2023

I promised to be less optimistic in my last annual list of things I'd like to see happen next year.  For the most part, that turned out to be a good idea.  Let's review the 2021 list, with comments in ALL CAPS:

More mandates and life complications for the unvaxxed, making more of them get vaxxed.

I SUPPOSE MORE GOT VAXXED, BUT NOT FOR INVOLUNTARY REASONS

Cryptocurrency regulations.

CLOSE BUT DIDN'T HAPPEN, BUT IT'S A LOT MORE LIKELY NOW THAT BIGSHOTS LOST BIG MONEY IN THE BANKRUPTCY OF FTX.

Prosecutions and convictions of Trump administration / organization officials who had roles in the 1/6/2021 insurrection.

CALLING THIS A YES, BECAUSE ALTHOUGH IT DIDN'T HAPPEN YET FOR ADMIN FOLKS, IT DID FOR MANY OTHER INDIVIDUALS.

A Winter Olympics that actually happens.

CHECK.  BUT IT WAS SORTA BORING.

An executive order, at the least, to loosen federal rules on cannabis.

YES THIS DID HAPPEN, BUT IT'S ONLY A PYRRHIC VICTORY WITHOUT ACUTAL LEGISLATIVE ACTION.

A top-tier Minnesota Vikings football team.

12-3 AS I WRITE THIS, SO I GUESS IT'S A YES?

A loss of market cap and credibility for Facebook/Meta.

A GIANT YES.

Me playing golf at a famous course / resort.

NO.

A decline in residential home buying.

ANOTHER GIANT YES, THANKS TO HIGHER INTEREST RATES.

A repeat from 2020 – me traveling to the final four U.S. states in which I’ve never set foot.

75% YES SINCE I GOT TO 3 OF THE 4.  ONLY ALASKA LEFT NOW.

Now for my new annual list of things I'd like to see happen next year.

A rising stock and bond market.

That Vladimir Putin is purged as a leader.  Any mysterious and/or violent way is acceptable.

Newly remodeled bathrooms in my house.

Me attending a major sporting event.

Elon Musk leaves Twitter, or I leave Twitter for another similar service.

Drought relief for the western U.S.

Me getting a golfing hole-in-one or eagle.

MAGA-death, and a crop of moderate presidential candidates for 2024 who aren't aged 70s or 80s.

More acceptance and usage of plant-based proteins.

Best Song Lyrics (Part XXI)

Last week, a list of Rolling Stone magazine’s 100 greatest singers from 2008 resurfaced in the Twitterverse.  Like most things on Twitter, people were complaining about it – the inclusions, omissions, and placing of names on the list.

Buried there at #37, probably a lot higher than he deserved, was Neil Young.  I never thought he was a great singer, and I’m not sure why Rolling Stone magazine thought that, but he was and is a great and prolific songwriter, going back to the early days with the groups Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young.

It’s his solo stuff that most will remember, although it isn’t easy to remember everything given his nearly 50-year long solo career.   Always pushing a message of social justice and change, one of his biggest hits was a song released in the late 1980’s, when he was already (incorrectly) considered to be in the late stages of his career…..

Called Rockin’ In The Free World, it was about a U.S. president whose policies he didn’t agree with at the time,  Imagine what he thinks about the current president, given today’s low standards.

There's colors on the street
Red, white and blue
People shufflin' their feet
People sleepin' in their shoes
But there's a warnin' sign
On the road ahead
There's a lot of people sayin'
We'd be better off dead
Don't feel like Satan,
But I am to them
So I try to forget it,
Any way I can

Keep on rockin' in the free world,
Keep on rockin' in the free world
Keep on rockin' in the free world,
Keep on rockin' in the free world.

I see a woman in the night
With a baby in her hand
Under an old street light
Near a garbage can
Now she puts the kid away,
And she's gone to get a hit
She hates her life,
And what she's done to it
There's one more kid
That will never go to school
Never get to fall in love,
Never get to be cool

(Chorus)

We got a thousand points of light
For the homeless man
We got a kinder, gentler,
Machine gun hand
We got department stores
And toilet paper
Got styrofoam boxes
For the ozone layer
Got a man of the people,
Says keep hope alive
Got fuel to burn,
Got roads to drive

(Chorus)

A Good Use Of Twitter (Redux)

Not quite three years ago, I blogged about using Twitter to share jokes, and listed a few of them.  I consider this one of the best uses for Twitter, at least as good as passing along information, and far better than the bullying, narcissistic activity for which most use it (including a certain president).

I follow several comedians / writers on Twitter, and I love to read short, smart jokes.  It works a bit better now that Twitter now allows 280 characters in stead of 140.  It's also fun to see professionals burn intellectually and ethically-challenged ideas and individuals (including a certain president).

The other day I came across a Twitter account that has archived their favorite jokes from what they considered the best Twitter jokers.  I had a great time laughing out loud to some of them, so similar to what I did in 2016, here are more of my favorites:

There's no I in anxiety. Wait. Yes, there is. Oh my god oh my god oh my god

The best part about being a walrus is probably never having to buy a staple remover.

Do you even know what condescending means?

I'll have a rum and coke

Is pepsi ok?

Whatever

*hands you a pepsi and a coke*

Wait what do you mean Jesus loves me? Did he say something to you? OMG I'm freaking out right now tell me his exact words.

Choose a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life, because you'll never get that job.

A Good Use Of Twitter

Several weeks ago, there was some media attention given to Twitter's tenth anniversary.  Some of that attention focused on the negatives of Twitter, namely that it makes some people believe they're more important than they really are.  (I'm looking at you, B-list celebrities and athletes.)

However, one article I read was someone's list of the 100 funniest jokes in the history of Twitter.  It seems odd, but while some jokes are funny when spoken, others only work in print.  The latter is one of the best things about Twitter, and it's made even better by the fact they have to work in 140 characters or less.  The joke has to be short, therefore, it has to be smart.

Here are a few of my favorites from that list of 100, most of which would only work in print:

Most cutting thing you can say is "who's this clown?" because it implies they're a) a clown & b) not even one of the better-known clowns

ME: honey, it's really muggy out today
WIFE: if I go outside & all our mugs are on the front lawn, I'm leaving u
ME: *sips coffee from bowl*

When you’re cutting wrapping paper and your scissors start to glide is what I imagine heroin feels like

[ordering cake over phone]
"and what would you like the cake to say?"
[covers phone to ask wife]
"do we want a talking cake?"

"Anybody here named Jeff?"
Jeff: "Yes"
Geoff: "Yeos"

The best thing about trying to name a baby is realizing how many people you hate

-The name's Bond. James Bond.
-I've written Bond now.
-Oh. Can you change it or is it too late?
-When your coffee's ready they'll call Bond

I put the "baller" in "I just ruined my daughter's ballerina recital."

COP: u were swerving a lot so i have to conduct a sobriety test
ME: ok
COP: lets get taco bell
ME: no
COP: text ur ex
ME: no
COP: ok ur good

When parents say to kids "go to ur room & think about what you've done" it's really good practice for what you'll do every night as an adult

What my girlfriend thought, first 4 dates:
1. Nice shirt.
2. Wow. A second nice shirt.
3. Okay, first shirt again.
4. He has two shirts.

(•_•) (•_•)
<) )╯ ALAS
/ \

(•_•)
\(•_•)
( (> POOR
/ \

(•_•)
<) )> YORICK
/ \ (•_•)

Ruining A Great Invention

The internet, as we know it, has been around since roughly 1990.  It was only for sending and receiving text at first, but by the mid-to-late 1990s, the World Wide Web became available.  This allowed us to electronically visit places (web sites) with pictures and later videos, which we would ultimately be able to pass along to others.

With that brief history of the internet in mind, I would compare it to any of mankind’s greatest inventions.  It may not be quite up there with the alphabet or the automobile, but it’s at least in the conversation with the printing press.

Unfortunately, that conversation would have to include whether the internet is now used as much for evil as it is for good, thanks in part to the proliferation of Facebook / Twitter / social media.  I don’t just mean terrorist type evil, either.  I mean the little bits of evil, things like trolling and bullying, and lies that get passed along as fact and influence behavior in a negative way.

I’m not the most internet-connected person, yet not a day goes by that I don’t see a false or questionable internet-sourced item that’s presented as fact.  (This is particularly true in national political election years like this one.)  It happened to me today, it happened to me yesterday, it will surely happen to me tomorrow.

I’m usually skeptical enough to figure it out on my own (sometimes with the help of snopes.com) but let’s face it, most people swallow whatever they’re sent as the truth.  That wouldn’t be so bad, but in our instant gratification world, those fake-truth-swallowers not only agree with what they see, they also have to affirm it, often by sending it along to other fake-truth-swallowers.

Using the internet in this way this isn’t good for civilization, but short of another evil called censorship, there are no rules of engagement to keep it from happening.  That’s a shame, really, for one of the greatest inventions of all-time.

Lessons From A Drunk

One of the big news stories in Iowa this week also gained some nationwide attention - a drunk girl was arrested at the University of Iowa football game.  Doesn't sound like much, does it?  How was it different than the other 100 or so arrests (typical number for every Iowa home football game), most of them also alcohol related?

Two things: 1) Her blood alcohol content was 0.341%, and 2) she bragged about it on Twitter and it went viral.  I'm not sure which of those two things is more stupid, but let's explore the first thing.

Until now, I hadn't really paid attention to how drunk one could get without dying of alcohol poisoning.  So I did a little Google research, and got a bunch of facts(?) from Wikipedia.

Turns out a .341% blood alcohol content isn't even Twitter-worthy.  There are many documented cases (which is to say, people were arrested) in the U.S. of over .5%, and some over .7%.  In fact, this drunk Iowa girl was only halfway to the state record of .627% which was apparently set just a year ago.

And don't even get me started on the international scale, where there are numerous incidents of folks whose blood alcohol was tested to be OVER 1%!  More impressively, some of them were still conscious!

[Yes, I know, this is from Wiki and might be a total fabrication - but you should still look at the entry on blood alcohol content.]

What lesson(s) can be learned here?  I mean, besides not bragging about being stupid, especially when it's about something that isn't as epic as it first sounds.

How about this for a lesson - a civilized society should not accept and glorify alcohol substance abuse, while at the same time attaching a stigma to (and incarcerate) those who would casually smoke marijuana.  Tell me which substance is more likely to make people do stupid and dangerous things.....

I'm waiting.

The Ten, Make That Nine, Habits of Very Organized People. Make That Ten.

Just finished reading Steve Martin's new book, The Ten, Make That Nine, Habits of Very Organized People.  Make That Ten.  Just that title should be enough to make you laugh and want to read it.

If the title isn't enough, then how about this:  It's a book of some of his tweets over the past year, and it takes less than an hour to read.

Anyone who follows him on Twitter know his tweets usually come in bunches, over the course of a day, typically on a single event or topic.  You don't need to be a lifelong Steve Martin fan like me in order to appreciate how he uses social media for both his own enjoyment, and the enjoyment of others.

Here's an example of a stream of his Tweets from the book, about the iPhone:

"A watched iPhone never syncs."

"My iPhone is now lip-syncing."

"iPhone just synced perfectly with toaster. All is well."

"iPhone and computer heading off to hotel spa for leisurely afernoon sync. Back in 4 hours, they said."

"iPhone and computer came back from spa with DIFFERENCT DONNECTOR CORD. Is something going on?"

Now that's tweet comedy!

The Social Media Trifecta

After months, even years, of avoidance and threats, last week I joined the world of Facebook.  I consider this to be the third leg of the social media trifecta:  Blog, Twitter, and Facebook.  (Yes, I'm on LinkedIn as well, but there's no practical social element to that, that's all business.)

On balance, this is a good thing.  Facebook has become a primary means of communication for a lot of people, so if you want to deliver a message, you'd better include that in your communication toolbox.

Unfortunately, social media complicates your life before it simpifies it.  For one, there's going to be a learning curve.  For two, I need to figure out the most efficient and effective use for it, both personally and professionally.  For three, I need to decide whom I want to see it, and whom I don't, if anyone.

Near term, one thing I'll use it for is to point people to this blog.  I got as many Facebook friends in one day as I have Twitter follows.  Goes to show you, adults are using Facebook, but not Twitter.  (I've thought for a long time that that's kind of strange, since Twitter is so much easier to use.)

Would you like to be my Facebook friend?

Smart Phones, Dumb Users

Back when cells phones evolved into a device that one could easily carry around, I would shake my head at the self-important people I worked with who deemed it necessary to answer their phone no matter the situation. I worked at a trade association, for God's sake - I'm pretty sure there was no regulatory or lobbying emergency that couldn't wait.

With the advent of smart phones, things have not gotten better. Smart phones have now allowed people to show everyone in the room how important and busy they are, without even receiving a call. People are texting, emailing, checking social media sites, and attending to all sorts of other unnecessary tasks during meetings.

Some people use the excuse of "multi-tasking" to explain away their behavior. Gimme a break. The truth is, smart phones are a drug for self-important people addicted to making themselves appear they must be available 24/7.

Earth-to-all-self-important-people: There is a time and a place for using personal devices, and meetings are NOT one of those times. So, if you're one of those people who just must play with your smart phone (or iPad) while you're supposed to be listening, get over yourself and get back to work, you obnoxious technology jerk.

How To Tell If Something Is Fake

This time of the year there are an awful lot Santas out there. So how can people tell the real Santa from all of the fakers? It's simple really. The dude at the end of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is the real Santa. Anything else you see between then and Christmas Eve is just a faker, or as I told my kids, Santa's helper. God-given common sense should tell you the real Santa has too much to do at the North Pole!

Fake Santas may not be the best example of how to tell if something is real, but God-given common sense is. This brings me to today's actual topic: Bristol Palin's Facebook Page.

I don't use Facebook; I'm still trying to figure out how to leverage my Twitter account. However, Facebook-ers often use it to communicate crazy things that get mainstream media play. Bristol used it this week to defend herself against a fellow Dancing With The Stars contestant, Margaret Cho, who blogged that Bristol's politically famous mother, Sarah, made her do the show.

It would be perfectly fine and even righteous for Bristol to defend herself using her Facebook page - if it was really her writing the entries. If anyone reads the Cho defense entry, and compares it to the actual verbal quotes of this in-over-her-head (like her mother) kid, no one with any God-given common sense could believe that she actually wrote it.

Let's deconstruct it: She uses the word "canard". She refers to her mother's "bestselling book, Going Rogue". She even makes an analogy that includes KD Lang and the Indigo Girls! When someone who normally communicates at an 8th grade level ends up writing something that sophisticated, and with political innuendo, my 'faker' radar goes off.

So that same God-given common sense tells me this entry was written by a Sarah Palin political operative for damage control. Normally that would be fine - most 'celebrities' and executives use publicists or ghost writers to write statements or even books. But a Sarah Palin ghost writer on her own daughter's Facebook page? It sort of gives Cho's blog entry credibility - that Mama Grizzly is controlling what her kids say and do.

In a way, I feel for Bristol. She didn't sign up to be a Palin, to be under the microscope, and criticism sucks, especially through the media. But when Bristol signed up for reality TV (and the cash that came with it), she put herself on the media-watch list. (Um, that is assuming it really was her and not her mom that made her do it.)

The best path for Bristol now is to live her life with a quiet confidence, and stay out of the limelight a la Chelsea Clinton at her age. In the meantime, she can hope her mom's political ambitions don't take over her life.

Thoughts on RAGBRAI 2010

For the uninitiated, RAGBRAI stands for the Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. It's a weeklong trek of about 10,000 bicyclists, who ride roughly 60-80 miles per day from the western to eastern border of Iowa. (If you need to know more go to ragbrai.com.)

2010 marked the 38th RAGBRAI. I've been on all or parts of 9 or 10 of them, including the third RAGBRAI when I was just short of 11 years old. Owning a 10-speed bike was a big deal then; helmets and biking jerseys were not.

This year I rode from Sioux City to Storm Lake on Sunday (72 miles) and Storm Lake to Algona on Monday (100 miles). (If you followed me on Twitter at @streffbuddy, you'd have received rolling updates!) RAGBRAI has evolved over the years, and mostly in a good way, with a few exceptions. Here are my thoughts from this year's ride:

*The average age of riders keeps going up. The aren't so many in the 20-29 age group anymore, and that used to be the main age not so long ago. RAGBRAI is slightly more family-friendly now, and it's mostly comprised of people in their 30s and 40s, and plenty in their 50s.

*RAGBRAI riders used to be in better shape than they are now. About half of today's riders would be considered overweight, and wearing tight bike shorts doesn't help their appearance. This may be correlated to the average age being higher, but it more directly correlates with Americans' poor diets. Even factoring in what can be burned off during a 450 mile week of bike riding, I'd say many riders have a net weight during RAGBRAI week, plue they generally eat and drink too much and don't exercise enough for the other 51 weeks of the year.

*Speaking of caloric intake, while there is a lot of food and beer consumed during the ride, there really aren't enough food and beverage vendors along the way. I think most communities on the route simply can't get their mind around how much eating and drinking is done by the thousands of riders in a short period of time. Lines have become way too long. In conjunction with this, there aren't enough portable toilets, either. Plenty of tall corn on the roadsides, though.

*The ride and riders are much safer now. I never saw a single rider without a helmet. Law enforcement keeps vehicles off of the route in both directions, and there are ambulances dispersed at short intervals. Still, there were several crashes, some serious. I personlly saw two riders go down crossing some railroad tracks. (They were going slow so they were not seriously injured, other than bruised egos.)

*What once was a given on RAGBRAI - church-run pie stands - has suddenly become obsolete. I saw a total of two places selling pie, in two days, and one of them had run out. It seems like the only sweets being sold on the route now are cookies and bars. I'm used to having one or two pieces of fruit pie every day on the ride. WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO THE PIE ON RAGBRAI?

In summary, RAGBRAI is still a fun and challenging endeavor. Everybody should put it on their bucket list, at least for a day or two.

Leveraging Twitter

I've been a Twitter-user (http://twitter.com/streffbuddy) for a couple of months now. I say this not to advertise, but to answer all those who simply ask me, and others who use Twitter, "Why?"

Although Twitter markets itself as something that lets others know what you are doing, I've discovered that there are better and more practical applications. Twitter allows people to pass along very brief thoughts and opinions that occur to them at random moments. These might be original, or 're-tweets' that come from other sources.

In a very short time, and while only following a few others on Twitter, I've read a lot of great information and material, much of it very funny, that I never otherwise would have. Most of it is interesting stuff to me, which partly goes to the fact that I'm only going to follow the Tweets of people whom I choose.

In the future I can surely envision using Twitter for business purposes, to remind contacts of what I'm doing or about something newsy in the investment world. In a similar vein, I've used it in the past to let people know that I've made a new post to this blog.

Of course, the catch is to get those people to follow my Tweets. Now that might take some advertising.