Hey y’all, watch this!

Foolin’ around

Posted on August 16, 2022August 16, 2022 by Mike

SO. Been futzing around a bit with the WP posting interface, which I can’t even begin to describe to you how much I despise, when what to my wondering eyes didst appear in the toolbar above the composition textbox a mysterious icon which, when hovered over, describes its function thusly, and I quote: “Select a part of text and ask readers for feedback (inline commenting).”

WELL. Intriguing, no? I think it is, and very much so. That being the case, if you should see some bizarre icon in a post that you never came across here before, that’s almost certainly what it is. Let me know what y’all think of it.

Update! Well, it seems to work quite nicely. Had to disable several conflicting and/or redundant plugins related to the comments function, which I probably should have done a long time ago anyway.

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Sayonara, sucker

Posted on July 23, 2022 by Mike

So today I had my very first opportunity to give the new user-registration-approval plugin I installed the other day a whirl: some blaggard with a dot-ru email addy attempted to slime his way in here, and I dumped his ass so damned fast it made MY head spin. In my twenty years of doing blog-business here, there has never yet been a living soul attached to a dot-ru address that was ever up to anything but a whole lot of No Good. So you can well imagine the pleasure I derived from flushing this latest example down the crapper and out the damned sewer pipe with all the other smelly turds. Think I’ll celebrate with rerun of a bona fide classic.

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Publick Announcement

Posted on July 22, 2022July 22, 2022 by Mike

Thanks to an astute suggestion from Barry that I admit had never even occurred to me, plus some clever follow-up sleuthing by SteveF, hopefully our annoying spate of comment-spam has been firmly brought to heel at last. So with that, comment moderation has now been rescinded, hopefully for good. Thanks to both of ya’s for the assist, fellas.

NOTE: A certain number of links embedded in any comment—four I believe it is, if I remember right—will still get you automagickally dumped into the moderation queue pending approval, which I promise SteveF or myself will get on just as quick as he/I possibly can, pas de sweat.

Publick Announcement(s)

Posted on July 18, 2022July 18, 2022 by Mike

SO, the recent insane influx of comment spam has driven me to the extreme expedient of sending ALL comments into moderation for the time being, which pisses me off no end. I know it’s a pain in the cods for y’all too, and I hate having to do it, but I can see no other to stay on top of it. Apologies to one and all for this hassle; with any luck, the spambots will lose interest quickly in gumming up the CF works and will seek other, more hospital rugs to take their special brand of dump on instead.

BUT…it does make me wonder if the selfsame asswipes might have something to do with this other bizarre problem that’s cropped up here all of a sudden, which I was apprised of just today and which I’m going to devote time I’d much prefer to spend on writing and posting to sorting out: the mysterious refusal of the main page to scroll down past the “Essayists” blogroll category. I diddled around with that briefly earlier today before I had to take off for a diabetes-doc appointment, all to no avail.

IF the goddamned Rooskies are disporting themselves in the CF back-end again, I am gonna be KILLING mad. Last time that shit happened, it ended up costing me twenty-plus years’ worth of archives.

In fact, given the current situation, all of y’all who are registered here should probably consider changing your passwords with a quickness, particularly guys like SteveF, Francis, Bill, and BCE, all of whom have posting and/or admin privileges here. Again: major pain in the ass, I know, and I’m deeply sorry for it. But hey, better safe than sorry, right?

Update! Eurethra, I have found it! Somehow, the link widget options had been altered, from “Show all” to showing only “Essayists.” At this point, I’m going to just assume I got Rooskie rats crawling around in the CF admin section. Gonna have to find some way to nuke the cocksuckers for good.

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OOOH NOOOOOOES!!!!!!

Posted on July 8, 2022July 8, 2022 by Mike

SO. After dicking around for two (2) days with Fucking FedEx, including more than one phone call to Customer “Service” on which I waxed quite damned rude and nasty over their having lost my damned new computer, I finally learned EffEx had delivered the new/old/refurbed 27″ iMac to my neighbor-lady, whose palatial single-wide abode is much too far from here for the world’s greatest one-legged blogger to be able to hop or crawl over there. Had my brother go and retrieve the precious item, and have spent the hours since trying to get the thing all set up and functional.

SO. After trying repeatedly without success to get the iMacs to shake hands and play nice together so’s I could transfer all my software, documents, and miscellaneous info from the old to the new, I said hell with it and downloaded my favorite third-party blog-posting app, Ecto. I unzipped it, double-clicked, and…and…and…

SO. Imagine my deep, deep, chagrin to learn that, Ecto being a long-since deprecated application which hasn’t been updated in years, the app is a 32-bit one.

Which, the new iMac cannot run. Only 64-bit software is compatible with these newer-fangled devices, see.

Downloaded the Scribefire extension for Brave, my usual old fallback for situations like this. It’s not bad, really, not bad at all. Maybe the best thing is, it doesn’t rewrite the HTML to add in a buttload of superfluous cruft to the code, like the native WP post editor does. But, I mean, well…just dammit.

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Catch-up ball

Posted on July 1, 2022July 1, 2022 by Mike

Been mostly staying away from the Innarnuts of late, due to way too much other shit tugging at my raggedy shirt-tail demanding my attention. In other news, I should have my old, crippled hands on the new-to-me refurb iMac by no later than July the 8th, so we all got that to look forward to, I reckon. Whilst I work on getting myself back up to speed on the haps out there, enjoy a few funnies, y’all.

Goose gate — *The sign my old H-D shop bossman, Goose, has on the gate at his new place*

No Fourth for you! — *Another from Goose, whose premise I couldn’t support more heartily*

NOT FUNNY YOU GUYS — *Hey, he seems sincere, what could POSSIBLY go wrong?*

That last one swiped from WRSA’s Friday Meme-O-Rama.

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Publick Announcement

Posted on June 3, 2022June 3, 2022 by Mike

Dammit, after many years of hard use, my aged but ever-faithful old iMac has begun to seriously shit the bed over the last three-four days. Not complaining mind; like I said, the old girl has been through one hell of a torture-test with me and until now has provided nothing but stellar, hiccup-free service. But the past several days, her advanced age (she’s a mid-2007 24-inch iMac) has been showing through via repeated lockups, hard crashes, and some truly frightening video-card glitches which are unlike anything I’ve ever seen. And being a dedicated Mac user since September 1998, believe when I tell you I’ve seen it all by now.

The interesting thing this time around is how fast this death-spiral has been. The other Macs I’ve murdered to death went radically, clinging to their fading existence with a desperate tenacity that was trul pitiful to see, just heartbreaking, honestly. But this time, it’s almost as if my girl just can’t give up the ghost quickly enough. The harbingers and portents have been doubling down on End of Runtime in a way that has left me slackjawed with astonishment.

So after the initial jagged lightning-bolt flashed across the screen, black with a thin white pinstripes all around the edges of it, which blanked out every pixel it lanced over for a split instant, it left me with such an ominous dread deep in my gut that I hastened to start checking the various refurbed-Mac sites I know about to see if there was anything available in my price range, which as usual was dismayingly low. Imagine my surprise when I found several refurbed mid-2017 27-inch iMacs whose asking price was in the five-six hundred dollar range, plus the usual stroke-inducing baksheesh for the goobermint—doable provided I scraped, scrounged, and fasted fiercely enough.

The only hitch is that the one I’ve decided has my name on it comes with free five-day shipping, and it feels like to me that the odds of my old one lasting that long aren’t encouraging. So if things do go sour, as I fear they’re likely to, and you suddenly experience total radio silence from here for a brief spell, well, at least now you’ll know the reason for it. As always, I’m extremely thankful for y’all’s kind attention, and wouldn’t want anybody out there worrying about me unnecessrily. Back soon, all.

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The Good Guys

Posted on April 17, 2022April 17, 2022 by Mike

My sincere and humble gratitude to Pete and Matt; they’ll both know why, bless their hearts. Thanks so very, very much, fellas.

Publick Announcement

Posted on April 2, 2022April 2, 2022 by Mike

Posting will be light to nonexistent over the next several days, probably until middle of next week or so. Gonna be busier than the proverbial one-legged ma…uhhh, never mind about all that; somehow, that old line just don’t seem near as funny to me as it used to nowadays. Anyhoo, I’ll be moving house Sunday, leaving me with no real clue when I might get the trusty iMac all hooked up and running once more. The nice thing is, this new pad has an actual office in it—a spacious one, at that. So once I do get CF CentCom squared away and fully operational again I’ll have my desk set up in front of not one but two (2) windows, from whence I can gaze vacantly down the hilltop and off into the surrounding woods.

This new crib of mine is situated up on a respectable-sized hill, kinda next to and up behind my brother’s place, way out in the bushes and the weeds, as my anthropology prof in college liked to say. Kinda remote; kinda secluded; real damned quiet, except for when me and my brother get frisky on a Saturday afternoon and start popping off rounds of varying caliber, with the few scattered neighbors soon following our lead. Before very long, the whole area sounds a lot like downtown Beirut circa the early 80s or thereabouts, only with fewer casualties, negligible foreign-policy ramifications, and loads more fun.

I’n moving not a lot of stuff with a whole lot of help, as befits a newbie one-legged cripple, but I nevertheless anticipate much-o suckage; it’s just the nature of moving, therefore unavoidable. Once in and settled, though, it’s gonna be fantastic, I think. For one thing, I very much like the idea of being so much closer to my bro and his significant other. For another…well, I dunno. For most of my adult (HA!) existence, city life was the only life for me. But as I’ve gotten older I’ve lost all my previous fascination with urban living, until I’ve come to actively abhor it. The traffic, the expense, the overcrowding, the general hassle—no more for me, thanks. These days, I want to be just as far out in the sticks as I can get myself. That attitudinal volte-face kinda surprises me sometimes, and I have no real explanation for it. But, well, there it is.

I’ll return to the ol’ pop stand here quick as I’m able to, folks. As ever, your patience and kind attention is humbly appreciated. Who knows, maybe life in the boonies will mellow me out some at last, and Ye Olde CF Blogge will slowly shift its focus and tone, away from bilious screeds filled with hate and dire threats of grievous bodily injury against all and sundry, and towards more thoughtful essays involving soft-serve ice cream, the fluffiness of bunnies, and random cloud formations.

Stop laughing, it could happen.

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Testing four…five…six

Posted on March 20, 2022March 20, 2022 by Mike

So I get on the ol’ iMac here for other purposes entirely, hopefully launch Ecto with no real expectation of success (backstory here), when what to my wondering eyes should appear but a seemingly stable, fully-functional blog-posting window instead of the usual debilitating lockup and crash? If this test post works properly, it’s gonna call for mucho rejoicing here at CF Central HQ, I’ll tell ya that much.

Another brief check-in from Ye Olde Bloggehoste

Posted on February 13, 2022February 13, 2022 by Mike

It may not seem like it from here, but progress is indeed being made on the not-keeling-over-stone-dead front, or so I am assured by the small army of medical personnel burdened with the task of fixing my broke-down ass. In fact, some of them are so enthusiastic about my prospects as to appear almost ready to burst into song and/or go capering about in a Happy Dance over this whole thing, well over and above the usual sunny optimism a decent Bedside Manner requires.

I now have less than thirty (30) days trapped in the rehab center, while I complete a final round of IV antibiotics they tell me I simply must have. After that, I’m a free man once more, for the first time since…

uhhh…

Dec 14th?!? No, srsly? That CAN’T be right. Can it? Ah well, my thanks to all you miscreants once more anyhoo for your attendance, and another special mention for BCE, whose unwavering support and encouragement provides the pluperfect example of what the word “brother” really means.

Back soon. Mean it.

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Haps and doin’s

Posted on February 3, 2022February 3, 2022 by Mike

My apologies for the tantalizing, appetite-whetting popup appearance here, only to mysteriously dive back into the shadowy, painful world I’ve spent the last month dwelling in right away. After much soul-searching (on just about every topic you can possibly imagine), I’ve decided to hold off on a full-time return to this beloved and entirely unique hogwallow of mine until I’m released from the rehab center and ensconced in my palatial double-wide bunker down at my brother’s. The pace of events here in the Brian Center rehab facility has really taken off this week, what with with veritable hordes of administrators bearing paperwork that needs signing; nurses wanting to administer yet another undisclosed drug via IV; prosthetic-limb salesmen hawking the latest, greatest replacement EVAR for my late, great left leg; and of course a daily trio of medieval torture aficionados we euphemize as “therapists,” exhorting “just a little higher” or “just a little longer” or the dreaded “good job–now let’s do that again!”

Just joking, of course; the people here have all been truly wonderful, exactly the kind of healthcare professionals we tend to take for granted until we require their services, from which point we will forever after wonder how society could ever possibly get along without them. Which, believe me, is a damned excellent question.

So yeah, sporadic and wholly unsatisfactory posting for just a little while yet, gang although I’ll do all I can to see to it that there are no more total vanishing acts like this last one. Far as I know and as of now, my release date is the 10th, after which the rhetorical logjam hereabouts should begin to dissipate. As always, my most humble and sincere thanks to all of you for your continued support, interest, and generosity. BCE of course deserves a specific shout-out here for all he’s done and continues to do to help me out; the response to his GFM fundraiser for me is nothing short of gobsmacking. Back as and when, folks.

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Comment of the week month YEAR

Posted on November 29, 2021November 29, 2021 by Mike

Not so much for the content of it, per se, as for a specific turn of…well, just see for yourself.

With old poopy-pants visibly failing and not even Democrats liking Harris, I am sensing an attempt to position herself for the future. “Hey Democrats! I’m rested, I’m ready! Shits and Giggles are obviously not going to cut it for 2024, so what do you say?”

“Shits and Giggles”?!? *snort* I damned near unmoored a floating rib when I first saw that the other day, and I’m still laughing about it now. I am SOOOO stealing that one for further use around this here hogwallow, Hap. Well done, buddy, well done indeed.

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Publick Notice

Posted on November 16, 2021November 16, 2021 by Mike

I had forgotten it, but as it happens I have an old alternate image, part of a much older CF Xmas theme, which might make a worthy stand-in for my beloved Scrooge Picard—of whom I shall brook no evil spoken, ever—buried deep in the Trusty iMac’s file catacombs. This alternate is a real humdinger itself, featuring as it does my all-time favorite pinup hottie, Bettie Page—of whom I shall also brook no etc etc.

Upon stumbling across the Bettie header by a stroke of sheer good fortune, I piddled about some with the thing and found its dimensions to be all out of whack with what this current theme calls for, tragically enough. So I’ma do a little mild immersion into P-shop World and see if I can’t make things right. Then, if all goes well without undue hassle, maybe I’ll poke around a bit for a header-image-switching script that will work. Should that endeavor prove fruitful, well…we shall see what we shall see.

Why yes, I DO in fact just loooove tinkering with shit that I should probably leave the hell alone, always have. Why do you ask…?

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Tricks ‘n’ treats

Posted on October 30, 2021October 30, 2021 by Mike

Elon Musk wins the Innarnuts. Handily, you might say.

Am thinking of starting new university:
Texas Institute of Technology & Science

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 29, 2021

Universally admired

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 29, 2021

As Stephen wryly reminds us, “The thing about Musk is that he might just do it.” I hope like hell he does. Seeing as how it’s Halloween and all, I have all the excuse I’ll ever need for running this.

Elvira is hot stuff right enough, and no mistake. But being partial to redheads the way I am, I kinda prefer Cassandra Peterson myself.

Hey, they don’t call ’em fun bags for nothing, you know.

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A boon, an indulgence, good friends

Posted on October 16, 2021October 16, 2021 by Mike

Yes, I’m dicking around with the site theme again, and my apologies for it. See, it’s like this: I’m near completion of a redesign/rebuild for my boy Phil over at Busted Nuckles, now available rat cheer, who was having the usual problems Real Americans must always expect when dealing with a shitlib corporate entity. I used a mildly-tinkered-with theme from Ye Olde WP Theme repository, as is my usual wont, and liked it enough I thought I’d play with it some more and see if I could make it suit for this hogwallow. Then, it hit me that the time for dear old Scrooge Picard to make his eagerly anticpated holiday appearance hereabouts, which meant that I had myself some more tinkering to do so as to be sure he Picard was all dusted off and ready to take the stage. And…well, here we all are.

Like I always say: expect weirdness—a la a Tim Burton flick, say—until I get all this sorted out. My humble thanks for your patience.

Update! Just a random thought here: I DO like Phil’s new theme a lot, but at the same time, I’ve gotten so used to the CF design I’ve been using for so long it feels kinda odd seeing this old house in new clothes, so to speak. Could be ol’ Scrooge Picard needs to make an early appearance again this year, just to shake things up a little bit.

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Yet another long-overdue entry into Ye Olde CF Blogrolle

Posted on October 1, 2021October 1, 2021 by Mike

This one being Phil over at Bustednuckles, currently suffering from all the myriad woes that accompany moving house on the Innarnuts.

I’m still having to fuck around with the moving of the blog to the new hosting company.

I’m not a techie and this is turning into a shit show.

Somehow or other it always does, Phil. All’s you can do is just square your shoulders, lower your head like a bull about to charge, and keep on keepin’ on.

Phil has been in my bookmarks for a good while now, don’t know why it is that I didn’t already have him in the blogroll long ago. Oversight now rectified; welcome aboard, bud.

(Editor Note: Our most awesome-est Host Mike got confused on the names… Phil runs Bustednuckles, and Kenny a.k.a Wirecutter handles Knuckledraggin… easy to confuse the two what with all the ‘too many-years-too-many-beers’ and blows to his nugget…so I done fixed it. Jes’ Sayin’ Big Country)

Update! Yep, t’is true, I shat the bed for some incomprehensible reason. I’d plead creeping Alzheimer’s like I’ve been doing for years now any time I screw up or get confused, but as I get older and slower and more enstupidated that begins to look less like a joke and more like somber reality. On the bright side, however, I am now fully qualified to serve as President, judging by current conditions.

On the even-brighter side, the whole disgraceful episode furnished me with a reminder that Knuckledraggin’ My Life Away, a/k/a Kenny’s online abode, needs to be in Ye Olde Blogrolle also, which installation has been duly accomplished. Red-faced apologies to Phil and Kenny both for my egregious fuckuppery, and thanks to BCE for having my back as usual.

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Get wise, Chuck

Posted on September 16, 2021September 16, 2021 by Mike

Some people seem to feel that every football Lucy holds up for them is worth trying to kick. CLUE: it ain’t.

Stop being a chump, Charlie Brown. Deny Lucy your consent. Because there’ll always be another football, but Lucy can trick you into making a fool of yourself only for as long as you allow her to, and no longer.

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The lion donkey lays down with the lamb pit bull

Posted on August 20, 2021August 20, 2021 by Mike

Remember the other day when I told y’all that pit bulls were the absolute best dogs on Earth? I was NOT just winding my watch, y’know.

Two soul-enriching pittie vids in the same week calls for the rerun of a few pics of the last dog I will ever own: my beloved Cookie Monster, late and more lamented than you could possibly imagine.

One of the late Cookie with my late wife, who originally picked her out to bring home. Over my objections, fool that I was.

One just as proof that pitties really ARE sweet dogs capable of getting along with just about anybody.

Finally, my absolute all-time favorite of old Kookie-Kook. So somber, so dignified, so noble she makes Walter Cronkite look like a goddamned drunken fratboy.

Vidya via Ace. For all you animal-fanciers out there, if you aren’t a subscriber to The Dodo’s YT critter-vid channel, you’re really missing out on something good.

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Publick Notice

Posted on August 10, 2021August 10, 2021 by Mike

So at the moment, I have about twenty tabs open on the iMac, and about ten on the phone—all of them stories I hope to get around to posting on sooner or later, although admittedly some of them have been just sitting there all lonesome and neglected for several weeks. This is due to the veritable juggernaut of worthwhile stories on momentous events bearing down on us, with more coming each and every day.

Add in the myriad other demands on my time and energy out in Meatspace and I was right before the point of just throwing my hands up, saying to hell with it, and closing the moldier tabs in despair when a possible palliative came to me: I could adopt a daily “Quick Hits” section à la the one Ace has going over at his joint. A way, in other words, to get these items out there for you CF Lifers to play around with without any lengthy commentary from me. I’ll need to come up with a different name for such a beastie here, I suppose—something like “Glancing Blows” or “Short Jabs” or “Rabbit Punches,” maybe.

Anyways, look for something along them lines to start showing up around here soon, once I can rassle this backlog of post-fodder into something resembling submission.

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