More About Montana

 

On January 27, 2023 I published a blog about Yellowstone. Being Sly, Cunning and Alert (and a noticer) I noticed something very interesting about Montana while watching Yellowstone on TV. They are into the 5^th Season of Yellowstone and it has yet to snow for one minute in any episode.

My wife was born and raised in Montana and she is sure it did snow in Montana. The only thing I can think of is some politician must have fixed their Snowing Problem.

I am certain there must a Statue in Montana of the person who got rid of the snow.

What I am not certain of is has that statue been spray painted, torn down and jumped up and down on by a bunch of cowboy and cowgirl college students who used to want to do something constructive with their lives.

It snowed a couple of years ago here in Georgia where I live. I wanna go live in Montana because it snows less there than it does here!

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

John McEnroe Was Not Born Only To Play Tennis. He Was Also Born To Shout At Us From The Tennis Court.

Did you just say to yourself, “Fella, pray tell. What was he born to shout at us about?”

Fella to Dear Reader, “You Can’t Be Serious! Don’t you know he was born to shout at us You Can’t Be Serious!”

Fella’s strongly held belief is, “The Internet ought not to feel obligated to bring to us every Foolish morsel of Foolishness spoken by Foolish People”.

Little Joey from the movie Shane is visiting with me today and he just agreed with what Fella pecked out above by saying, “You are right, Fella, there’s too many!”

************

Prepare yourself for, “encourages people to hug for 21 days consecutively, and to have each day a hug that lasts for a minimum of 21 seconds”.

This from the Internet...

Health Benefits of Hugging

“Hugging has been proven to have health benefits. One study has even shown that hugs increase levels of oxytocin and reduce blood pressure. Hugging can also buffer against the release of the stress hormone cortisol if a romantic partner hug is shared before a stressful situation. This effect was however only observed for women and not for men.

Based on significant research indicating that a 20-second-or-longer hug releases oxytocin, motivational speaker Leo Buscaglia encourages people to hug for 21 days consecutively, and to have each day a hug that lasts for a minimum of 21 seconds. He recommends ‘getting lost in the hug’, encouraging people to slow down and ‘use the power of the hug to be fully present in the moment’.”

Fella is particularly distraught with himself today. He tried to do what the Internet told him above (don’t we all try to do what the Internet tells us to do?) but he messed up. He only did 20 days and 20 seconds and, instead of fixing everything, he fixed nothing.

************

As if that was not enough the Internet also contains this...

Prepare yourself for, “Similar to hugging, cuddling is a more affectionate and intimate embrace, normally done for a longer period of time (usually lasting from a few minutes to several hours)”.

You read it right. It actually reads...“several hours”.

Cuddling

Cuddling is a related form of physical intimacy in which two people hold one another with each other's arms wrapped around the other's body for an extended period of time. Cuddling can be with family members, friends or lovers. Similar to hugging, cuddling is a more affectionate and intimate embrace, normally done for a longer period of time (usually lasting from a few minutes to several hours). In contrast to hugging, which can often be a nonverbal greeting or parting tradition, cuddling is usually shared between two people who are lying down together or sitting somewhere in an intimate manner. Like hugging, cuddling makes the body release oxytocin, which has a variety of effects. In some cities around the United States, cuddling has evolved into a social activity, where individuals gather for the purpose of cuddling.^[20]

************

Thank heaven the Internet was not around when Alexander Graham Bell was working on his Telephone Thingy. We would be still talking through tin cans with string between them, if, just when he got close to making any breakthrough, the Internet Loudspeaker in his laboratory would have shouted out, “Now hear this. Now hear this. It’s cuddle time! Stop whatever you are doing and cuddle for the next several hours!”

************

OK, I got carried away...Or did I?

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Lagniappe: This picture had 2 different captions: 1^st was, “Group hug among young men” and the 2^nd one was, “Bromances”.

 Which do you like best?

If It Were Not For the National Soap Shortage We Could Wash Out Their Mouths with Soap

 

I am watching Yellowstone.

I enjoy it.

I think it is well done.

I think it is ground breaking entertainment.

I wanna be a cowboy.

Having said that, think of this...

Ø If you have been watching Yellowstone along with me, think of the number of times you have heard the F-Word used.

Ø My memory is not what it used to be but I feel absolutely certain I am correct when I say I have not heard the word "Swell" used one single time. (See 1942 Coke billboard above).

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Forget Everything You Know About Passwords, Says Man Who Made Password Rules

 

We need a Password to get into darn near anything on the Internet (I probably could have left out the “darn near”). It is a Confusing Mess.

We all have our own systems of setting up our Passwords. Many sites we want to get into have their own Requirements for the Passwords they allow us to use. A problem arises when many of the many go out of their way to keep their Guidelines a Secret from us.

After creating our Password according to the Guidelines we know quite well (because they are our Guidelines) we are told our password is unacceptable because it did not meet their Guidelines (the ones they did not tell us about)...

Ø We should have made our password a minimum of 8 characters but not more than 16 characters.

Ø We should have included one or more lowercase characters.

Ø We should have included one or more uppercase characters.

Ø We should have included one or more digits (0-9).

Ø We should have included one or more of the following symbols: @ # $ % ^ & * - _ + = [ ] { } | \ : ' , ? / ` ~ " ( ) ; .

We are capable of doing this but we must be told we need do this before we don’t do this because we were not told we needed to do this.

************

Ø Do our passwords need to be extra long? Not really.

Ø Do our passwords need to be complicated? Not really.

Ø Do our passwords need to have squiggly things in them? Not really.

Ø Is it permissible for us to use a password that that we can actually remember? You betcha it is!

Bill Burr is the guy who started all this Password Confusion. He has now come clean and he admitted He Was Wrong!

Read All About It! 

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/forget-everything-you-know-about-passwords-says5-man-who-made-n790711

************

If there is a statue to Mr. Burr somewhere in the Good Ole USofA, it ought to be spray painted, torn down and jumped up and down on by a bunch of college students who used to go to class to learn something useful before they decided their calling in life was to spray paint, tear down and jump up and down on statues.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

I could say The Sky's The Limit But The Sky Is Too Low...Part Next

If you are smarter than Fella you don’t know that our 9% Approval Rated Congress is all tied up in knots again about raising the Debt Limit.

You can certifiably certify you are smarter than Fella is if you have stopped watching the Nightly News on TV. Fella is still watching the nightly news and that proves he ain’t too smart.

Because I am still watching the nightly news I know that Congress is again wrestling with their re-occurring ritual about whether or not they will Raise the Debt Limit but they are not good wrestlers and they will give in quickly and Go To Happy Hour. In wrestling they call this a Pin and in this case it means they are about to pin a darker future on the Good Ole USofA.

One thing is for certain. They will all be blaming someone other than themselves and each member of Congress will come out of all of this craziness “knowing” it’s not his/her fault.

************

If you think that our rulers in Washington D.C. have to raise the Debt Limit so they can spend more money you are as confused as most of the Folks Back Home (that’s us).

That’s not what’s happening here. They have to raise the Debt Limit because they have exceeded the Debt Limit. They are actually seeking authority to borrow enough money to cover what they have already spent.

Why do they bother to even put up the facade that they have a limited amount of money to spend? Once they have spent all they had, they simply make more.

At least they ought to change the name of the National Debt Limit. Here are my recommended names…

• The Temporary Debt Limit.
• The Debt Limit Until We Zip Right Past the Debt Limit Limit.
• The Unlimited Debt Limit.
• The What Debt Limit Limit?
• The Absolutely We Ain’t Gonna Go Over Limit Unless And Until Such Time As We Spend So Much Money That It Is Necessary To Borrow More Money To Cover The Money We Already Spent But Which We Did Not Have Authority to Spend Limit.

Until they get a new official name change in place they ought to put a Smiley Face before and after the old name. This way we will know they are just kidding.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Lagniappe: What can it hurt? It’s not a lot of money...Or is it?

• In 1917, somewhat counter intuitively, Congress established the debt limit so it could have more flexibility for deficit spending during World War I. The first official debt ceiling was established on the eve of World War II, in 1939, when Congress set the amount at a mere $45 billion.
• In 2002, Congress raised the debt limit from $6.0 trillion to $6.4 trillion, the first time it was raised in six years. In the decades following, Congress has abandoned any semblance of fiscal restraint as it has resorted to increasing the debt limit 20 times.

Since this is the Bottom Line, here is the Bottom Line...The current National Debt Limit is $31.4 Trillion. That’s 31.4 Thousand Billion Dollars. The Good Ole USofA is embroiled in Out-Of-Control Totally Unsustainable Deficit Spending.

LGBTQ+ Part 2...I Apologize For the Leaving Out the “IA”. I Should Have Used LGBTQIA+. Please Forgive Me.

Here is the link to prove I did not make this up: https://abbreviations.yourdictionary.com/what-does-lgbtqia-stand-for-full-acronym-explained.html

 LGBTQIA+ is an inclusive term that includes people of all genders and sexualities, such as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, queer, intersex, asexual, pansexual, and allies. While each letter in LGBTQIA+ stands for a specific group of people, the term encompasses the entire spectrum of gender fluidity and sexual identities.

What Does LGB Mean?

The letters LGB stand for lesbian, gay and bisexual. These terms mean:

• lesbian - term for women sexually and romantically oriented toward other women
• gay - any person attracted to the same gender
• bisexual - those who are sexually and romantically attracted both to men and women

What Does the T in LGBTQIA+ Mean?

The T in LGBTQIA+ can have several different meanings but typically deals with gender identity. Some words have fallen out of favor or their meanings are slightly different depending on the person.

• trans - an inclusive term for anyone whose gender identity does not match their sex assigned at birth
• transsexual - can mean someone transitioning from one sex to another using surgery or medical treatments; not in common usage
• transgender - term for someone who identifies as a different gender than what was assigned on their birth certificate

What Does QIA Mean?

QIA stands for questioning or queer, intersex and asexual. These terms mean:

• questioning - when a person is exploring their sexuality, gender identity and gender expression
• queer - an inclusive term or as a unique celebration of not molding to social norms
• intersex - used for individuals who don’t fit into specific gender norms of woman or man; can also be used for those with reproductive anatomy that isn’t biologically typical
• asexual - uses for those who don’t feel sexual attraction to either sex or that don’t feel romantic attraction in the typical way

The + in LGBTQIA+

The plus sign at the end of LGBTQIA+ can include members of other communities, including allies — people who support and rally the LGBTQIA+ cause even though they don’t identify within the community itself. Other identities included in the LGBTQIA+ are:

• agender - refers to those who do not identify as any gender at all
• demisexual - describes someone who requires an emotional bond to form a sexual attraction
• genderfluid - describes one's gender identity as self-expression and not static
• graysexual - refers to the “gray area” between asexuality and sexuality
• non-binary/genderqueer - a term used for those who do not conform to binary gender identities
• pansexual/omnisexual - a term for individuals with desire for all genders and sexes
• polyamorous - a term for those open to multiple consensual romantic or sexual relationships at one time
• sapiosexual - describes a person who is attracted to intelligence, regardless of a person’s gender identity
• two-spirit - a term used by Native Americans to describe a third gender (sometimes included as 2S in the main acronym as LGBTQIA2S+)

(This is Fella: Looks like I left out more than the "IA" in the first blog. Now we see there is the above LGBTQIA2S+. Don't worry. I'm not going to do a Part 3.)

Other Terms in the LGBTQ Community

In today’s society, people are challenging social norms associated with relationships, sexuality and gender identity. These people may not be gay, so other terms to describe them were created or popularized.

• ace - short for asexual
• bi - short for bisexual or bicurious
• cis - shortened version of cisgender (a person who identifies as the gender they were assigned at birth)
• closeted - state of being totally private about one's sexual orientation or gender identity
• coming out - the act of sharing one's sexual orientation or gender identity with loved ones
• deadnaming - calling someone by a name they no longer use 
• fluid - term that describes one's sexual identity or gender identity as not set or binary
• gray-a - short for graysexual
• pan - shortened version of pansexual
• per - gender-neutral pronoun for those who do not identify as male or female (short for person)
• poly - short for polyamory or polyamorous

************

Did this Blog Posting help you to understand more that the first one helped you understand? I sure hope it did but I doubt it did.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Lagniappe: The not yet late John McEnroe is visiting with me today. I bet you can guess what he said. Yes, you guessed it, he said “They can’t be serious!”

LGBTQ+

 

We are just getting to the point where we can almost figure out what is meant by LGBTQ+ and now we have to get our minds to wrap around BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, or People of Color).

Don’t think this is the End of the Confusion cuz It Ain’t.

Maybe this will help...

“The program will prioritize enrollment of Transgender, Non-Binary, Gender Non-Conforming, and Intersex (TGI) people who are also Black, Indigenous, or People of Color (BIPOC), experiencing homelessness, living with disabilities and chronic illnesses, youth and elders, monolingual Spanish-speakers, and those who are legally vulnerable such as TGI people who are undocumented, engaging in survival sex trades, or are formerly incarcerated.”

Did that help?

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

In Defense of Beating a Dead Horse

 

Most of you will line up against me in defense of, “You Can’t Beat a Dead Horse” but I will line up against those most of you and say it’s my Blog and I can beat a dead horse if I want to and I want to...

I published this Blog Posting at least 2 times. I like it because it makes so much sense in a Silly kind of way.

First published May 4, 2010:

Too Many Members Of Congress Can’t Handle Numbers

This may seem elementary to those of you who have gone through the 5th grade.

Lots of numbers are being thrown around our 9% Approval Rating Congress these days. I watched in amazement yesterday on CSPAN as one of our elected "leaders" said the following …

"My good friend from the other side of the aisle has just voiced strong opposition to my proposal to spend $10 Billion to convert all states that are using Paper Ballots to Electronic Voting Machines and to convert all states who are using Electronic Voting Machines to Paper Ballots. I continue to be amazed at the short sightedness of the Opposition Party and their ongoing inability to handle basic arithmetic with regard to a mere $10 Billion price tag.”

"I am sure that the folks back home have no problem with spending $10 Billion for such a worthy project. They understand that 10 is not a big number. 11 is bigger than 10 & so is 12. If I were asking for 100, that ought to give pause to the taxpayers as to how their money is being spent but 10 is only 10. It is hardly more than 9."

"Beam me up Lord. I can no longer stand being around such penny-pinchers who are not smarter than a 5th grader."

Ok, I admit I made up all of the above … or did I?

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

************

There appears to be a growing distrust of Electronic Voting Machines. This harkens back to what Aristotle (or someone else) once said, “If you set up vote counting so it can be manipulated, the vote counting will be manipulated.”

The tide appears to be turning against the Electronic Voting Machine side of this Foolishness. Here is an excerpt from a 1/14/23 article (yesterday).

The Western Journal

Court Votes to Remove Voting Machines from Election, Turns to Paper Ballots and Hand Counting Only

 By Warner Todd Huston  January 14, 2023 at 3:18pm

A county in Arkansas is joining a growing number of localities turning against electronic voting machines and going back to paper ballots as more and more Americans come to distrust the reliability and safety of voting machines.

A Cleburne County quorum court voted last week to end the use of the electronic vote machines and go back to reliable paper ballots, requiring all future elections to be hand counted, according to KARK-TV.

“These voting machines, which are really just computers, do not follow US or Arkansas election laws which clearly state that voters have the right to verify that their votes are properly being represented when entered into the tabulation computer,” Arkansas Voter Integrity Initiative (AVII) CEO Colonel Conrad Reynolds said in a Dec. 19 press release.

If you want to read the whole article, click here: https://www.westernjournal.com/court-votes-remove-voting-machines-election-turns-paper-ballots-hand-counting/

************

As for Fella’s take on all of this here is what he had to say, “Hey, machine, don’t let the door knob hit ya!”

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

 

The Prosecution Lawyer Near The Point of Exhaustion Begs the Judge, “Please Tell Me, What Evidence Am I Allowed To Use!”

Information and comments from others about Nohema Graber...

• She paid her way through flight school to become a Commercial Airline Pilot. She was one of the first women in Mexico to be licensed to fly passenger jets. 
• She was well-known in the Fairfield, Iowa Latino community.
• She taught Spanish at Fairfield High School since 2012.
• In her nine years with Fairfield High School, Mrs. Graber touched the lives of many students, parents and staff.
• She was active in St. Mary's Catholic Church in Fairfield, eventually attending mass daily, and became a liaison between the church and what was then a small but growing Latino population.
• She was a very kind, compassionate, faith-filled woman who treasured every moment of her day.
• As their children grew older, she decided, in her 50s, to get a degree in English and a teaching certificate from Iowa Wesleyan University in nearby Mount Pleasant.
• She quickly became a fixture at Fairfield High School, loved by many students. She often received cards and letters from former students.
• She was a community leader, teacher and friend.
• She was an absolute angel.
• She was an exceptional person.
• She was a lovely person.
• She was a loving mother of three.
• Graber was bashed to death with a baseball bat.
• She died at 66 years of age.

Prosecutors have filed documents saying two high school students allegedly murdered Nohema Graber possibly because they were upset about their grades.

Investigations into her death led to Willard Miller and Jeremy Goodale, both then aged 16, being charged with two homicide felonies.

Investigators found that Miller met with Graber at Fairfield High School on the afternoon of Nov. 2, 2021, to discuss his poor grade in her class. Graber later drove her van to a park where she was known to take daily walks after school, authorities say. Witnesses saw her van leaving the park less than an hour later with two males in the front seat.

The van was later left at the end of a rural road. After getting a phone call from Goodale, a friend and witness later picked up Goodale and Miller as they walked to town on that road.

************

A Defense Attorney for Miller is asking the court to:

• Invalidate four search warrants.
• Suppress evidence from Miller’s home.
• Suppress comments he made to police.
• Suppress information taken from his cell phone.
• Suppress information obtained from the social media platform Snapchat.

It looks like the judge is being asked to prevent the prosecution from using any evidence the police investigation uncovered.

The Prosecution Attorney near the point of exhaustion is begging the Judge to please tell him what evidence is he allowed to use. The judge replies, “You are free to use the testimony from Hugo Sonofa, who the court knows to be a congenital liar, who was sleeping off a drug induced daze in a nearby tree at the time that he says he saw the accused hit the about to be deceased victim in the head with a baseball bat making her actually deceased. The judge said the court will throw out Mr. Sonofa’s testimony because he is well known to be a congenital liar and he was coming out of a drug induced daze at the time that he saw what he says he saw”.

OK, I admit I made up what the Judge told the Prosecution Attorney...Or did I?

There is no funny punch line to this one.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella 

Lagniappe: But Graber's adult children, who adored her, have already forgiven her killers. Her son, Christian Graber, posted a Facebook message saying he did so because there was no point in being angry. “My mother was an angel of a woman and was one of the kindest souls,” he wrote. Her daughter, Nohema Marie Graber, echoed the sentiment, writing on Facebook, "To the two teenagers that so cruelly took her life, it is clear that they need more love and light in their hearts. But I agree with my oldest brother Christian, all we can do is forgive.”

Hold On, Doctor, Let Me Do The Talking

 

The Prescription Commercial Industry is all over us because it is All Over TV. The little Lizard that sells us insurance is having a hard time finding time slots to do cute things for us in his beloved commercials.

Now it seems that the Prescription Commercial Industry is getting overconfident. They have so much control over us that they are just plain cocky. Wannabe Patients are rushing into doctor’s offices all over the Good Ole USofA demanding to be prescribed the drug with all the Z’s & X’s & Q’s & J’s & Y’s in its name (which they can’t pronounce) that they saw advertised on TV the night before.

I am here to tell you that Unbridled Cocky leads to Silly Foolishness. I saw a commercial yesterday that said this, “Tell your doctor if you have High Blood Pressure”.

Huh? We are now responsible to tell our doctors what wrong with us? Is that not the doctor’s job? Does it not seem logical that our doctor would know we had High Blood Pressure before we knew we had High Blood Pressure?

Where could this lead? Since we live in a society that cheats a lot, are we going to start falsifying our illnesses to our doctors? Will we start picking diseases that we know are curable or not serious enough to pay them no never mind?

Since this is the Bottom Line of this Blog Posting, here is the Bottom Line...

I Predict We Are About To Find Ourselves In the Midst of a Pandemic of Epic Proportions of the 24-Hour Flu!

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

We Are Getting Bigger and Bigger But a Whole Bunch of Us Are Going All In For Easier and Easier

 

Americans as a whole are getting fatter with every passing day but it looks like we are embracing Easy Exercise.

Bicycling is not just a way to get from point A to Point B but it is a way to get Exercise while we are getting from point A to Point B...Or is used to be.

Today we are buying bicycles that have pedals that we don’t need to use. The Pedals are where the exercise part of riding bicycles comes into play. There’s a new bike on town. These bikes have a motor that makes the pedals unnecessary. These bikes are called EBikes and “E” stands for "Electric" not for "Exercise". (Some say it stands for "Easy".)

I just went Internet Shopping for an EBike. There are enough links to EBikes that I could spend months trying to find the exact right one. The highest priced one I found was priced at $14,999.99.  I guess the seller decided that, if he asked $15,000 for his EBike, no one would pay that much.

I decided to send you a picture of this almost $15,000 EBike but I could not find it again when I went back to search for it. Maybe, at that "cheap" price, they sold out. If you were interested in buying one, hang onto your wallet, at that price, they are sure to make more.

Fella Memory Recall: When I worked for Ford Motor Company the Maverick (a whole automobile) was introduced at a Selling Price of $1,995...

************

At a time when we are getting fatter and fatter we are buying more and more No-Exercise Bicycles.

The Evolution of No-Exercise...

Ø We used to get off the couch to walk across the living room to change the TV Channel but the TV Flicker made that unnecessary.

Ø We used to walk places to get places but now we see overweight people gliding past us in Hover Boards. 

Ø Even having sex has gotten easier. There is now a Microwave Fireplace you can position yourself and your mate in front of that makes it possible to enjoy 2 hours of mad passionate lovemaking in only 3 minutes.

************

What’s next? I just saw where there is a new App that works this way...

Every time we leave our house to go take a walk the App makes the route we take always downhill. It is not yet available for download because they are finishing up the Companion App that makes the return home downhill also. I’m sure you understand the Companion App is of vital importance to make anyone want to buy the First App.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Laniappe: I know I have painted EBikes as almost downright evil. I know it is important even necessary for some people to have an EBike. You should also know that I am not only a Noticer but I am also a Poker. I Poke fun at life. Besides, once I found the picture of that little kid trying to see around Mama, this Blog Posting had to be written.

Speaking of noticing...Did you notice the Outfit Mama Is Wearing? That is a for certain indicator that she also Pokes Fun at Life.

************

Have you bought my book lately? If you have not and you want to buy one (or you have a friend or enemy you want to buy one for), go to https://www.amazon.com/Foolishness-Alexander-J-Ortolano-ebook/dp/B00AJ3IYI8/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Foolishness...Or+Is+It%3F&qid=1558617535&s=gateway&sr=8-1 and buy one or two.