random update of random stuff
It's been annoyingly busy at work so I have much less time to do stuff like post. Anyway, a few days ago, I went to McDonald's for lunch since I am easily influenced by advertisements (football commercials). I was pleased to see they added self ordering! So basically, there were two comically large touch screen displays which you go through and order your meal (think like WaWa but a full wall size). You pay and then take a tracker. Then like a few minutes later, an employee brought me my meal. It wasn't bad. I think since I was slightly confused, it took longer than normal ordering, but in general, I like stuff like self-checkout or the Japanese vending machine service and the like. So that's nifty.
Another annoying thing about work right now is that my phone cell doesn't get data (even though it claims to be getting LTE coverage) in my office!!! And it's localized to my office. If I move a couple of offices down, it'll work so I don't know if it's because of the construction/destruction going on around or what, but that's incredibly annoying.
Speaking of annoying, Trump
I'm always torn between if Trump actually plans things to take advantage of stupid people (his base) or if he's just an idiot who has no control. So I can definitely see Trump using wild stupid statements to divert attention away from his general poor job performance. Additionally, it typically works for him to divide his supporters so that they can have a mentality of how he speaks for the unspoken. But at the same time, he's just so idiotic that I wouldn't be surprised if he just couldn't control himself and his supporters are just too dumb to care. Like not even disagreements on issues, but it seems like his supporters will not even acknowledge that he tells lies or makes statements that are immediately proven false. And we're not even talking about standard politician statements like "I support X" while they really don't, but factual statements. But whatever.
So his new idiotic diversion is to be a standard hick and complain about NFL players kneeling during the national anthem. Personally, I think it's a bad protest because (as you can see), it already diverts attention from the cause of the protest. But I definitely think it gets way too much attention with people claiming they'll stop watching games. Sure bro, I'll believe that when I see it. I'm sure you're so offended by someone kneeling during a part of the game which wasn't even widely shown that you'll stop watching.
I also think people who rail about how it offends veterans is quite overblown. Is it disrespectful to veterans? Yes, a bit, especially since there's always an announcement about standing and removing your hat to honor veterans and service men/women (which is why I think it's not a good protest), but it's stated reason is not against veterans. Basically, to me, sitting/kneeling is disrespectful based on the reason and it's clear that the reason isn't to be against veterans or the military. It's anti-police mainly and it's also anti-American (at least from Kaepernick based on statements), but I wouldn't say it's anti-veteran/military. So you can still be against the player's protest, just know the right reason to be against it.
It's such an overblown issue, but I guess people have to report on it now that stupid Trump is so against it. To me, it's really a non-issue since you are watching NFL players for their skill at football, not any sort of political belief. And it's not like this protest is unheard of, there are plenty of similar rallies so whatever.
It's just overblown, just like Colin Kaepernick himself. First, I always thought he was an extremely overrated player. He's basically one of those "the QB of a good time must be good" people. The 49ers were a very good team with Alex Smith and they switched to Kaepernick and continued to be a very good team. Additionally, when the 49ers were a top team, they basically were top in the league in everything EXCEPT passing offense, which is what a quarterback is primarily there for. And if you look at Kaepernick's stats, they're really not that good. His yardage is poor for a modern offense and he basically is just good for TD:INT ratio. He just had some good games during the playoffs so people thought he was great. Plus it was during the time when the running QB was going to change the game.
But when you take away the dominant defense and powerful running game, Kaepernick became a very marginal quarterback. On a team that was down almost every game, he put up rather pedestrian numbers. So the whole idea that he was blackballed because of his beliefs, I think is false. Basically, he's the same boat as Tim Tebow. He gives too much of a headache for a backup quarterback. If Kaep was a starter, he'd probably be in that bottom area of teams who are not happy with their starting QB. And he hurts himself all the time with stuff like comparing NFL owners to slave owners, which killed any prospect at him being the backup in Baltimore.
Anyway, our aquarium has gone through some changes. Since we had extra bioload without Puffy, we added new stuff. Our new additions were zebra danios (actually before Puffy's death), guppies, and African Dwarf frogs. We bought some stuff from Petsmart and I'm not sure if I'm happy with their stuff since several fish died pretty fast when we got them from there. We bought 8 zebra danios and half of them died! We wind up replacing them (since they're a schooling fish) with fancy danios from another pet store. At first, I was worried that they wouldn't get along, but they seem to be schooling together (fancy folk and normal folk). We also bought 9 guppies from Petsmart (to maintain a good male to female ratio) and two of the females died. So I'm not sure if it is the case, but I'll avoid Petsmart fish for a little.
And those African Dwarf frogs are very amusing. And for some reason, NJ requires a permit! So it'll be $10/year for a $4 frog. At least we bought 4 of them to get some value out of our permit. At first, I was very concerned because I read that ADFs can get stuck under large rocks and drown (they're fully aquatic but have to surface to breath). And they're not known to be great swimmers, so larger tanks can be a problem too. So since our tank is larger than recommended and we have rocks (not sure how large is large), I was very concerned the first few days. But after seeing them swim, surface, and generally be alive for a while, I figure they'll fine.
New York Comic Con is in a couple of weeks. We have Friday and Saturday tickets. There are a few panels that caught my eye, but I haven't gone through and make a grid of things. But I tried my costume pieces on the other day. And I think it's pretty good for a last minute, mostly assembled costume. This year, I'll try to search for costume ideas at the actual con so we're not like this next year. Although I kind of think a Mario 3 boot costume would be okay.
The Maze Runner is going okay. I'm actually somewhat surprised that I'm not reading it faster since it's meant for kids. But it's fairly long and I've had less time to concentrate on reading at lunch due to random meetings and having to catch up with random internet stuff. I'd say it's pretty good and interesting enough to continue with. So far, I'd say it's better than the movie, which I thought was good. So I'll continue and be a young adult.
Oh, and we watched the first episode of Star Trek: Discovery yesterday. I thought it was good. I think it was a good mix of old Trek but feeling new. I assume it takes place before TOS and I'm not normally a fan of prequels. I also wasn't a huge fan of how the Klingons looked, but I did like the look of the Starfleet crew. And so far, I like Michael even though she's a bit crazy at times. So I'm pleasantly pleased.
Another annoying thing about work right now is that my phone cell doesn't get data (even though it claims to be getting LTE coverage) in my office!!! And it's localized to my office. If I move a couple of offices down, it'll work so I don't know if it's because of the construction/destruction going on around or what, but that's incredibly annoying.
Speaking of annoying, Trump
I'm always torn between if Trump actually plans things to take advantage of stupid people (his base) or if he's just an idiot who has no control. So I can definitely see Trump using wild stupid statements to divert attention away from his general poor job performance. Additionally, it typically works for him to divide his supporters so that they can have a mentality of how he speaks for the unspoken. But at the same time, he's just so idiotic that I wouldn't be surprised if he just couldn't control himself and his supporters are just too dumb to care. Like not even disagreements on issues, but it seems like his supporters will not even acknowledge that he tells lies or makes statements that are immediately proven false. And we're not even talking about standard politician statements like "I support X" while they really don't, but factual statements. But whatever.
So his new idiotic diversion is to be a standard hick and complain about NFL players kneeling during the national anthem. Personally, I think it's a bad protest because (as you can see), it already diverts attention from the cause of the protest. But I definitely think it gets way too much attention with people claiming they'll stop watching games. Sure bro, I'll believe that when I see it. I'm sure you're so offended by someone kneeling during a part of the game which wasn't even widely shown that you'll stop watching.
I also think people who rail about how it offends veterans is quite overblown. Is it disrespectful to veterans? Yes, a bit, especially since there's always an announcement about standing and removing your hat to honor veterans and service men/women (which is why I think it's not a good protest), but it's stated reason is not against veterans. Basically, to me, sitting/kneeling is disrespectful based on the reason and it's clear that the reason isn't to be against veterans or the military. It's anti-police mainly and it's also anti-American (at least from Kaepernick based on statements), but I wouldn't say it's anti-veteran/military. So you can still be against the player's protest, just know the right reason to be against it.
It's such an overblown issue, but I guess people have to report on it now that stupid Trump is so against it. To me, it's really a non-issue since you are watching NFL players for their skill at football, not any sort of political belief. And it's not like this protest is unheard of, there are plenty of similar rallies so whatever.
It's just overblown, just like Colin Kaepernick himself. First, I always thought he was an extremely overrated player. He's basically one of those "the QB of a good time must be good" people. The 49ers were a very good team with Alex Smith and they switched to Kaepernick and continued to be a very good team. Additionally, when the 49ers were a top team, they basically were top in the league in everything EXCEPT passing offense, which is what a quarterback is primarily there for. And if you look at Kaepernick's stats, they're really not that good. His yardage is poor for a modern offense and he basically is just good for TD:INT ratio. He just had some good games during the playoffs so people thought he was great. Plus it was during the time when the running QB was going to change the game.
But when you take away the dominant defense and powerful running game, Kaepernick became a very marginal quarterback. On a team that was down almost every game, he put up rather pedestrian numbers. So the whole idea that he was blackballed because of his beliefs, I think is false. Basically, he's the same boat as Tim Tebow. He gives too much of a headache for a backup quarterback. If Kaep was a starter, he'd probably be in that bottom area of teams who are not happy with their starting QB. And he hurts himself all the time with stuff like comparing NFL owners to slave owners, which killed any prospect at him being the backup in Baltimore.
Anyway, our aquarium has gone through some changes. Since we had extra bioload without Puffy, we added new stuff. Our new additions were zebra danios (actually before Puffy's death), guppies, and African Dwarf frogs. We bought some stuff from Petsmart and I'm not sure if I'm happy with their stuff since several fish died pretty fast when we got them from there. We bought 8 zebra danios and half of them died! We wind up replacing them (since they're a schooling fish) with fancy danios from another pet store. At first, I was worried that they wouldn't get along, but they seem to be schooling together (fancy folk and normal folk). We also bought 9 guppies from Petsmart (to maintain a good male to female ratio) and two of the females died. So I'm not sure if it is the case, but I'll avoid Petsmart fish for a little.
And those African Dwarf frogs are very amusing. And for some reason, NJ requires a permit! So it'll be $10/year for a $4 frog. At least we bought 4 of them to get some value out of our permit. At first, I was very concerned because I read that ADFs can get stuck under large rocks and drown (they're fully aquatic but have to surface to breath). And they're not known to be great swimmers, so larger tanks can be a problem too. So since our tank is larger than recommended and we have rocks (not sure how large is large), I was very concerned the first few days. But after seeing them swim, surface, and generally be alive for a while, I figure they'll fine.
New York Comic Con is in a couple of weeks. We have Friday and Saturday tickets. There are a few panels that caught my eye, but I haven't gone through and make a grid of things. But I tried my costume pieces on the other day. And I think it's pretty good for a last minute, mostly assembled costume. This year, I'll try to search for costume ideas at the actual con so we're not like this next year. Although I kind of think a Mario 3 boot costume would be okay.
The Maze Runner is going okay. I'm actually somewhat surprised that I'm not reading it faster since it's meant for kids. But it's fairly long and I've had less time to concentrate on reading at lunch due to random meetings and having to catch up with random internet stuff. I'd say it's pretty good and interesting enough to continue with. So far, I'd say it's better than the movie, which I thought was good. So I'll continue and be a young adult.
Oh, and we watched the first episode of Star Trek: Discovery yesterday. I thought it was good. I think it was a good mix of old Trek but feeling new. I assume it takes place before TOS and I'm not normally a fan of prequels. I also wasn't a huge fan of how the Klingons looked, but I did like the look of the Starfleet crew. And so far, I like Michael even though she's a bit crazy at times. So I'm pleasantly pleased.