Ah, well, poop

(Heh. I always think of "oh, poop" from Despicable Me - where Vector winds up on the moon and that's his reaction.)

* My piano teacher is sick today so no lesson. I was kind of looking forward to it. Now I need to wait another week. Though maybe that means I do the Voldemart run I was contemplating for later in the week.

* Kind of seized by the "dunwannas" - I need to finish the discussion section of my poster, pop it in, proofread the thing, and think about trying to get it printed. Yes, I have three weeks until I need it but I worry..

I also have those chapters to start on....I'm actually being hired to do six or eight of them over the next two months which is exciting but also slightly scary as I hope I didn't sign myself up for something that will eat my life. (Then again, once classes start up for the fall? I will have lots of office hours that could be spent on those). Not sure what the money will be put toward, maybe the Eventual New-Used Car Fund I am starting to think about. (My car is only six years old but I recognize that even with my careful maintenance, it won't last forever, and I'm not counting on my dad's help to buy my next car. And I'd rather, really, if I can at all swing it, pay out of pocket for it if I can without having to finance. Even though for people like me who are good credit risks there tend to be okay deals, still, I like the thought of "it's all paid for." And yeah, my next car is going to be used - or rather, "certified pre-owned" where the dealer has checked it out and I don't have to deal with someone from the sketchy side of town on Craigslist, but which is still cheaper than new-new.)

I have enough yarn. I have too many books already. I'm not big on buying expensive clothes and anyway I pretty much hate clothes shopping here. I don't need any fancy appliances (though I suppose an "eventual new fridge fund" or "eventual new oven/range fund" would be a good idea).

I will probably eventually blow some of it on "just plain fun" stuff (maybe more G1 ponies, probably more yarn or quilt fabric, despite already having too much and not using up what I have). But one thing I know: I need fun in my life and I have a really hard time finding fun. Last Friday going to Longview to hang out with Laura was fun and I now have plans to see if I can figure out some other kind of East Texas excursion (like an interesting museum) where we could do another meetup-and-lunch in August. 

* First instance of ransomware showing up on campus. Ugh. Someone clicked on an attachment to an e-mail that was apparently claiming "here's the invoice you asked for" and boom. I guess I better be extra careful (though I almost never open attachments, and only then if it's something I KNOW I need and if it's clearly sent by someone I know). Maybe time to send all the vital stuff I've not backed up yet to the campus cloud.

I tend to feel like penal colonies should be re-established for folks who commit cybercrimes (and people who do stuff like install skimmers on credit card readers). No, they wouldn't have to be hellish pits, just places people could not leave and that would prevent them from having access to whatever technology they used to commit their crimes. Surely there are a few islands full of time-share properties people are looking to unload? There could be periodic air-drops of food and whatnot so the people stay alive, just, they have NO internet or cell phone access whatsoever.

Ransomware seems especially bad; Computer Services indicated this one was 128-bit encryption so hard for a white-hat hacker to fix it and of course it fundamentally "bricks" your computer. And if you pay the ransom, you're just encouraging the goons to do it again. (And who knows where that money goes; it could even buy blocks of C4 for would-be terrorists, for all we know).

* And yeah, another instance of Human Awfulness, this time at the airport in Istanbul. I am not happy about how some news outlets are allegedly (I didn't bother to watch it) playing the video of someone blowing himself up? I think? and they're offering a weak trigger warning ahead of time but really? Do we need to see that? I think of the phrase, "Disaster porn" though this isn't honestly a "disaster" in the sense that the flooding in West Virginia is - this is human caused. Times like this are why I tend to prefer radio news...it tends to be less graphic. (There is STILL one all-news channel out of Dallas I can get on the AM. Most of the AM channels are either political commentary or religious broadcasting and while I am fine with at least some of the religious broadcasting....sometimes I just want "the facts, ma'am" about what's going on in the world without an obvious spin on it. (And yes: all news outlets spin, I know.)

*A fanciful thought about the penal colonies: maybe that's how we colonize Mars? Offer the choice of a lengthy prison sentence or "transportation"? Kind of like early-Victorian Britain and I'm sure some would object to that idea but honestly, I'm sick of cybercriminals and the like.

Oh, I know: there are honest, earnest, hardworking people who WANT to go to Mars and they'd be offended at the idea of a crook getting to go before them. For me, though, the thought of being sent to be in a colony on Mars, never getting back to earth, dying up there on that rock if the oxygen producer wasn't functioning just right, probably facing strict food rationing....it would be like a prison sentence to me. I wouldn't find it exciting, I would find it horrible.

* Sunday is an abbreviated church service (lots of people will be gone) with breakfast. I volunteered to make muffins but I'm just going to do a couple batches of the Krusteaz blueberry ones from a mix: those are about as good as the ones I could make from scratch and are somewhat easier.

Last week was "Mexican" Fiesta (I am preserving the scare quotes). I went pretty authentic, making Carne Machaca off of the recipe from my Arizona Highways cookbook. It turned out quite well but it almost entirely got eaten up, so no leftovers....all it was was a chuck roast, dusted with Penzey's Chili 3000 (an off-recipe addition but a good one), seared, cooked until done in the slow cooker, shredded, and then topped with a sauce made from chopped onion cooked in olive oil and then mixed with chopped garlic, a can of tomatoes, one of the little cans of mild diced chilis, and then all dumped on top of the shredded beef and reheated.

It was good but I would only ever make it to take somewhere because three pounds of chuck roast is too much for one person to want to eat up.