The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Fixing The Broken

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Thought of this song because I used it while fixing the broken posts of a blog that deserves better than it gets.

Happened to stumble across this post while searching for something else and that lead me to the song and to fixing the mistakes of broken code.

Ten years later and we’re closer together in some ways and further apart in others.

Got some very serious thoughts and ideas about what might come and what might not.

Got ideas about what I ought to do and what I must do bookended by hope, dreams and thoughts of maybe this is it.

Maybe this is the time that leads to next.

Makes me smile, makes me grind my teeth. Makes me hope, makes me despair.

Never know what the tide will bring unless you go to the shore to see it now do you.

Guess I am beach bound.

Your Neighbors Are Bad People

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It takes five minutes of conversation to hear the tale of the neighbors who say they believe in a popular conspiracy theory about a patriot known by a single letter.

Five minutes to hear they believe satanists have taken over and are eating and or abusing people.

Five minutes to learn they are prepared to use weapons to fight this scourge and to fight for a way of life that never existed outside of books and movies.

“What do you think?”

“Your neighbors are bad people. Your neighbors are no different from Germans or Poles who turned the Jew next door into the Nazis and celebrated by stealing their possessions.”

“That’s an extreme position.”

“Maybe, but so is belief in a conspiracy theory that is so strong you are willing to take up arms. Be careful with the true believers because they’ll kill you first and ask questions later, assuming they ever think to ask.”

A Reasonable Motto

Found the photo above online in a few different places and captured it. Showed it off to SQ and said “it is a reasonable motto” but got no reply.

Shrugged my shoulders and remembered silence is acceptance or so they say, whoever they is or are.

Would rather debate this sort of nonsense than spend chunks of time thinking or wondering about whether the current chaos can be overcome and or managed.

Suppose it’s time for faith and hope and a willingness to buckle in and buckle down because this ride might get rough.

But rough doesn’t mean impossible or suggest it cannot be overcome so here goes nothing or something.

The Broken Blog

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Don’t quote me but I think this blog has been self hosted for 10 years now or will be in a few months.

But don’t go looking for a big anniversary party because technically the posts here extend back to May 2004 which means it is a high school junior.

Or maybe I ought to say it is similar to a junior in that it doesn’t laugh at the same silly tricks that used to work upon it once a time.

There is more truth in that than I want to admit and plenty in saying there are lots of issues here that make me crazy.

The detritus of multiple themes, broken plugins and decades of blogging has left their mark upon it and now there are strange characters and broken links all over.

In theory there might be a simple fix I can use to correct all of the additional characters and garbage that occupy posts but I don’t know what it is.

Nor have I put much time in trying to figure that out. Instead I show up and try to make adjustments, fixes and changes on the fly.

It is better, but not perfect and so the blog stays somewhat broken.

Drunk, As Drunk Can Be

And so we find ourselves more focused on trying to provide solid content than upon the clothes which the content wears.

Somewhere I can hear the groans and exhortation of an old graphic design teacher to focus on the looks so that the reader will find it easy to focus upon the words.

Not a bad suggestion, but I am short on time and lacking the energy/interest I once had.

Or more accurately, it is hard to maintain multiple blogs so one gets most of the attention and the others get some attention.

It is the sad truth but it doesn’t provide the full story.

It doesn’t mean this place is dead or that I won’t go through spots and moments in which it is my primary focus.

This is a reflection of now and now may not be reflective of tomorrow.

Ask the Shmata Queen, she’ll tell you many things, not the least of which is she is crazy about me and still my number one fan, at least when it comes to writing.

More to come, posts and changes, but not today. Stay tuned and keep close.

Playing With Blocks

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I have intentionally avoided using the block editor because I haven’t had time to mess around and try to figure out if it is a useful tool.

But tonight I gave into impulse and started playing with Blocks. I think I kind of like it.

Testing Limits

I really need to figure out how to best use the shaded box like you see below as it offers some real utility. 

The ability to highlight and emphasis parts and pieces can be a great tool for telling a story.

‘Cause love’s such an old fashioned word
And love dares you to care for
The people on the edge of the night
And love (people on streets) dares you to change our way of
Caring about ourselves
This is our last dance
This is our last dance
This is ourselves under pressure
Under pressure
Pressure

Under Pressure- Queen

I know this post is messy and lacks coherent organization, but I am going to leave it up for a bit because I want to think about it. I want to use it as a live sandbox to play in and learn with.

One Day I’ll Visit

Told SQ that one day I would agree to visit her city and that she could come to mine. 

Would make for some great tales and stories, oh yes it would.  In the interim check out some of my greatest hits.

The Best Cover Letter….Ever

One Slightly Used Pump For Sale

There Are No Coincidences

1 Foolproof Way To Become a Better Writer 

P.S. I know there are some font issues in places and am working on fixing them. When you have 15 years of posts it can take a while to correct.

Please bear with me.

The Love Story Revisited

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There was a time when I would receive emails from a few readers asking for updates about the love story and for information about when the next chapter would be written/shared here.

Been a long while since the last one so I am not certain whether the reader(s) who wanted such news are still around or what the last update they saw was.

I have some ideas about what sort of update to provide and have played around with how to present it but obviously haven’t yet done so.

Some might ask for clarity on whether I am waiting to hear back from the readers or if I intend to share something new here regardless.

It is a reasonable question and one I could answer but probably won’t.

Yeah, that is the kind of mood I am in. 😉

Not a bad one, not by a long shot but I am sort of enjoying the warmth of this particular feeling. We all have our secret worlds and sometimes we choose to live in them for a bit longer because we can.

Sometimes the king and queen require their time to be their own so they can have a moment to get reacquainted and rebalanced.

It is good for all parties and what is good needs to be watered and nurtured so the trunk stays strong and the roots well fed.

Changes Upon Changes

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Been listening to this song on and off throughout the day. Can’t tell you why I started but once I did a couple sections hit me and I was sucked in.

Haven’t had time to start looking at the redesign of this joint, but did play around with asking SQ about it.

Already hit her with some other questions that might be making her eyes roll, knees weak and her head explode so might let it go cuz those other questions might lead to the positive or negative sides of the physical descriptions above.

And truth is I really need to think about what I am trying to achieve here and that will lead to the path I choose to go down or so I think.

It is a particularly strange time so I am giving myself room to move around a bit, the final days of 2020 require it.