Toosday [DOT 9/6/20]

9/6/20 MegMegMcGee 41

It’s all too much! Let’s taco ’bout it…

This is a good breakdown of how they cleared Lafayette Park, excuse me, Black Lives Matter Plaza, prior to Trump’s photo op with ‘a Bible’.

The crackdown before Trump’s photo op
https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2020/06/08/timeline-trump-church-photo-op/?arc404=true

Who did nazi that coming?

Henrico prosecutor: Hanover man who drove into protest is admitted KKK leader
https://www.richmond.com/news/local/crime/henrico-prosecutor-hanover-man-who-drove-into-protest-is-admitted-kkk-leader/article_54776922-5870-5657-8900-eb2969ae9140.html

Who thinks this guy is actually going to trial?

George Floyd killing: judge sets $1m bail for ex-officer Derek Chauvin
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/08/george-floyd-killing-derek-chauvin-bail

Alrighty then.

Stock futures hold steady after S&P 500 turns positive for the year
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/08/stock-market-futures-open-to-close-news.html

US has officially entered first recession since 2009
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jun/08/us-has-officially-entered-first-recession-since-2009

You love to see it:

Daniel Radcliffe Responds to J.K. Rowling’s Tweets on Gender Identity

Sure, we’ll yell at you if you’re on the wrong side of the escalator, but this is the D.C. I know:

D.C. Bars and Restaurants Showed Up With Sandwiches and Support for Protestors This Weekend
https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/food/article/21136438/dc-bars-and-restaurants-showed-up-with-sandwiches-and-support-for-protestors-this-weekend

Sprots! (This is cute af.)
‘Adopt a Minor Leaguer’ provides players financial support, friendship during pandemic
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/06/08/adopt-minor-leaguer-provides-players-financial-support-friendship-during-pandemic/

Also, cute af. Best six minutes of my day.

Have a great day!

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41 Comments

  1. …maybe it’s just me…but it strikes me that were, say, the cast of the movies to pull together in a touching gesture & acquire a first edition of this rather well-known essay (that might have provided a useful bit of insight into a few things that might have helped her keep her foot out of her mouth) it’s somewhere between possible & likely that she’d never get past the title & would just add it to a tally of points thoroughly missed

    The Death of the Author

    …shame, too…she’s no Le Guin but having read a lot of ropy genre fiction the hogwarts stuff is genuinely not bad…not sure I particularly understand why so many people decided it was the best thing ever & not at best mildly different from literally countless other examples of almost-the-same-thing but I guess that’s what makes me old & cranky & out of touch with the cool kids?

    • I did my master’s thesis on Le Guin. Indeed, Rowling is no Le Guin. Honestly, I never made it past book … three, I think? I kept telling people, “You realize there are other authors that did the same thing, but better, right?”

      I did once hear a solid justification for Rowling, which was that she got a lot of people reading who wouldn’t otherwise have done so. That I will acknowledge.

      And finally, I will never understand why people feel compelled to weigh in with stupid observations on Twitter. It backfires on them like 94% of the time, and yet no one learns.

      • …amen to all of that, I think…plus I’m pretty sure I might find that thesis interesting?

        …different genre but I recall feeling a version of that confusion the year that everyone decided captain corelli’s mandolin was a masterpiece…nothing really against the book itself which I enjoyed fairly thoroughly myself…but as it exploded in terms of popularity to begin with I’d try to talk to people about how much more interesting & enjoyable I’d found the “latin american trilogy”…after enough tumbleweeds had piled up I just gave up & let people tell me all about this one book I’d read quite happily before they had without feeling any need to go on about it

        …& when you consider the source that seems like it should mean something to anyone who knows me?

        • I’d send you my thesis but I don’t actually have an electronic copy any more. When I wrote it floppy disks were the pinnacle of technology and I don’t think I ever remembered to transfer the files to another form of storage. Even if I still had the floppies somewhere I don’t know how I’d manage to access them. Damn, that’s embarrassing.

      • It is 100% that they are books people who don’t read will read. Her books especially attracted kids and teens who weren’t readers, which made parents more likely to read them too. She got a lot of non-readers to stick through 7 long books; that is definitely a laudable feat. And her backstory is interesting, though now she’s basically lit her good will on fire.

        Not to Malcolm Gladwell it up, but there’s a tipping point when something becomes popular *because* it’s popular. Like music, a lot of what’s popular isn’t really considered “good” by those with a critical eye, and vice versa.

  2. So, yesterday, I got a letter from the IRS. With a little trepidation, I opened it…and found a letter from Donald J Fucking Trump, telling me how awesome everything is and how great he is and wasn’t I just so goddamned grateful for the money he sent me? There was literally no other point to the letter. I already got the damned check (which went straight into savings because it’s an advance on next year’s tax bill and will be sent back to the feds in 2021), so I don’t need a reminder that I was sent a check. How much did that little ego stroke cost?!

    There was one minor upside to the letter. On the other side of the page, the entire letter was in Spanish. Taking odds that literally nobody told that asshole this was going to happen. Otherwise, he probably wouldn’t have sent it in the first place.

    • Just curious: did you get a check or did you use direct deposit? Apparently the plan was the direct deposits would roll out fairly quickly, and the checks would take a little more time. Then Trump stepped in and said he wanted his signature on all the paper checks. God knows how many checks, already printed, were destroyed, further delaying the payments. That wasn’t good enough, so he came up with the scheme that direct deposit recipients would gat a letter from him as a follow-up.

      We’re really in “The Madness of King George III” territory here. I wonder how his followers would feel knowing that their paper checks were held up by a month of two because they had to be redone to incorporate his signature?

      • I have never torn up a letter as fast as I did that one from Trump.

        • Same. But I used a shredder. More satisfying. Fucking orange asshole sending his propaganda bullshit to my damn house.

      • I got a debit card in an innocuous looking envelope. I heard a lot of people have thrown them away by mistake.

        • Re the thesis & digital copies… is there a chance that your University has digitized their copies yet?

          (I remember finding a Thesis section of my old school’s library, years ago–digitizing seems like the sort of work they may have had some of the undergrad work study folks do…)

        • If you know anyone personally who did that, you can tell them to call the IRS ombudsman folks, and there IS a process to re-issue them!

          Learned that, because *I* called last Friday-ish, to find out how to start the re-issue process, for my mom’s check.

          Hers (and one of my paychecks!) may-or-may-not have been in the same envelope (addressed to our bank back home) passing through the Minneapolis 55408 post office building, the night that post office got burned out…

          The envelope still hadn’t gotten to the bank as of Friday, so I’m giving it until *this* Friday, before I call the IRS folks back up (with Mom on the line), and start them doing a look up & re-issue.

          Even our banker didn’t know that the IRS could do it, but the awesome ombudslady TOTALLY knew how the process worked😉😁🤗

      • We got a check because we actually pay in most years. We structured it that way on purpose because we’d rather have full access to our income throughout the year and budget a certain amount to pay in, than provide an interest-free loan to the feds.

        Anyway, it looks like everyone is getting a letter, no matter how they get the money. Figures.

        • We do the same thing, always owe, but just enough that we don’t skid into fees and penalties territory. I’ve been doing this pretty much my entire adult life.

          At least 20 years ago I was talking to a friend and he was overjoyed: he was due a tax refund of $5,200. I said, “Oh God, that’s awful!” “Are you fucking kidding me! It’s 5200 bucks!”

          “Yes, and that means every week for one solid year you had $100 less cash on hand. If you want to set up some kind of Neo-Christmas Club account fine, you do you.”

          He, and I suspect most Americans, don’t think about it that way. After the latest tax reform went through the Treasury announced the following year that it was huge success and that something like 87% of filers would be getting refunds. As if society-wide financial innumeracy is something to celebrate.

          • I get refunds too. Interest rates aren’t so high I worry about the opportunity cost. I also frequently have freelance/second job income which is hard to project and difficult to adjust withholding to compensate for. So I have extra taken out to ensure I’m not writing a big check at the end of the year. Happened to me once. Never again. Yes, I could shift some into savings and do it properly, but now we’re talking about WORK and I’m lazy. Let Uncle Sam handle it.

  3. I saw someone post this recently so I’ll steal for here: If you could be eternally thin or give up tacos, would you choose hard or soft?

        • I refuse to let you erect such a bad joke in this thread.

          • Wood you guys just knock it off already?!

            • Don’t blame me, Clever Name Here is the one dicking around. You don’t need to look too far upthread to get the jizzt of it.

              • Can’t leave you jerks alone for 10 minutes

                • They’re making a complete cock-up of your DOT!

    • Not a taco fan, I’d go for thin.

  4. It’s not my fault that people don’t know proper escalator etiquette, okay!?

    You STAND on the right and let people PASS on the left, no matter if you’re going up and down. If you can’t understand this then you should be taking the Metro to work every day, Chet! And no, I don’t give a damn if you bought your bicycle, that’s what the elevator is for you cretin!

    • I am a generally mild mannered mid-40s lady and I have definitely yelled at tourists for standing on the whole escalator. I’ve also ridden back around to help a family collect the kid they left on the platform. I’m not totally heartless.

      • …I tend not to think I look particularly imposing but I seldom have to raise my voice to get people to shift over on the escalator itself

        …the one that has seen me take a break from hurrying from A to B to yell at the bemused is when groups of people pause to decide where they’re meant to go next either immediately before or after the riding-the-escalator bit

        …how little spatial awareness (or lack of ability to conceive of anyone beyond yourselves) do you need to be that fucking oblivious

        …you’re there because that’s where that ride spits you out

        FUCKING.MOVE.YOUR.DUMB.ASS.
        ANYWHERE.THE.FUCK.ELSE

        …the ride is still running & some of those on it wouldn’t necessarily mind riding right over your dawdling ass…seriously…for the life of me I just can’t understand those people?

    • Well…aKtUalLy they’ve done a study and it is more efficient for everyone to stand still and fill the whole escalator when it is crowded.

      That said I agree when it isn’t so busy letting people pass is preferred.

      • That study would make more sense if trains, planes, and buses were always on time. Or if it didn’t take some people 20 minutes to fill up bins at the security entrances. I remember bitching about it on the Lifehacker post.

        Stand on right, walk on left! And FFS if you are with a person or group, stand on your own steps on the right and NOT beside each other.

  9. I saw this acronym written on a status board at work.

    P-N/S.

    Yes, I laughed because I am an immature kid at heart. I don’t know why any management doesn’t see that or at least change it.

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