Literally.
When I’m going to take a picture with my iPhone at night and I don’t realize that the phone is set to the forward facing camera with the flash on instead of the rear camera with no flash.
Damn, I look like shit!
Author Archives: momdude
Eating Healthy Is Going To Kill Me
I need to lower my A1C numbers and shave off a few pounds, despite the oncoming holidays and associated feasting, so I’m trying to eat healthier. Tonight it was just a small piece of broiled chicken breast and a small portion of steamed green beans. No carbs at all.
Hypoglycemia, here I come!
Crashing and burning, trying to stay awake, it’s a good excuse for some ice cream and OJ and grapes, but my head is still floating.
This “healthy” shit is going to kill me!
Filed under Health, Photography
Instagram Ad Hell
Mondays! Am I right? Ho, ho, freaking ho, Merry freaking Christmas!
If I’m letting my brain burble for a moment and I’m surfing through videos of sunsets and planes and loons and wild critters and so on on Instagram and you and your mind-numbingly STUPID product interrupt my flow with an ad, I will hate you with the white-hot fire of a million suns.
If on top of that the audio on your ad starts with, “Whoever invented this deserves a raise!” then I hope that they’re excavating a whole new level of Hell for you and I hope you’re there soon.
If the audio on your ad starts with “How did it take until 2025 for someone to figure this out…” then I’m wondering why YOU didn’t figure it out and get insanely filthy rich last year, so YOU get the next level of Hell underneath that one.
If the audio on your ad starts with both, I will break the land speed record hitting the “mute” and “delete” buttons and I will make a voodoo doll of you to make sure that every time you think about sex you get kidney stones instead.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Farce, Paul, Video
Maple Leaves – The Next Chapter
It was a joy watching the leaves on our front yard maple tree turn bright red. (See here and here, for example.)
Now –
The white branches and few straggler leaves look cool against a bright blue sky.
But, of course, all of those leaves had to go somewhere.
There they are! What a mess.
And the astroturf acts like Velcro as they blow up on there.
Once I get the final lights done I guess I’ll have to move into “homeowner maintenance” mode. Ugh!
Filed under Forever Home, Photography
Hesperia Christmas Lights 2025 – Day Three
Not a lot of new lights up, mainly because they’re all “in transit” from where I ordered them online and the deliveries keep getting delayed. I tried to see if Lowe’s had anything still, and they’ve been picked pretty clean. My bad for not being prepared, I guess.
However, the wreathes came in, and like with our Pomelo house (from 7+ years ago) we again have two gorgeous wooden front door, each with a huge, all natural wreath from the Vermont Country Store.
I love the look! But what’s that hiding in the one on the right?
Sorry, I can’t help myself.
Filed under Christmas Lights, Forever Home, Photography
Supermoon Over Christmas Lights
At the Forever Home, Friday is trash pickup day. So Thursday night is take-out-the-trash-bins night. Last night I was out shortly after sunset when, from the viewpoint at the curb, the Cold supermoon was just rising above the house.
Not bad, eh?
Every single day there’s still a moment when I stop, look around, and say, “DAMN! We live here!!!”
Filed under Astronomy, Christmas Lights, Forever Home, Photography
Cold Supermoon Rising
That’s “cold” as in “Cold Moon” is the name of the December full Moon, so while it was nippy in SoCal, it wasn’t really cold.
With the Moon rising to the northeast, it came up right behind these power line towers as seen from the kitchen. It looked bitchin’!
To get the shot from the back yard, however, I was on a small ladder way off at the side of the yard. No problemo!
A couple of minutes later, from my usual spot on the pergola, the Moon was starting to get into a thin layer of clouds at almost the EXACT moment of being full. The Moon was 100.00% full at 17:00 PST – this picture was taken at 16:49, just eleven minutes away from being full.
Near perigee (the closest point to Earth in its eliptical orbit) the Moon was something like 30% brighter than it would be at apogee (the furthest point from Earth). Thus the “super” Moon.
It was stunning to see!
Filed under Astronomy, Photography
39ºF + 99% Full Moon + Clouds
Quite the recipe for a bracing and brisk and beautiful night!
But wait, there’s more!
Blow up the image to full size and you’ll see Orion just to the right and below the center. And the “V” (pointed to the right) of Taurus just under the Moon, in that notch in the clouds.
And of course, even if you didn’t blow the image up to full size, that really bright object just off of the left edge is Jupiter.
Wouldn’t it be neat to just lay out on a lawn chair and watch for a couple of hours? Preferably in a thick, down-filled sleeping bag. 39ºF now, headed toward 32ºF before dawn.
Nippy!
Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Weather
No Context For You – December 02nd
Choose your Hell…
Concentrate on those important tasks for hour after hour after hour? End up exhausted, barely able to keep your eyes open and capable of staggering to bed, little or no energy or time to do anything else, anything enjoyable.
Work hard but put down your labor when the allotted time comes? Feel okay, have the time and energy to read a book or watch the hockey game – but the whole time your brain is racing about your deadlines and how you’re risking failure, and trying to sleep is futile and troubled.
In between somewhere? There’s a reason it’s called “work/life BALANCE.” Some days it feels like that balancing act is being done with you as a last-minute substitute for Philippe Petit, on a high wire between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center.
Which, if you’re tired enough, becomes an allegorical phrase from the Tamarian language. “Paul, a poor substitute for Philippe, on a high wire between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center.”
IYKYK!
Filed under Memes, Paul, Photography
Bots?
“A spike in your stats” indeed! Apparently something or someone was visiting this site this afternoon causing a 13,250% increase in traffic. No messages or comments were left and other than the alerts from WordPress and Jetpack I don’t see any signs. I haven’t gotten any huge jump in subscribers, just the usual “couple a month.”
One of the social media posts that kicks out every time I post something new (like this, my usual “daily” post) goes to LinkedIn, and I have had a few new folks joining the company who have asked to connect to me there, no doubt prompted by the Linkedin algorithms when they update the information on where they’re employed. I give them fair warning that I don’t post “business related anything” there, just the more-or-less daily connections to my personal blog, and if they find it bizarre or boring I won’t be offended if they disconnect. It’s possible that one or more of them finally actually looked at what’s posted here, but still… 275+ views is quite a bit.
My suspicion is that it’s a bot or digital agent of some time that started “scraping” content and for reasons unknown picked a large but not complete batch of posts. Who knows?
I, for one, WELCOME our digital overlords! If they want to sign up as subscribers, or better yet, PAID subscribers, so much the better!
We Love The Stars Too Fondly 