(no subject)

I recall taking a school field trip to some kind of naturey hiking preserve thing. Maybe third or fourth grade, I think. We spent a couple of weeks before hand learning about different plants and animals we were supposed to see. As soon as we drove into the drive of the place, I recognized a bird from class: the easily recognizable Red Wing Blackbird. It's a regular tiny black bird with a stripe of yellow, and another of red, on each wing. Stylish!
Since then, I have always had fond memories of that particular bird. So imagine my sadness when I learned that in Arkansas, thousands of these birds fell down dead, just before midnight on New Years Eve.

Why? They weren't sick. Sick birds don't fly. These were literally falling out of the sky. WTF, Arkansas? For reals.

Back to work today, and back to the grind. I am quite resentful of the fact that I even have to have this job. I'm continually irked at having to fix mistakes I didn't make, working with shitty cheap software on slow-ass machines. I said I was gonna quit on Jan 15th if I didn't get a holiday bonus. As it happens, I got a tiny one. Not even enough for H and I to see a movie, unless we levitate there and eschew getting a beverage.

In case you're interested, here's the new article I wrote on The Black Swan