridge Out Ahead" would be a reasonable warning... if it were at the start of the trail. Instead these signs are posted a mile in from the trailhead. WTF?

Well, we decided, "Bridges? We don't need no stinkin' bridges!"

Bridges? We don't need no stinking bridges! (Covel Creek, Aug 2022)

This reminded me of another set of signs we saw on a different waterfall trail in Washington years ago— "TRAIL CLOSED to weaksauce city folk".

Fortunately the dry creek that was easy to cross had plenty of water flowing not to far upstream.

Waterfalls on Covel Creek, Gifford Pinchot National Forest (Aug 2022)

We passed a number of small waterfalls on Covel Creek.

Waterfalls on Covel Creek, Gifford Pinchot National Forest (Aug 2022)

Neither these two waterfalls (last two photos above) nor other small ones we passed on the trail as we climbed have names. That meant the two named waterfalls, Covel Falls and Angel Falls, would have to be even better, right? Stay tuned for the next blog to see!

Update: In the next blog we not only get to Covel Falls, we walk behind it!

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