Such a lively audience. Here’s Silver Convention from 1975 with “Get Up and Boogie”.
The “that’s right” has been sampled a LOT.
November 2019
Bliss.
Even though I’m an Apple guy, I’m not afraid to admit that one of my favorite desktop backgrounds, or wallpapers, of all time is the “Bliss” wallpaper from Windows XP. A couple years after the release of that iconic version of Windows, an updated version of the Bliss wallpaper was released with some of the newer themes that were available at the time. This wallpaper then took top spot of my favorites.
Bill Gates once said “Bliss” was inspired by that feeling you get lying in the grass watching the clouds go by. I totally feel that when I see this wallpaper.
Another multimedia feature I’ve always enjoyed was the startup sounds from the pre-release version of Windows Vista, called Longhorn. It’s a shame this sound never made it to the finished product; I always thought it had a wonderful, soothing sound to it instead of the tinkles they settled on for the official release.
I use Windows 10 at work and it makes more bonks and boings than I care to think about. I keep the sound turned down on my speakers because the various warning noises break my concentration.
I guess I need more bliss.
Politics.
We had the impeachment hearings on all day today. Earl was sending text messages from the living room to my home office when the big stuff happened and if I wasn’t in a meeting I would run out to see what was going on, shake my head a bit, wonder why Trump is still in the White House, and then I’d go back to my office and do some more work while I had Twitter scrolling by on my iPad.
We now have the Democratic Debates running this evening. I’m getting pretty burned out on politics today. However, I can’t help but feel that I need to be tuned into what’s going on to make sensible choices in the upcoming votes coming along in the next year.
Look, I’ll admit that I don’t have a lot of confidence in the American people doing the right thing in 2020. The Democrats have to have such a incredibly solid candidate to beat Trump in 2020 and right now there’s so much uncertainty and ‘pie in the sky’ chatter. That is, of course, assuming Trump is the GOP candidate come next November.
I’m not a political strategist. Last time I voted I scanned my ballot into the wrong machine (we have two precincts voting in the same location here in the neighborhood). But I floated this idea around the thinking of the GOP: they admit Trump/Pence really are criminals and convince resignations. Pence resigns, Nikki Haley goes in as VP with a promise to pardon Trump, who resigns due to health issues (see the visit to Walter Reed last weekend), and boom, the GOP has given the United States of America their first female president by way of Nikki Haley.
Hey, at least it’s not Sarah Palin.
I believe this would energize the GOP base, even the middle of the road folks who feel disenfranchised by the current administration and it could swing some middle of the road Democrats who are not enjoying the promises of higher taxes and forced medical insurance plans. Likely to happen? Probably not. Plausible? Yes. But ultimate I don’t believe the GOP is that smart.
It’s going to be a very long year to the 2020 Presidential Election. As painful as it is, I feel a duty to pay attention to what’s going on.
Fasten your seat belts.
Break.
Apple prides itself on the way their Apple Watch inspires you to be fit and healthy. As people around the world stand up in unison at 10 minutes to the top of the hour, they do so because their Apple Watch just reminded them that standing is healthy and you should stand at least once an hour for half of the day.
Everyday.
Without fail.
Stand up.
Everyday.
On the 50th minute.
The problem with Apple Watch is that without a bunch of setting changes, it will never give you a break. You will be reminded that yesterday you did better than you’re doing today and with a little effort you can do better today than you did yesterday. It’s a cheery bit of guilt to keep on exercise. Never take a break. Close those rings every day. Do not stop. Do not rest. Keep on closing those rings.
Our bodies need rest. We need rest once in a while to give our body a chance to rebuild that which we’ve been working. If we don’t rest we plateau. We get tired. We get cranky.
I think I’m using the “royal” we now.
I appreciate what Apple is trying to do but I think their approach needs a bit of refinement.
And a donut once in a while.
Recycled.
I was browsing through some YouTube videos of 80s music and this song kept coming up as a recommendation. I don’t remember hearing this song at all back in the day, so I took a listen.
If you know 80s pop music, try listening to this video with your eyes closed. Ignore the lyrics and I’m pretty sure you’ll hear “I Heard A Rumour” by Bananarama.
A quick peek at Wikipedia confirmed my suspicions.
Reminisce.
So first the time in a long while I’m sitting at a Panera eating dinner while writing a blog entry. Two of the family members are off to a Blackhawks game, so I took the opportunity to go to the airport to talk airplanes with fellow pilots. It was a great discussion and I’m looking forward to new aviation adventures in the near future.
There’s a reason I haven’t sought out a Panera experience since moving to Chicagoland. When we lived in the Mohawk Valley of upstate N.Y. going to Panera was a wild Saturday night in the ‘burbs. Folks traveled from near and far to go to that Panera and we were among their number.
Here in Chicago? Not so much. I mean, it’s nice, it even exceeds adequate, but regardless of the location it’s the same experience no matter where you are.
Support your local businesses.
I thought it’d be fun to eat dinner at Panera again before heading back into the city, and the experience is absolutely adequate, but nothing is really blowing up my skirt.
At least I’m not hungry anymore.
Meandering.
As a private pilot I sometimes take great delight in just going up to meander in the sky.
Guilty.
I’m a bad gay in that I’m not particularly a fan of Barbra Streisand. Isn’t that awful? Gay men and lesbians alike lose their minds when she hits the stage but I just think, “yeah, she’s not bad”. I enjoy her motivation and her stamina but I don’t get all breathless when she sings. Nevertheless, I do enjoy some of her work and whenever I eat pasta the 1980 hit “Guilty” goes through my head.
On a never-ending quest to lose weight I strive to eat healthy more often than when I’m not eating healthy. Pasta is sort of a no-no in the “my, but look at the size of your spare tire” clique, but sometimes I want some pasta. My husband tries to help the situation by buying protein leaning pasta and that keeps Bab’s voice from going through my head, but Thursday night we went to a local Italian place and I couldn’t help myself: rigatoni and peas were the order of the day.
It was delicious.
In a weird attempt to keep Barbra’s crooning of “Guilty” from ransacking my brain for the following 48 hours I opted to sit in a way at the restaurant table that would have displeased Barbra. By sitting in her preferred seat (where her profile would have met her acceptable standards), I prevented her from entering my realm and I enjoyed the pasta dish in peace. Twice. I ate half of it at dinner and ate the other half at lunch the next day.
Welcome to the way my brain works. Have a seat, you look hungry.
Presentation.
This video was in my YouTube suggestions this morning and I must say I really enjoyed the presentational style of the person on camera.
Enjoy a video explaining the differences between VHS and Beta.
