FrankL

So I've been working on the new digital storefront for work since late November. Marketing provided the mockup, and I am in charge of making the template/css/etc work. Note that I've been doing this project for more than a month.

Yesterday afternoon we get a list of changes from corporate branding. Changes not just to some of the things we've done (those changes happen). Changes to the mockup! In the words of my six year old, "Are you kidding me!"

I'm posting this because I want to give praise to my boys, but I can't post this to Facebook. You'll see why.

On Sunday, we got word that the parents of a family at church had just lost their overtime hours at their jobs. They have 4 children still at home (and the father has 4 living with their mother). As such, they have to scale back Christmas for the kids. My wife and I decided to help them. She told our boys yesterday morning about this, three of the kids are in the same Sunday school class. She then said, "Would you like to help them?"

These two boys, 6 and 8, got their money envelopes, pulled out 50 cents to keep for their Royal Ranger dues, and gave her the rest of the money.

Siberian tiger becomes unlikely friends with a goat it was given to eat

 

This goat is boned...

 

Agreed. Just biding his time.

I'd give that whirl.

FWIW the... punishment has yet to be meted out; the girls have appealed to the SCOI.  India does seem to get way more medieval the further out into the boonies you are.

I'm reading Around the World in 80 Days to my boys right now. The trip through India involves rescuing Auoda from a suttee. I had to stop and explain quite a bit.

Dreamed I was remodeling the downstairs bathroom and found two large spiders. One was yellow, the other blue. While trying to hit the yellow one, the blue one bit my toe. I woke up, kicking my feet.

Well, how did it go? 

Was a good sermon with a nice response. Ephesians 6, Armor of God.

I know how Dr. David Marcus felt. Sometimes, even though protomatter is highly unstable and condemned by every ethical scientist in the Federation, it will solve certain problems. And that's what I keep thinking of as I look as this mess of code before me.

Though many of the Wal Mart employees here in Knoxville are anxious to work on Black Friday. The store was hit by a small tornado two weeks ago and is only partially open. Employees are on leave and reduced shifts while the building is repaired.

Got a big surprise this morning. The head pastor called and he's snowed in where he went for a funeral the other day. I'm preaching tomorrow. I have never finished sermon prep this fast!

The Boston Symphony performed Beethoven's Ninth recently. There's a 20 minute stretch where the double bassists have nothing to do. Instead of sitting there twiddling their thumbs, they decided to hit the tavern next door. After slamming down a few beers, one of them looked at his watch and said, "Oh. we're late!"

Another said, "Not to worry. I tied the last few pages together of the conductor's sheet music together with string. It'll take him a bit to get it undone."

Once they stumbled back in their place, a woman in the audience saw the conductor looking nervous. She mentioned this to her companion.

"Of course," her date replied. "It's the bottom of the ninth, the score is tied, and the bassists are loaded."

I did not know all of that about him, but I was correct by the end.

Let's see. The Germans, Swedes, and Polish are ticked at their leaders bringing in all the refugees. Now the French are being drug to the party. Greeks, Northern Italians. Hungary, Croatia. Powder keg over there.

My wife is doing a series at church on the founding of America, of course that means Pilgrims. As she's researching, she keeps finding new things related to what she's looking at and trying to figure out the why for that event.

"I can't believe this. I've just got to pick a time and stop. Did you know the Pilgrims spent time in Holland before coming to America?"

"Yes, I did."

"Do you know why they left?"

"No."

"This happened, and this happened. And Holland and Spain were coming to the end of their peace treaty. War might have broken out. Now, that war happened because of this and this. And that all happened because of the Spanish Inquisition!"

"What? Nobody could have expected that!"

Not allowed to know he had been fine for a month after initial treatment? Inconceivable!

Bolt and the Wrecking Crew would be working to stop the monsters without killing them. Once they found the cauldron, Bolt would remember reading about it long ago (but he thought it was just a story inspired by a legend). If the night turned against the heroes, he would climb into the cauldron to stop it.

I was talking to a coworker today about a project that will simply things in our department once implemented. He said, "The biggest issue right now, but we aren't at the point where we can address it, is to find out who uses the data in these old tables. We know some people are using them, but not who."

I said, "Turn off the update routines and see who screams."

He glanced at me sideways. "That's always an option I consider."

God bless, BB! So glad to hear that.

Yikes! That's rough. Prayers for you.

Oh, there was one other aspect I meant to comment upon: I like that the daily announcement of each match included only the character names, and not the team or player names. Ideally, that's what each match should be about: the two (our four) characters in the arena, not whose characters they are or which team they play for. I found that having only the character names given helped me, at least subconsciously, to eliminate (or at least reduce) my own biases and vote strictly based on the character I thought would win.

 

So I'd vote for keeping that aspect going forward as well.

The same. I found in the past that even when I tried to eliminate my biases, knowing it was X's team made me more likely to vote for or against the character. Even trying to ignore those biases didn't always work.

However, most matches didn't include if they were powerless peril or no equipment. I imagine that I voted inappropriately (not realizing that Punisher* wouldn't have his guns sorta thing).

*Selected as the example because he wasn't drafted.

You do not mess with the son of Odin when he is hungover!

(Shut up and take my money!)

I think what I like about the Earth-2 Wells is he isn't fattening them up for the feast, whether he's good or evil. The Earth-1 Wells was good at telling everyone exactly what they needed to hear in a way they admired. This one clearly cannot edit his own thoughts, he says whatever he thinks is the case, whether it's right to do so or not.

So E2 Wells is Donald Trump.

Personally I wasn't a fan of Dr. Light in this. I guess the Arena games has made me rather sympathetic to Kimiyo Hoshi as Dr. Light. And given the shows strong use of scientifically minded folk, I guess part of me was thinking that if a Dr. Light was introduced it would be that version. But C'est la vie. Kimiyo is far from the go to person for Dr. Lights.

As soon as they named Dr. Light as the villain, I thought, "Foreign Orchid is going to be so disappointed!"

Also like the name "Breachers." I didn't hear anyone use it before Cisco, and he's the one to come up with good names.

Cisco getting a date was awesome. Then I realized who it was with and I pumped my fist into the air!

Had to look that up to see who. Now the humor of his denial being a meta to her is even better. Isn't there a trope about two supers out on a date trying to keep their secrets from each other and circumstances forcing them to find out/reveal? Is Cisco going to be the babe magnet of the show? First Golden Glider and now Hawkgirl. He's already the fanboy everyman.

I didn't like Jay leaving either. He doesn't think Barry is ready so he's out?

I'm very curious about the statement from Dr. Light that she can't live on Earth 1 unless she kills her double or Barry. Why kill the double? Well, the writers do a good job of leaving mysteries for later.

In the golden age comics, they had multiple kinds of Kryptonite with a range of effects. Blue was beneficial to Kryptonians. Green, kills. Red had a random effect each time (depending on the writer, this was fantastic or a flop). Gold would remove their powers. I heard DC has kept the kinds of K down these days, but using a teeny bit of gold to make that dampening field would have been a nice hat tip. But then, if they want to change it to a killing field with a switch, green makes more sense. Though gold could remove powers permanently (if that's what the story needed, see "Once There was a Superman". I never found the second part, but always assumed he either got his powers back in it, or the editor said, "Now we see what the world would have been like if Superman had picked up that red and golden rock that day. Be thankful that this is merely a what-if and there really is a Superman!").