February 2019

Manifest.

Photo from IMDB.

So Earl and I have been watching NBC’s Manifest. It’s on Monday nights at 10:00 PM Eastern/9:00 PM Central (yay for Central time!)

The show is fairly uneven. If you’re not familiar with the storyline, basically Flight 828, en route from Jamaica to New York, goes through some really rough turbulence and then is diverted to Stewart Airport (after being turned away from JFK). The kicker? When the flight lands it’s 5 1/2 years after it left Jamaica.

I hope they got a meal during that long ass flight.

Anything with airplanes is going to get my attention, so Earl and I subscribed to the dreaded Monday night slot on NBC. I’m always hesitant to watch anything Sci-Fi like on NBC because they start getting weird with the series by either throwing the storyline into a weird tangent (Heroes) or just killing the show without warning (The Event). However, Manifest was cleared for a full season, which is somewhat comforting.

Honestly, it feels like the writers aren’t sure as to what they want the show to be. Is it Sci Fi? Is it supernatural? Is it a soap opera? Is it Dynasty? Twists, turns, ins, outs, so many ways for the story to go.

Not to give too much away in case you want to watch the show when it’s bingeable, the folks on the flight that was lost for 5 1/2 years suddenly have subtle yet very present “callings”. We don’t know what’s causing them, we don’t know what they mean all the time, but as time moves on they become more and more frequent and intense. Psychic stuff? Fortune telling? Who knows.

At times the story is plodding along at a snail’s pace. It’s during these moments that you start to notice that some of the acting is a little wooden or the special effects are a little less than what one would expect in 2019, but because I’m a fan of these types of shows, I am forgiving. There are times when I reach for the iPhone or something because the story is moving along so slowly. There’s romantic triangles and occasionally a bit of family drama mixed in but we are still finding it tolerable.

We never watched “Lost” so we don’t know how much like “Lost” this show is turning out to be. It’s twisty and turny, which is good. I just hope the writers resolve the mysteries before this show comes to an end.

And we don’t know when that will be.

A couple of stray observations (without spoilers):

  • None of the men apparently own a razor
  • I found it easy to mix up the characters of Grace and Autumn but that could be my thing
  • One episode must have been sponsored by Chevrolet because there’s a lot of Silverado going on
  • The head mean person will look familiar
  • The New York locales look honest and filmed on location
  • Did the NYSDMV issue special license plates for television shows, because prop plates on all New York based shows begin with “Q” these days
5 February 2019 by Everyone's A Critic. 0

Mean.

The sign in the median is just mean.

And dangerously inaccurate.

4 February 2019 by Geek 0

Disconnected.

I felt like today was a good day to start taking a break from Twitter again. Normally I can thread myself through the flames from the dumpster fire and make the experience enjoyable, especially when I concentrate on my connections with geeks and pilots, but after wading through some especially robust idiocy this morning I decided enough was enough.

I started out my Twitter experience by blocking the keyword “Trump”. but that went against my belief that if you’re going to Twitter, you should Twitter all the way. So the keyword blocking lasted for just an hour or so. During that time, the idiot in chief went ahead and said we had to build the wall before a caravan of immigrants arrived at the border, and his bots and followers all chanted yes in unabandoned idiocy, so I decided it would be best to just step away for a bit.

By the way, this post will still auto post to Twitter because I haven’t turned off that connection. I’ll be doing that after I finish this post.

I would like to think that I’m stepping away from Twitter forever, but you know and I know that won’t be the case. So I’m stepping away from Twitter for now.

At least until I have the mental capacity to deal with it again.

4 February 2019 by Political BS. 0

Exploration.

I am taking advantage of the warmer weather and out on an exploration adventure in The Second City today. I love being able to jump on the ‘L’, get off at a random stop, and start walking around to get to know other neighborhoods. I know what stops are safer than others so I’m smart about the whole process. I know many fear the city of Chicago, especially those that subscribe to the fear based leadership we have running the country these days, but Chicago is a beautiful city all year ’round and I love finding out what it has to offer.

I might walk home from my current location. That would definitely get my steps in for the day. From where I am in the West Loop, it’d take about an hour.

It’s a great day to explore.

3 February 2019 by Fun and Games Dept 0

Data.

ABC News is reporting the Trump Administration is not sure if they separated thousands of more children from their families at the southern border. They’re not sure about this because they haven’t been keeping track. There’s little in the way of records of these separations.

Heartbreaking doesn’t even to begin to describe how I feel about this.

Even if you believe that it’s right for the United States to separate families trying to immigrate here, you have to admit that the United States Government should be responsible in keeping track of who belongs to whom. I can’t get my blood drawn in my doctor’s office without citing my birth date multiple times and confirming my identity, I can’t imagine why anyone in any position of authority wouldn’t implement some sort of tracking system for these children.

I mentioned on Twitter that I would write the web application needed to do this. Since the Trump Administration has claimed that the numbers aren’t that big, then it makes sense that the database to track these individuals wouldn’t need to be very large. I could write something in a weekend to accomplish this; I’m sure teams of government IT officials could write something better and faster in the same amount of time.

The process would be quite simple:

  1. A child must wear a wrist band, much like what we wear in the hospital, at all times. The wrist band has a unique identification number on it.
  2. All of the child’s data is stored in a simple database tracking their whereabouts. It could also be used to track food or medical allergies, medicinal needs, schedule information, and psychosocial notes on the child.
  3. The guardian’s information would be entered into the same database and tied to the child’s ID number. A photo of the guardian would be entered into the database as well.
  4. The guardian would be given an official certificate with the ID number on it. Without this certificate, the guardian would not have access to the child.
  5. To regain access after whatever bureaucratic red tape was cut through, the guardian would have to present the “completion report” and the certificate, with a photo match taking place as well, for the guardian to regain custody of their child.

It’s not hard. Not difficult at all. But the gross incompetence of Homeland Security and ICE has created a mess that really should be treated like a crime against humanity. What they’ve done is just inhumane.

No child should be separated from their guardian if the child is not in harm’s way. The United States should not be putting the guardian in harm’s way. I don’t care if they’re coming from Mexico, Brazil, South Africa, France, or Venus. What the U.S. is doing is wrong.

And with just a little bit of effort, it could be a little less wrong. But there’s no interest in that when you’re part of the puffed up chest party.

It is such a dark moment in the history of this once great nation. I really hope this nightmare ends soon.

2 February 2019 by Why. 1

About J.P.

Just a guy with a husband. We’ve been together 28 years and he still makes me see fireworks on a daily basis. Hiker. Storm Chaser. Private Pilot. Tech Guy. Hackerish.

Weird? Eccentric!

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