Delivery blues

I was going to post more on Memorial Day weekend, but I was working, then I got busy unpacking and setting up my new mattress. I bought it before the Memorial Day sales, so I lost out on a 60% discount. So I had to settle for a 40% discount instead. Oh well. The purchase was fine, but the Fedex delivery was terrible. They emailed me that my package was delayed a day, then minutes later said it was on time, but it was going to Pflugerville Texas instead, which is hundreds of miles away. I tried both the website and their phone number for an hour but all I got were automated robots who refused to transfer me to a human being. Eventually I did an internet search which revealed that Pflugerville is some kind of distribution center that some packages have to go through even if it means leaving Dallas only to come right back a day later. If a customer service rep had just answered the phone and explained that to me, then I would've calmed down and not fucking cursed out their robot multiple times for saying "we have no more information for you." Fuck you, Fedex. The bed is nice and firm at least.

Due to the hail and thunderstorms on Tuesday, my internet went out and stayed out for over 14 hours, with only one "outage" message from my internet provider. I guess I should just be thankful that I still had power and that my home wasn't damaged, unlike so many other people in DFW.

I managed to read a book and do a few loads of laundry before the sun came out and there were no more flash flood warnings. I decided to go shopping and run errands, hoping that the internet would be restored by the time I came back. I stayed out 3 hours, but when I got back the internet was still out and stayed that way for hours more. So it's been a day.

Ramblings

That's it. I'm done with brown rice. I made it again with less water, and it still boiled over in the rice cooker. Back to white rice that tastes better and is more predictable. No point in ruining my new rice cooker for an allegedly healthier brown rice.

Meanwhile, the local Asian mall had a weekend celebration for AAPI heritage month, so I went on Sunday. They had various vendor booths, and a stage for performers. I saw a really fun performance by a K-pop dance troupe. I don't normally listen to that music, but the diverse dancers were really talented and their enthusiasm was infectious. They also seemed like local kids, not like a touring professional act imported into town. It made me feel hopeful for young people today, joyfully celebrating regardless of race or gender. Don't I sound old now?

I was sad to hear about the sudden tornados in Houston. The storms killed people and knocked out power. Storms are getting weirder and stronger all the time due to climate change.

Meanwhile I've started reading a biography on Madame Restell aka Ann Lohman, a major abortionist in Victorian-era New York. I first heard about her on Wonkette. It's expensive for an ebook, but at least it's 400+ pages to justify the price.

Disappointments

It's been too cloudy and rainy the past couple of nights for me to see any aurora from the big solar event. I didn't even try to look on Friday night because I thought the forecasts said it wouldn't be visible in Texas. Then I woke up the next day to see reports of aurora as far south as Florida! 😞 Oh well. There's a bright street light near my house anyway, so I probably wouldn't have been able to see an Aurora I guess.

Meanwhile I recently made brown rice in my new rice cooker, and it nearly boiled over. I didn't realize that cooking brown rice would be so different from white rice. Apparently you don't need to rinse it like white rice, and I guess I have to use less water in the cooker.

I saw The Fall Guy for Ryan Gosling, but the movie was less of a mystery than I expected, and less funny than Barbie. There were some good songs and action scenes though; I liked a cartoony one in a club when Ryan's character was drugged and hallucinating unicorns. Stephanie Hsu has an extremely small part that I wish was bigger. There's not much else I want to see this month. Though I liked Godzilla Minus One, I didn't bother to see the Godzilla x Kong movie, and though I loved Rise of the Planet of the Apes, I soured on the rest of the franchise, so I don't think I'll watch the new Kingdom movie, which doesn't even have Caesar. I'm tired of the typical blockbuster films in general, and have been looking for smaller films. I saw ads for a kids' mystery called Thabo and the Rhino Case, but it was limited release, and never available anytime that I wasn't at work. Now it's completely gone from theaters with no word about a streaming release. Come on, don't have such a limited release, especially for something that's supposed to benefit wildlife charities!

Lackluster TV

CBS apparently announced its fall schedule early. I thought they usually waited until the end of May to do their press tour thing at the upfronts. Are all the networks going to do this early? I'm sad for the cancellation of So Help Me Todd, but it was uneven at times. I liked the light comedy/mystery, but I didn't care for the corporate intrigue at the law firm. Now CBS is all excited about their new Elsbeth, which is a quirky mystery show sort of like Columbo and sort of like Peacock's Poker Face. It's okay, but I don't care for the police corruption storyline.

Meanwhile I'm starting to sour on the US Ghosts. This past season has been so disappointing, ever since they copped out of Flower disappearing, made Carol die, and became predictable. After all that buildup, I hated the botched wedding. Other CBS sitcoms like Bob Hearts Abishola and The Neighborhood have been bafflingly wrongheaded too. They have totally lost their way and would rather write people selling their family businesses and betraying their core principles. It was particularly disgusting for Douglas to say "most CEOs get prison; you get rich." Excuse me?!! When has any CEO gone to prison? All I ever see are CEOs getting golden parachutes after dismembering a company and ruining their employees' lives. I wish some CEOs went to prison; then there might be justice in the world. Fuck whichever writer wrote that line for Douglas. Has the Boeing CEO been fired yet, let alone been arrested? Seriously, fuck you.

Plus they ignored Abishola's medical school acceptance all season, only to shove it into the time-jump finale where she's already a doctor. So they just skip the question of whether she was going to move from Detroit and/or if Bob would join her. Instead of addressing the major issues during the season, they just gloss over it and then do wacko things like Kemi's food truck for their "happy ending." What a cop-out. They wasted the whole final season. Good riddance.

Campus Protests

As I said before I'm no longer in college but I remember those idealistic days. I understand why the college students are holding pro-Palestinian protests, and I'm happy to see many Jewish students there, showing that Israel does not represent all Jews. Unfortunately the media is portraying the protests as anti-semitic, and colleges are calling the cops to crackdown on protesters. Like they learned nothing from the antiwar protests during Vietnam. I read many skeptics online saying scornfully, "what do they expect the colleges to do"? Well, the students have specific demands, such as divestment from Israel. They aren't expecting a magic end to the war; they have rational, concrete goals. I've personally been boycotting Israel for years. And I remember that college students protested against apartheid in South Africa and demanded divestment then. This is all within their 1st amendment rights, yet the world treats it as dangerous and violent and antisemitic; as if they were mindlessly rioting. It's sad that so few colleges are acting like Brown University, negotiating in good faith to de-escalate the tension. At least Biden said he would not deploy the National Guard to put down the protests.

Anyway, I heard that the ceasefire talks failed and Israel is threatening once more to invade Rafah. But the US put an ammunition shipment on hold, and Blinken says that the US will publicly oppose the invasion. Plus the US was supposed to start humanitarian aid using the new temporary pier this weekend. I hope these are good signs that maybe we'll withhold weapons too. We can't keep letting Israel commit war crimes with our help.