burningspy

[burningspy]

Stop trying to prove that I'm old!

I get, all right. You can stop now.

[burningspy]

Why the fuck is it always deep in the middle of the night when the battery in the damn smoke detector starts to die?!

I was actually sleeping pretty well for once when that damn piercing chirp startled me awake.

Since my apartment actually has 2 smoke detectors and a carbon monoxide detector, I then had to play detective, waiting for the chirp over and over to figure out which one of them had murdered my restful night.

Now the deed is done and I'm extremely tired, but my blood pressure is way too high for me to get back to sleep.

[burningspy]

I have always had a fairly exceptional immune system.

Which, for the most part, is a good thing.

Earlier this week, I had the flu. Within a couple days, my white blood cells had eradicated the virus and wiped it out. I never even had a fever. Though, to be fair, my normal body temperature is in the low-97 degree range. So a fever for me would typically be a normal body temp for most other people. but I digress.

The downside to this amazing immune system, is that it does not know when to finally calm the fuck down! I've taken flu tests in the past few days, and there is no trace of the virus left in my body. Which is great. Except, my stupid body keeps excessively pumping more and more phlegm into my lungs in order to protect them from a nonexistent virus. Which means, I am perpetually coughing this crap back up all day and night. This, in turn, causes the tiny pebble in my skull to rattle around, giving me headaches and making my mind feel cloudy all day. Not to mention, every muscle in my body is sore as hell from tightening up every time there is a coughing fit.

This part is even worse than the actual illness!

I don't get sick often, but this happens every single time that I do.

[burningspy]

Even though it was supposedly just a 4 hour dose, I'm still feeling the effects 15 hours later!

Why are so many cough medicines and antihistamines allowed to be marketed as "non-drowsy" when that is a straight up lie?

I have been fighting and struggling (and failing) to stay awake for the past 2 hours after taking a cough medicine which clearly states "non-drowsy" on the label. Seems like fraud to me.

Hell, the main ingredient in many antihistamines, like Benadryl, is the exact same active ingredient in many OTC pharmaceutical sleeping pills!

It's good that I didn't take this before I went to work this morning, otherwise I probably would have driven off the side of the freeway.

[burningspy]

Why are so many cough medicines and antihistamines allowed to be marketed as "non-drowsy" when that is a straight up lie?

I have been fighting and struggling (and failing) to stay awake for the past 2 hours after taking a cough medicine which clearly states "non-drowsy" on the label. Seems like fraud to me.

Hell, the main ingredient in many antihistamines, like Benadryl, is the exact same active ingredient in many OTC pharmaceutical sleeping pills!

It's good that I didn't take this before I went to work this morning, otherwise I probably would have driven off the side of the freeway.

[burningspy]

Dammit!

Well, this really sucks. An 18-wheeler decided to launch a rock right at my face.

It's not easy to tell from the picture, but that crack is almost 3 inches wide and directly in front of the drivers seat. If it wasn't for that piece of laminated glass in front of me, there would most likely be a giant exit wound in the back of my skull right now.

Anyway.... does anyone want to buy me a new windshield?

[burningspy]

Thanks to my idiotic downstairs neighbors, I have not been able to easily breathe inside my own apartment for the past 12 hours.

I can only assume, but it seems they have never tried using a fireplace before. Well, not before last night, at least.

As I was sitting here at my desk yesterday, I began to notice the unmistakable smell of smoke filling my apartment. There is a bit of a difference between the odor of burning lumber, such as that used in construction materials to build this apartment, and that of simply logs intended for burning. What I smelled last night was the latter. So, I wasn't afraid that my home was burning down, but there was a lot of smoke in the building from a fire. Also, the air quality meter I have in my home began spiking. Something bad was certainly flooding the air around me.

It seems the people living below me are not aware that you cannot simply toss a log into that ceramic-tiled hole in the wall and set it ablaze. Because doing that, means the smoke has nowhere to go, except inside every room of the building. There are actually multiple levers that must be pulled, in order to open the chimney, so the smoke has somewhere to rise and escape, as well as ventilation slots at the front, to create a bit of a draft in order to ensure the smoke actually travels in that direction.

Opening the door to my balcony, I could hear the piercing scream of a smoke detector coming from below. Which told me all I really needed to know.

I cranked up my air purifiers as high as they could go, and eventually the air began to clear a bit. It appeared that they had put out the fire and opened their windows to rectify their mistake. Though, less than an hour later, the smokey polluted air began to significantly increase yet again. They apparently did not realize their error and attempted to start another fire, with the exact same results as before.

They must really believe in the old adage, "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again."

Except, before trying again, you really should first take time to analyze your results and figure out any necessary changes you may need to make, rather than simply doing the exact same thing and expecting something different to happen.

It took a quite while, but eventually the air did clear out once again. Unfortunately for me, just like many years ago in my first apartment where part of the building did catch fire, the smell of smoke will continue to linger for several days or even weeks!

[burningspy]

Happy new year.

And happy anniversary to me, I guess.

Has it really been 14 years since I first joined this place? It both doesn't seem that long and seems a lot longer at the same time.

Either way, this blog is officially filled with 14 years of idiocy. Seriously, I wouldn't recommend looking back at my old posts. You won't find anything intelligent or truly interesting there.

Maybe in the coming year I may put some worthwhile posts on here, but I wouldn't get my hopes up if I were you. It will most likely be more of the same stupidity and sarcasm.

[burningspy]

What in the Silent Hill is this shit?

Just struggling to make my weekly grocery run this morning in dense fog. It's actually even thicker than it shows in the picture.

Of course there was one asshole that almost hit me, because he was speeding and driving without any kind of lights on his car. He had California plates, so it doesn't surprise me that he's a moron.

[burningspy]

Merry Christmas from baby me and my dad!

I hope your day is filled with as much joy as that day was for me and my family.

Ok. That's enough good will and cheer from me. We will be back to our usual sarcasm and cynicism tomorrow.

[burningspy]

I give thanks for at least one (fairly major) thing going right so far today.

Since my family doesn't typically do much, if anything, for Thanksgiving, I figured today would be the perfect opportunity to do something that I have never done before, but needed to do pretty badly.

I fixed my car by myself!

This wasn't something like replacing a battery (which I did myself about a year ago) or just changing the oil. No, what I needed to do this time was replace a motor mount. Yep, one of the things that prevents my engine from just falling out of my car.

For some of you that do a lot of your own auto repair and maintenance, this may not seem like that big of a project. But for someone like me, who has pretty much paid actual mechanics to do almost everything under the hood, the thought of doing this had been terrifying me for the past month.

Those of you that have been following along over the past several months, you're aware that I have already recently spent nearly $8,000 having my transmission rebuilt and suspension replaced. Which made me very hesitant to spend even more time and money taking my car back into the shop. Especially since I also need to buy a new set of tires very soon. (If you'd like to help with that, Christmas is coming up and you can give me the wonderful gift of cash!)

But I digress....

After having my suspension fixed, I noticed there was still a loud grinding-ish noise as I drove coming from under the hood close to the area where a strut had just been replaced. Some quick google searches lead me to discover that the issue was most likely the motor mount starting to fail. A quick look under the hood, and I could see that the rubber on that mount was cracking and starting to come apart. Another quick search online, and I found that most mechanics or dealerships would charge around $300 on average for that repair. BUT, if I wanted, I could buy the part online for about $40 and, according to the YouTube videos I watched, replace it myself.

Luckily, the particular mount in question was in an area of the engine compartment that is relatively easy to access. The only thing I would need to move out of the way was the radiator overflow tank. With the tools I already own, as well as those I have access to borrowing from my job, I already had everything I would need to do this replacement myself.

So, very early this morning, I drove down to my workplace, since I knew no one would be there and I'd have the entire lot to myself (partially for privacy reasons, also because it's a lease violation to do any kind of auto repair in the parking lot at my apartment).

As the sun began to rise, I popped the hood and began to work. I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to get the entire job completed within about 45 minutes. Especially since the whole thing started out with me having issues trying to get one of the clips holding the anti-freeze reservoir to release so I could shift it out of the way to reach one of the bolts.

Needless to say (but I'm going to anyway), I was scared shitless the entire time. Because, this is one of those projects that if something goes wrong, then I would be completely fucked. But, everything actually seems to have gone right in the end.

I am still a bit worried that something will come loose and it will all fall apart. So, I plan to occasionally check to make sure all of the nuts and bolts are staying torqued down properly. At least for the next few weeks. But, my long drive home after this went smoothly as well with no noticeable issues.

I am very happy to report, that after this, the grinding noise is finally gone and my car even seems to drive a bit smoother too!

[burningspy]

I have a LOT of email addresses. (probably somewhere around 20? maybe more)

I own at least a few different domain names, and each one of those has at least one base email account attached to it. A couple of them also have several additional email accounts on them.

I've used those domains to set up email addresses specifically for my various bank and utility/home-related accounts. A couple used just for websites that require an email for access and will potentially spam me with junkmail. Almost every social media account I have uses a different email account, to help reduce the possibility of those companies from being able to find my various outlets in their attempts to compile my data for ads and other crap. (similar reason as to why on my computer at home, each account is opened in a separate "container" tab, so the cookies can't "talk to" each other)

The list of reasons for each account goes on and on... And that's not even counting the standard gmail and old yahoo accounts I still have but rarely access anymore.

I feel like the age of having a "burner email" is gone. Out of curiosity,

[burningspy]

I have successfully completed yet another trip around the sun.

Which means it's time for my annual birthday selfie. This time with mediocre homemade birthday cake for more comedic effect!

Apparently, this is what 47 looks like now. Very different than the way people in their 40's looked like to me when I was a much, much younger man. (and no, I'm not complaining about that at all)

[burningspy]

And now, for the results:

Apart from just over a third of you (which I am skeptical of your honesty), it seems everyone has some kind of computer issues. At least at some point.

So, why was I asking about this? Here is your answer.

These results are exactly why I am strongly resistant to self-driving cars being unleashed on the world!

Self-driving cars are entirely computer controlled. For them to be safe, those computers need to be infallible. Yet, as far as I know, there has never been a computer in existence that didn't have occasional problems, glitches, or even crash entirely. Especially not with long-term use.

Even if the software is perfectly written and coded, hardware wears out. Sensors get weak and die. Cameras get damaged. Storage and memory can only be accessed, read, and written on the various sectors of the drives so many times before they become corrupted. So the cars, or at least their components, would need regular replacement and upgrades to continue functioning properly. Which would hopefully be done in advance of the failure (at an expensive cost), and not after something goes horribly wrong.

Not to mention, as with every computer, phone, or almost any electronic device, whenever software is upgraded, it increases the possibility of "bugs" or conflicts in the code. It has happened numerous times that various companies have pushed out an OS update and ended up "bricking" devices and rendering them useless. At least when it's just an Xbox or cellphone, there is minimal risk of someone ending up badly injured or killed in a crash.

As a side-note, I don't only feel this way only about self-driving cars. I also have this feeling about our increasing dependence on the "safety features" that are constantly being added to newer "regular" cars each year. That automatic braking feature you rely on to prevent you from rear ending someone or backing out in to moving cross traffic, it will fail eventually and you will crash. Unless you are paying attention and maintaining full control of your car yourself. You know, the traditional, old school way of driving.

This is basically a long-winded way of saying I believe we have an extremely long way to go before I will ever trust anything other than an attentive person behind the wheel of any vehicle.

[burningspy]

Less than 6 hours left to respond to this poll.

I'm very curious what your answers are. And I'm sure you may be very curious why I'm even asking. Both curiosities will be answered later today.

[burningspy]

Thanks to this mashup/"cover" I have learned that this song actually has lyrics and is not, in fact, merely a spelling lesson for the tik tok kids.

This is officially the only version of this song that I can tolerate and willingly listen to.

Also, if you are a fan of rock music (or just music in general) and have not seen or heard Mac Glocky's stuff before now, go check it out. The dude is super talented.