November 13, 2026 · 22:23

A Sign Of The End Times

Sure, the FAA cost us all billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of hours of wasted time due to some fuck up. NVIDIA has been selling top-secret AI chips to the Chinese and now their market share has collapsed by billions and the AI bubble is bursting. Microsoft can’t keep any of their systems to stay online to save their lives, after firing 60,000 of their staff and replacing them with untested AI agents. There’s that entire clusterfuck in Washington, and the Angels have lost 99 games a season for two years in a row.

Bad things, all of them. No doubt.

But do you want to know what is REALLY a sign of the downfall of humanity and the destruction of civilization?

We’re doomed!

I get it! I made a LOT of daily runs to some fast food place or another trying to get the latest Beanie Baby or Pokemon toy. I think I managed to do it with a little more grace than the Helicopter Mom who was LOSING HER SHIT to the poor, young lady at the Burger King window from the car in front of me.

Surprisingly, screaming and hurling insults and racist epiteths didn’t seem to miraculously produce any additional Hello Kitty toys out of thin air.

She wasn’t driving a van and she seemed to be alone in the vehicle – I was left to wonder if SHE was the one collecting the toys.

I’m going to try to remember her the next time I think my life sucks. There but for the grace of God…

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Filed under Farce, Paul, Photography

November 12, 2026 · 20:53

Straight As An Arrow Overhead

The title says it all. Whoever they were, they split the sky!

Storms are coming – not as bad here as the massive hit the Pacific Northwest and Northern California are taking from this atmospheric river, but we’ll be wet more often than not for the next week to ten days.

That’s a cold front moving in with all of those high, thin, icy clouds!

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Filed under Photography, Weather

November 11, 2026 · 20:20

Setting Crescent Moon

We’re about two and a half days past New Moon, so that, of course, means a brilliant crescent Moon setting just after sunset.

The skies were clear (that will change a LOT starting Friday, probably through most of next week) and, as always, a short (1/8 sec) exposure will show you the crescent.

A longer exposure (1.6 seconds) will show you the overexposed crescent and the rest of the Moon illuminated by Earthshine (sunlight reflected off of the Earth, to the Moon, and back to our eyes).

Then, after I had shifted position so that I wasn’t looking at the Moon setting over the neighbors’ roof but over Old Baldy (Mount San Antonio), I got this spectacular sequence:

If your sky is clear, go look again tomorrow after sunset!

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Sunsets

November 10, 2026 · 22:22

The Amazing Crimson Maple Tree

We had seen some brownish-red leaves starting to turn on the geographically confused maple tree in our front yard – but I was disappointed, having grown up in Vermont.

Today I went out to look for a package that I was expecting.

BAM!!! KAPOW!!! WOWSERS!!!

HOLY GUACAMOLE, BATMAN! That tree has turned spectacular almost overnight!

I may just have to go sit out there for a while and bask in my personal fall foliage extravaganza.

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Filed under Forever Home, Photography

November 9, 2026 · 23:29

Proof Of Life – November 09th

I’ve been thinking a lot about running marathons and endurance and goals and deadlines and hanging in there when common sense says to just hang ’em up.

I’ve never run to win the race – even the training runs and shorter 5K races and half marathons, I wasn’t ever even in the top ten for my age group. For the LA Marathons, probably not in the top 100. Or the top 500.

That’s okay, I wasn’t running against the clock or the other runners, I was running against my own limitations and fears.

Now that I’ve passed into my 70’s, I don’t know if I’ll ever run again. At this point even the Monday Municipal Miles were kicking my ass, and that was only a mile and on flat ground.

But my brain points out that part of the problem is how out of shape I’ve let myself become. That can be fixed. And it started to be! The first MMM my mile was almost 25 minutes – by Week Three I had it down under 20 minutes, and I did Week Five in about 19:30. If I were to do that three or four days a week and then start extending those distances, I could get back close to where I was.

Will I be running any 3:00 marathons? Not in THIS lifetime! Could I maybe do a 6:00 marathon? It’s possible.

Which brings us to day-to-day life, not running, but just trying to keep up with a to-do list that’s growing twice as fast as I can knock things off of it. How can I catch that endurance and persistance lightining in a bottle to keep going on all of those boring, mundane, routine, but necessary tasks?

If anyone has an answer, I would love to hear it!

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Filed under Health, Paul, Photography, Running

November 8, 2026 · 20:14

An Early Start This Year

As much as I love putting up Christmas lights, one rule that’s always been sacrosanct is that I don’t start putting them up until the day after Thanksgiving.

Until this year.

I still won’t put any up outside until after Thanksgiving, but inside? One lesson from last year in The Forever Home is that it’s big, and takes time. So this year we’ll get a jump on the indoor decorations.

(One of our kids called me a “Blasphemer.” One sent the “Elf” meme implying that I “sit on a throne of lies.” The best response was from the daughter who is the expert on Halloween pumpkin carving – “Man, the pumpkins haven’t even rotted yet!” It’s apparently a bigger break with tradition than I had thought. It’s unclear what further deviant behavior this will lead to.)

The tree is up. The decorations go on next.

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Filed under Christmas Lights, Forever Home, Photography

November 7, 2026 · 20:58

Last Light For Wrightwood

From where we were, the Sun was down, but as it sank into the west, the taller mountains to our due east still had some light.

Those peaks are up behind Wrightwood, along the Angeles Crest Highway. It’s Table Mountain, Mount Kare, and Blue Ridge – I think from left to right, but I’m only about 70% sure of the details.

On the other side of the left and center peaks, facing away from us here, are ski resorts, the Mountain High resorts. Many folks are surprised that there’s snow skiing so close to Los Angeles, but with mountains that go up to well beyond 10,000 feet, there’s often skiing until the July 4th weekend.

Tonight it was just a line of shadow creeping up the side of the mountain, proof that the Earth is round if anyone needs it.

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Filed under Forever Home, Photography, Sunsets

November 6, 2026 · 22:37

Proof Of Life – November 6th

Even though a great deal of the news on the political front has been fantastic, it’s still take a bucket of adrenaline this week to get here. (Not to mention all of the weeks for the past two years.)

And the deadlines, the time pressures, that never seem to stop or let up…

Being buried at times by massive, existential doom, pull back and focus on the little things. Our health is generally good. It’s getting late enough in the year so that before I go to be I can go out and see Orion in the east. When I have to get up to pee at 05:30, Venus is incredibly bright in the east. The Cooper’s hawk has started roosting during the day on my telescope out on the back porch. We still love being in The Forever Home.

There’s definitely room for some improvements. It’s finding that balance that makes every day an adventure.

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Filed under Forever Home, Photography, Politics

November 5, 2026 · 22:17

A Bit More Brownish Red

It’s taking its sweet time, but the maple tree in the front yard IS turning for fall.

Unlike its cousins in Vermont and New England, which can turn completely in just a week or so, it’s going to take the better part of two months for the change to happen here.

And where the more northeastern of the species will tend to go BRIGHT RED, this has more of a burnt brown, rust, reddish color.

I’m sure that the soil composition, temperature, and seasonal timing differences have a lot to do with the differences.

I’ll take whatever I can get! It’s still gorgous!

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Filed under Forever Home, Photography, Weather

November 4, 2026 · 23:06

Thank You!

Thank you to everyone who voted!

Thank you to all of the Democrats and liberals who understood the assignment and followed through to be counted!

Thank you to all of the Republicans and conservaties who realized the stakes and considered that they might be on the wrong side of history, and voted this time to change course!

Thank you to all of those who never or rarely vote and just sit out the election, who realized what a mistake that was this time around and made the effort!

Thnk you ao all of the young people who might have been voting for the first time but got it done anyway.

Thank you to everyone who knew that their candidate(s) had a one in a gazillion chance but voted for them anyway.

Thank you for all of the down ballot votes, so not only did blue Senators and Governors get elected, but blue School Board members and Insurance Commissioners and judges.

Thank you to everyone who stood in line for three minutes or three hours because this was really important.

Thank you to the Ukranian forces that have been bombing Russian data centers and taking Elon’s and Putin’s bot misinformation machine offline, making room for the truth!

Thank you to all of the poll site workers who made sure that votes counted!

Thank you to EVERYONE who refused to be intimidated or threatened by the powers that have been trying to shut down voting and destroy our democratic system.

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Filed under Photography, Politics