Happy New Year All!

Celebrate with conviction!

Comments

[Bela1]

First!!!

[Bela1]

Have a Happy New Year Tom Maguire & to all JOMers !!!

[peter]

Thoid

[Narciso79]

Cuatro happy new year.

[daddy]

In honor of TM's New Thread and the New year we just had a 5.0 Quake up here! Alaska Earthquake Center

Time: December 31, 06:03 PM
Magnitude: 5.0
Location: 61.31,-149.99
Depth: 43.0 km (27.0 miles)
Event Id: 0191pccr7

I was upstairs prowling through my Darwin books, (still scattered in the closet from the last quake), for my Audobon quote. The gals and the dogs were on the main floor below me in the TV den watching some Brit 'claymation' comedy movie when it hit. The house really shook hard and I heard momma hollering and everybody scampering out the door to the open porch on the side of the house. I stayed put, but once it ended it was nice to hear them laughing and enjoying the experience instead of petrified. Nelson and Fry dashed out of the house as well, but Scout stayed put. Good dog, Scout.

[Jim Eagle]

New Horizon is getting closer. Look in at around 0800hrs tomorrow for the pics.

Hey its outer space, really this itme.

[Narciso79]

One of the first fusion sieves:

https://spectator.us/trump-deep-state-2019/

[jim nj]

https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/31/this-clever-ai-hid-data-from-its-creators-to-cheat-at-its-appointed-task/

Odd

[MissMarple2]

Narciso,

That Spectator article reads like some Never Trumper nut case.

[Gentlejim]

I want to know what happened that JiB is still with us at 1032. :)

Happy New Year JOM. Celebrate safely.

[Narciso79]

I think wood was drinking some schnapps made from some rare Amazon root.

[daddy]

Magnitude 5.0 - 6 miles N of Anchorage

I think we are still technically in "aftershock" mode from the recent big one, and this may be like number 4,000 or so if I'm not much mistaken.

OL,

So far all I can come up with is this from his autobiography, written as an old man, so the quote IIRC is probably in one of his youthful letters home, but from his bio here he is describing himself at 17 years old and at the University of Edinburgh, attending a lecture by visiting Bird Expert Audubon, and you can get a sense of his opinion:

...but as the subjects were exclusively medical I did not much care about them. Much rubbish was talked there, but there were some good speakers, of whom the host was the present Sir J Kay Shuttleworth...I heard Audubon deliver there some interesting discourses on the habits of the N. American birds, sneering somewhat unjustly at Waterton. By the way, a Negro lived in Edinburgh who had travelled with Waterton and gained his livelihood by stuffing birds, which he did excellently; he gave me lessons for payment, and I used often to sit with him, for he was a very pleasant and intelligent man.

Desmond and Moore's excellent bio says of that lecture, ...As an old man Darwin could still remember seeing Audubon, with his black flowing locks, exhibit a drawing of a buzzard at the Society and describe his ingenious method of wiring up dead birds for painting.

And then of course there is that well known bit from "Voyage" (page 184-186) where' after he describes how Chileno's capture Condor's live, he is in that hacienda where there are a number held captive:

April 27th: This day I shot a Condor. It measured from tip to tip of the wings eight and a half feet, and from beak to tail, four feet...When an animal is killed in the country, it is well known that the condors, like other carrion-vultures, soon gain intelligence of it, and congregate in an inexplicable manner. In most cases it must not be overlooked, that the birds have discovered their pray, and have picked the skeleton clean. before the flesh is in the least degree tainted. Remembering the experiments of M Audubon, on the little smelling powers of carrion-hawks, I tried in the above-mentioned garden the following experiment: the condors were tied, each by a rope, in a long row at the bottom of a wall; and having folded up a piece of meat in white paper, I walked backwards and forwards, carrying it in my hand at the distance of about three yards from them, but no notice whatever was taken. I then threw it on the ground, within one yard of an old male bird; he looked at it for a moment with attention, but then regarded it no more. With a stick I pushed it closer and closer, until at last he touched it with his beak; the paper was then instantly torn off with fury, and at the same moment, every bird in the long row now began struggling and flapping its wings. Under the same circumstances it would have been impossible to have deceived a dog. The evidence in favour of and against the acute smelling powers of carrion-vultures is singularly balanced. Professor Owen has demonstrated that the olfactory nerves of the turkey-buzzard ((Cathartes aura) are highly developed...

And a footnote at the bottom says: (Darwin) I noticed that several hours before any one of the condors died, all the lic, which with it was infected, crawled to the outside feathers. I was assured that this always happened.

And that's all I have to say about that:)

What an unexpected pleasure to read a Brit scientist using yards and feet instead of those damned French meters@#$%

[clarice]

Happy New Year one and all and TinY Tim. (wait..what?)

[MissMarple2]

Well, I made it until midnight.

Happy New Year, all!

See you tomorrow!

[daddy]

How come back in 1967 the street markings in London were understandable to the average human, yet 50 years later they are undecipherable?

How did humanity go so wrong?

[Narciso79]

Well the actual recent season might have been programmed by daleks or cybermen.

[Catsmeat]

daddy--thank you so very much! She was a very good wife to him, and he did in fact love her dearly all his days, so there's that...

And also thank you Jack!

I miss Calvin and Hobbes very much.

[jim nj]

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/12/31/greenpeaces-iconic-rainbow-warrior-ship-chopped-up-on-a-third-world-beach-sold-for-scrap/

Nice and clean way to gut a ship, not,

[Narciso79]

Jane curtin seems to have had too much of the schnapps

[JimNorCal]

TM: "Celebrate with conviction!"

Wait. What? Who's been convicted?
Oh.
Never mind.

[Narciso79]

Did they know ultima thule was in that trajectory of the probe, if not how did they manage it?

[Ralph L]

HNY!
It's 65 degrees here in NC now.

I dropped NEtflix for AcornTV tonight. I hope they're not leftie too.

[Narciso79]

Insofar as BBC is leftwing, much of their material comes from there.

[daddy]

Well the actual recent season might have been programmed by daleks or cybermen.

Narciso,

Z says that on the plus side at least with the new Dr Whoess it isn't nothing but scripts who's underlying theme is will or will not the Dr and his sexy Companion wind up in carnal embrace.

[mike in houston]

The brave Maggie, my Scottish Terrier, just came running into the room and onto the bed as the fireworks have started in earnest. This is the same dog that will go after large field rats and stare down German Shepherds. Here is some NYE music from my favorite singer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOwNBP_B1xo

[daddy]

You can bet these guys will never get invited to Meet The Press with F. Chuckedup Todd. No deniers permitted.

Now here is where if SNL (Saturday Night Live) had a molecule of humor left in 'em, they could do a parody of Chuck Todd having Flat Earther's and Earth Centered Universers on the show, banning Copernicus and Galileo and Kepler and Brahe and Newton who are outside banging on the studio door.

Sadly, they don't have a molecule of humor left in 'em.

[jim nj]

Incredibly stupid white paper.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/the-dollar-store-backlash-has-begun/ar-BBRdPzh?li=BBnbfcN

Dollar stores are evil because they open in low-income areas and don't sell nutritious food.

[jim nj]

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/12/the-knights-of-columbus-responds-to-sens-hirono-and-harris.php

[Another Bob]

One man’s predictions for 2019.

Other than the European stuff that I don’t follow closely enough, I find the rest hard to argue against.

http://thezman.com/wordpress/?p=15981

[Gentlejim]

Food deserts, Jim, it’s all about food deserts.
I wish I had some dessert right about now. I’m damn hangry and the only thing open is a gas station. Nothing nutritious there. To whom do I complain?

[jim nj]

AB,

Yeah, I've been reading a lot of prediction articles tonight. Some are thoughtful. Others look more like personal wish lists. Many discuss one facet and say that this, that, or the other thing will happen. Well, yeah, probably one of those things will happen.

Gentlejim,

I had a marketing professor many years ago that pointed out that marketing was a key component of stable societies. Rule of law was more important, but marketing told consumers what their choices were and the feedback from marketing influenced providers in what they would supply.

Gas station shops and dollar stores depend on that feedback. That which doesn't sell is no longer carried. That which does sell shows up in larger quantities. Why lose a sale by being out of stock?

These stores don't hold a gun to their customer's heads.

[jim nj]

7-11 hot dogs are d bomb.

[rich]

>>>Did they know ultima thule was in that trajectory of the probe, if not how did they manage it?

Posted by: Narciso79 | January 01, 2019 at 12:55 AM<<<

in much the same way that Tombaugh found Pluto ... looking at dots of light a frame at a time.

[Gentlejim]

Jim,
You expect me to believe that I can’t get fresh baby spinach at the dollar store because baby spinach simply doesn’t sell at the dollar store? I’m going to grab a bag of hot Cheetos and think about that.

$1 for 2 chili/cheese dogs at 7/11 when I was in college were a weekend staple.

[Gentlejim]

I just finished the KofC letter, which was well done. The ball has been thrown back into the progtard court where I suspect they’ll disppaear into a bathroom and deflate it never to be seen again. :)

[JimNorCal]

Almost new year in AK.
Have a great '19, daddy!

[jim nj]

Gentlejim,

I've got several chain supermarkets nearby, but the best for produce is a Korean greengrocer downtown. Quality, quantity, range of selection to accommodate many ethnic cuisines and price. Price. Beats all the chains.

Oh, right, sorry, I forgot that visiting a Korean greengrocer is racist because they open markets in low-income areas and suck money out of the community.

[Gentlejim]

Jim,
We should sit down with a bag of hot Cheetos and see if we can sort out the circular “logic” of those demonizing the evil Korean grocers. The roof Koreans are the ones they need to be mindful of.

[jim nj]

nytol

[daddy]

Thanks Jim SV,

I was out with Fry on a very snowy backroad and he was barking up a storm at all the firecrackers. Then at exactly midnight some huge colorful bursts filled the air and he went bananas! Much fun. Happy New Year back at 'cha!

Looks like we've already had the fly by of Ultima Thule, but with the 6 and a half hour delay in signals we won't know anything for another 5 hours or so---amazing!

[daddy]

A word of advice for Jonah Goldberg from Marcus Aurelius:

Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.

[henry]

Happy New Year.

[peter]

In the 50s here but very windy. HNY

[Extraneus]

Happy New Year, Comrades!

[James D.]

Now here is where if SNL (Saturday Night Live) had a molecule of humor left in 'em

When was the last time that was true? The late 1980s, with Toonces the Driving Cat, maybe?

[James D.]

Happy New Year, everybody!!!

[pagar]

Have a Happy New Year Tom Maguire & to all JOMers !!!

[Buckeye]

Happy New Year JOMers!

For the last 50 years, I have lived in an urban environment, and fireworks and occasional gunfire was the order of the day when the ball dropped.

Now we are out in far suburbia, and at midnight I heard absolutely nothing but the dog snoring.

A bit weird:)

[Jane]

For some reason, the year 2019 seems very odd to me. I don't think it's because it's an odd number, but rather because it's an ODD number.

Sydney OZ may have done it right - they forgot to change the number.

[JimNorCal]

A link to save, then dust off if Liz Warren gets the Dem nom for '20.
Via Insty.
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3105661

[Jim Eagle]

HNY all.

We didn’t make it to 12. I think 2 bottles of Billecart-Salmon had something to do with that. But sitting out on the terrace with our closest neighbor we watched the Paris, then London fireworks on the Telly, through a window😊🇬🇧🇫🇷🇺🇸

[Old Lurker]

Happy New Year, friends.

[Narciso79]

Well it's the year Roy batty is supposed to return from space, maybe they should have had a wall, there,

[henry]

What time is NASA showing the flyby pictures??

[Marlene]

Happy New Year! Well, my Medicare coverage begins today! Jane mentioned 2019 being odd. Yeah.I don't know if I should laugh or cry.

[Captain Hate]

2019 isn't a prime number.

[Captain Hate]

Now here is where if SNL (Saturday Night Live) had a molecule of humor left in 'em

When was the last time that was true? The late 1980s, with Toonces the Driving Cat, maybe?

Even during its so called heyday I never found it more than slightly amusing.

[Neo]

My prediction of the year ...

If the House seriously moves to impeach Trump, he will fire Mueller.

No sense letting them impeach him twice.

[peter]

Jane, I agree about the oddity of the number 2019. It is not a prime number, however, as it is divisible by 673 and 3.

[peter]

Jeez, hate missed it by that much. Too much beet flavored beer.

[Neo]

2019 isn't a prime number.

Oh yeah. 2+0+1+9 = 12
1+2 = 3 yep, can be factored with 3

This only works for 3 and 9

[peter]

I love bad predictions. Look at these (paid for by you, the taxpayers) from only a year ago: I love #s 9 and 18.

And remember Jeane Dixon predicted Teddy Kennedy would be President by 1972.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/18-predictions-for-2018-and-beyond

[henry]

Peter, number 9 was needed to by an example of number 18.

[henry]

Buy. Auto cucumber changed that.

[Narciso79]

I think I understand the stratagem that a put forward, the polish model is like an articles of confederation model more autonomy for member states, Poland is quite aware of the alternative.

[henry]

10:15 am for flyby.

https://t.co/eMJrTOiPxQ

NASA TV feed

[Captain Hate]

Marlene,

Medicare is great.

[Jane]

Peter and it adds up to 3, which is my personal number - even so...

[Marlene]

CH,I told hubby this morning that if he has to bring me to the ER to remember that I'm on Medicare now. :)

[jimmyk]

I love bad predictions.

Well, he gave himself 5 years so I suppose some of them are bound to be right. But he clearly is one of our betters, which is his ticket to a PBS forum.

[Jane]

Marlene, I actually agree. Medicare is wonderful compared to insurance in the era of obamacare.

[Jim Eagle]

In 6 minutes. Hold on to your hat:)

Tuesday, Jan. 1, 10:15 a.m. EST: New Horizons #UltimaThule Flyby Signal Acquisition
Tuesday, Jan. 1, 11:30 a.m. EST: New Horizons #UltimaThule Post-Flyby News Conference
Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2 p.m. EST: New Horizons #UltimaThule Science Results Briefing from Johns Hopkins APL
Thursday, Jan. 3, 2 p.m. EST: New Horizons #UltimaThule Science Results Briefing from Johns Hopkins APL

[jimmyk]

Medicare is great.

I don't need to tell you guys that you're on the beneficiary side of the ponzi scheme. It's great being in early, not so great for those down the line when the thing blows up.

[Old Lurker]

Medicare works but I would give it up in a heartbeat if the Federal Government would withdraw 100% from the entire medical industry, and if the States would withdraw except for supporting one hospital in each county which would accept only legal citizens as patients. And when I say "withdraw" that means no mandates imposed on insurance companies.

Otherwise, Medicare, like SS, is merely opium for voters over about 60.

[Old Lurker]

Great minds, Jimmy.

[jimmyk]

Yeah, OL, I'm feeling cranky this morning.

[sbwaters]

All I’ve got is the earth from the space station. So ordinary. ;-)

[Captain Hate]

Has anyone seen the movie, The Favourite? As I strive to make abundantly clear, I despise Whoreyweird and almost everything they do. But my wife dotes on that swill. So when I asked her if there was something she wanted to do for New Year's Eve, of course she said go to the movies. Through gritted teeth I said "fine, but it has to be something mutually acceptable" with which she agreed. The Favourite looked like a good choice and it was; a dark comedy about Queen Anne in the early 18th century. I'm sure it took *great* liberties with the material but it was funny and well done. Plus they used the word "cunt" a lot, which is still oddly taboo in our purportedly anything goes culture.

Imagine my shock when some dickweed guest, as a film expert, on a local college radio station included it in his ten worst films of the year. Ordinarily that wouldn't bother me that much, maybe it got sand in his man cunt, but he was raving in his "faves" about how good Vice was and how everyone looked like the people they were portraying and I just consider him another worthless pile of shit groveling in the cesspool of what popular culture has become.

[clarice]

We qualified for medicare some years ago but stayed on my husband's firm's insurance plan until today as he is retired as of yesterday. We'll see.

[Narciso79]

That's how screwed I their rage virus has made them in another season it sould be a dark horse. The queen Anne star is the one I would have cast for the duchess because kiera Knightley is a stiff most everywhere.

[sbwaters]

So the NASA wbsite is promoting a New Horizons song as if it was a New Years Eve entertainment crossover show.

Aargh!

[Captain Hate]

To be clear, I wasn't judging the economic soundness of Medicare. And I'm not like Vic at AoS who insists that because he paid into it for years that he deserves it. Yes, that was the deal but it doesn't make it cost effective.

But the quality of care is outstanding.

[sbwaters]

Well, I think I’ll wait for the book.

[jimmyk]

But the quality of care is outstanding.

Glad to to hear that. That may vary regionally. I have a sister on Medicare who complains that a lot of doctors don't accept it, and she's often unhappy with the ones that do. Though she's a chronic complainer, so who knows.

[Captain Hate]

I thought the casting was very well done in The Favourite. As usual I'll watch it with subtitles on DVD for the lines that I didn't catch because of accents and poor enunciation (and aged hearing).

[Narciso79]

Yes if they are going to have dead fill it with some computer simulation.

[Old Lurker]

I never bought that "I paid into it" crap on any of these programs, and wish the government (thank you FDR) had never discovered how effective that word ploy is. I don't buy into its cousin "I worked and you promised THIS pension crap either".

I would have the government honor all Notes, Bills, and Bonds properly issued by the government pursuant to each Constitutional Requirement for same, and only those. One of the thorniest issues resolved in our founding was exactly which expectations would in fact be paid by what government, if any. We are in the mess we are in because politicians discovered they could collect power now for promises made on behalf of future taxpayers.

[jimmyk]

And I'm not like Vic at AoS who insists that because he paid into it for years that he deserves it.

Right, he probably deserves something, but like SS if he got back only the value of what he actually put into it, he probably wouldn't be too happy.

[Narciso79]

Of course one has to go 40 miles to altamonte springs to go see it,

[Captain Hate]

I have a sister on Medicare who complains that a lot of doctors don't accept it, and she's often unhappy with the ones that do. Though she's a chronic complainer, so who knows.

It was fairly easy to get a list of doctors in the University Hospitals system that take Medicare patients. I like women doctors and the first one I got managed to get rid of my decades long persistent cough. If she had a flaw it was overreacting to some of my conditions but it was erring on the side of caution plus with my inexpensive supplemental plan it hardly cost me anything. She left her practice to raise children and she referred me to some other woman who temperamentally is just what I wanted: very smartassedly down to earth on how I'm doing.

[Marlene]

The big issue with Medicare is that the demographics are upside down. My 86 year old mother and 88 year old mother-in-law are still living. Here I am,at age 65 next week,starting coverage. I don't think death panels will be something to joke about by the time many of us are 80-something years old.
Hubby told the daughter to put us in a nursing home and make sure we get the good drugs. :)

[Jim Eagle]

Impressive science, and engineering. I wonder how much the ChiComms have stolen already? The collective IQ in that Operations Center was most likely more than all of DC combined.

[JimNorCal]

CH: "maybe it got sand in his man cunt"

Extremely coarse!
I denounce myself for LOLing and filing it away for future use :)

[Jane]

I watched "The Whole Truth" on Amazon Prime last night and it was absolutely amazing.

[jimmyk]

The big issue with Medicare is that the demographics are upside down.

Yes, you look at the history of Medicare taxes, and they've skyrocketed for the increasingly small share of the population that pays into it. Of course a lot of it is piled onto higher-income people.

[Jim Eagle]

A little history:

"January 1, 45 B.C., was celebrated as New Year's Day for the first time in history as the Julian calendar took effect.

Soon after becoming Roman dictator, Julius Caesar decided that the traditional Roman calendar was in dire need of reform. Introduced around the seventh century B.C., the Roman calendar attempted to follow the lunar cycle but frequently fell out of phase with the seasons and had to be corrected. In addition, the Roman body charged with overseeing the calendar, often abused its authority by adding days to extend political terms or interfere with elections.

In designing his new calendar, Caesar enlisted the aid of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, who advised him to do away with the lunar cycle entirely and follow the solar year, as did the Egyptians. The year was calculated to be 365 and 1/4 days, and Caesar added 67 days to 45 B.C., making 46 B.C. begin on January 1, rather than in March. He also decreed that every four years a day be added to February, thus theoretically keeping his calendar from falling out of step. Shortly before his assassination in 44 B.C., he changed the name of the month Quintilis to Julius (July) after himself. Later, the month of Sextilis was renamed Augustus (August) after his successor.

Celebration of New Year's Day in January fell out of practice during the Middle Ages, and even those who strictly adhered to the Julian calendar did not observe the New Year exactly on January 1. The reason for the latter was that Caesar and Sosigenes failed to calculate the correct value for the solar year as 365.242199 days, not 365.25 days. Thus, an 11-minute-a-year error added seven days by the year 1000, and 10 days by the mid-15th century.

The Roman church became aware of this problem, and in the 1570’s Pope Gregory XIII commissioned Jesuit astronomer Christopher Clavius to come up with a new calendar. In 1582, the Gregorian calendar was implemented, omitting 10 days for that year and establishing the new rule that only one of every four centennial years should be a leap year. This is our present day calendar."

[Captain Hate]

I never bought that "I paid into it" crap on any of these programs, and wish the government (thank you FDR) had never discovered how effective that word ploy is. I don't buy into its cousin "I worked and you promised THIS pension crap either".

NK once infuriated me by pointing out how politically astute GWB's Medicare expansion was. The GOP is just as irresponsible and pandering as the Uniparty-D.

Not sure what your point is on the pensions unless you're talking about the massively underfunded public ones.

[JimNorCal]

I don't know about MediCare but I'm pretty sure that I could have invested the money that govt took from me for Social Security and piled up WAY more than SS will ever pay out to me.

[MissMarple2]

Good morning!

Beer and midnight exact a toll.

[MissMarple2]

Laura Ingraham
‏Verified account @IngrahamAngle

Media Didn’t Like McChrystal Until He Started Bashing Trump https://www.lifezette.com/2018/12/media-didnt-like-mcchrystal-until-he-started-bashing-trump/ … via @LifeZette

==================

To which President Trump comments:

Donald J. Trump
‏Verified account @realDonaldTrump
32m32 minutes ago

“General” McChrystal got fired like a dog by Obama. Last assignment a total bust. Known for big, dumb mouth. Hillary lover!