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Desert Cat's Paradise 
Felis desertus |
 "The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it." - Proverbs 27:12. |
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Monday, April 30, 2012For Sam Swing low, sweet chariot come to carry Samuel home. Swing low, sweet chariot, come to take my Samuel home.  If a picture paints a thousand words, Then why can't I paint you? The words will never show the you I've come to know. If a face could launch a thousand ships, Then where am I to go? There's no one home but you, You're all that's left me too. And when my love for life is running dry, You come and pour yourself on me. If a man could be two places at one time, I'd be with you. Tomorrow and today, beside you all the way. If the world should stop revolving spinning slowly down to die, I'd spend the end with you. And when the world was through, Then one by one the stars would all go out, And you and I would simply fly away. July 28, 1997 -- April 30, 2012 Rest in peace my sweet boy, I will see you when I get there. ------------- One more from better times: I feel good!. (I called him my James Brown cat, because while waiting for me to get out of the shower, he would often stand at the edge of the vanity counter and do his best impression of James Brown going "WOW!" in this song.) posted by Desert Cat @ 9:09 AM | permalink Sunday, April 29, 2012No ProgressThursday afternoon I had two wisdom teeth removed from the right side of my face. One of these was fused to my jawbone. Thursday evening the first pain pill didn't even touch the pain--9-10 level pain despite the pill. I took the second one an hour early and had about an hour's reprieve during the overlap. I took that opportunity to get some supper in me.
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By Friday morning I was doing better with the pain and the pills were effective. I laid low in the apartment, doing some packing for our upcoming vacation. Yesterday and today I've been out here at the farm, doing no construction work, but catching up on some of the long-neglected house cleaning. It still hurts, of course, when the meds wear off. I'm returning to the city later this evening, to do some additional packing of stuff that I picked up out here. Why did I get my wisdom teeth pulled out now? Well for one, there was a cavity growing in one of them and I didn't want to risk the chance that cavity breaks through to the tooth root chamber while I'm away. But the other reason, as I joked with my co-workers, is to take my mind off the pain of dealing with the IRS. This tax season was costly again this year, and my CPA can't guarantee the IRS won't question the way we prepared the return anyway. I finally dug out some paperwork from last year, and after doing some math, it appears that if they don't like it the way we prepared it, we can do it a different way and owe only a relatively (relatively!) small amount more. By relatively, I mean a few thousand, because the ugly tax truth about losing a house to foreclosure is that it is possible to have the entire deficiency (difference in value between the loan amount and the amount the house sells for at foreclosure) be counted as imputed income (cancellation of debt income), subject to ordinary income tax rates. Say your house is $100,000 underwater. The bank takes your house, and then the tax man comes around looking for his share of that $100,000! Inconceivable! I know it sounds so, and yet it happens all the time. Fortunately for us, the insolvency exclusion is an escape hatch for the majority of what we would otherwise owe. That is, if the IRS disagrees with our read of the state anti-deficiency laws. As I and my CPA read it, there was no cancellation of debt because per state law, the bank had no recourse to collect on any deficiency at the time they chose to exercise their right of trustee sale. No recourse = no cancellation = no COD income. Sounds simple, except that the bank checked box 5 on the Form 1099-A, implying that the loan was a recourse loan. So far they have refused to change that form to reflect state law. We shall see. The nice customer service satan that answered the phone down at Internal Revenue Satans said it would be at least Christmas before they got around to reviewing my return in detail to see if they disagree with our take on it. How nice of them. Pulling wisdom teeth is a cakewalk in comparison. posted by Desert Cat @ 3:10 PM | permalink Monday, April 23, 2012Fleas!Seems I have a minor flea infestation on my hands. I suppose I should be happy it's been as minimal as it has up until now. But these fleas, or more accurately, these FLYSPECKS on the window of my blog have increased enough lately to address it directly.
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To the Flyspeck Brigade, here is my policy statement: This blog has a zero tolerance policy for comment spam. All efforts in all forms to utilize the comment section for SEO or commercial promotion purposes will be expunged and contact information will be blacklisted with Disqus. Apparently you are having trouble understanding what this means. Quite simply, when your user name contains a link to a commercial website, you are attempting to use my comment section for SEO purposes. It does not need to be overt advertising in the body of your comments, in fact fake, inane comments from someone I've never heard of before is a sure fire tip-off. Give it up! It is not worth your time. I don't have so many commenters that I won't notice and expunge your handiwork within a matter of hours if not minutes. And I don't have so much traffic that it is doing you any good in the first place. Go leave your fly droppings on a popular blog. posted by Desert Cat @ 9:17 AM | permalink Sunday, April 22, 2012Progress Pics    The only complication is, of course, Daisycat. She is not doing any saving toward her own retirement, and indeed she strikes me as someone who would have a difficult time knowing what to do with herself without a job. As it is, her free time that is not spent obsessively cleaning her apartment is mostly spent buying stuff on Amazon, and retirement for her would only increase her spending, not decrease it. Given our recent history, I won't be financing any of that out of my own retirement. So there she be in her little apartment at Dogpoop Acres for the foreseeable future. I suppose I'll need to make a weekly pilgrimage for that reason alone, perhaps giving her finally what she wants, which is my presence on the weekend instead of the weekdays. But a man can dream. Living the bachelor life out here gets old after a while. It would be nice to harness some of her housecleaning zeal for this pad. With the ongoing dusty dirty work under the house, I've determined I'm not going to waste time cleaning when I will just be tracking more dust in immediately thereafter. Once I finish this task and get on to a less messy task, I will give the place a thorough going-over. On that note, here is the Last Hole In The Wall for this stage of the work. I am now in the process of pulling conductor through the main spine conduit and wiring up the junctions in each box along the way.  Additionally this weekend I had a sewer line to repair. It seems the long run under the house was being subject to substantial longitudinal stresses due to the diurnal temperature fluctuation. This finally cracked the pipe at one end. Gluing it back together didn't work. I ended up cutting out a section and fastening in a rubber coupling. This will give it the flexibility it needs to expand and contract.  Labels: San Pedro homestead posted by Desert Cat @ 8:53 AM | permalink Thursday, April 19, 2012The Handicap of High IQThere is much I recognize of myself in this article.
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The Outsiders | The Prometheus Society It's a damn shame that the exceptionally gifted are so completely wasted by neglect in this society. For reference, I took a proctored IQ test at age 14 that scored me 165 verbal IQ. Again I will say that I am thankful for the Dread Ilk, that in them I have many peers. posted by Desert Cat @ 7:50 AM | permalink Wednesday, April 18, 2012Progress PicsQuite late. I ran out of time Sunday night and haven't gotten around to uploading until today.
More holes in the wall, more wires inserted.
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 Also this weekend I turned over portions of the gardens to the summer cover crop. The north field got mowed down in stripes after sprinkling blackeyed pea seeds down the path. The rye and vetch left standing will continue to grow a couple more months while the peas come up in the mowed sections.  In the south field I mowed down the full width of most of the beds with the clippings piled in the center of each bed over the bean seeds. This way I don't need to till in the spring and also the vetch will come back from the mowing and set enough seed so that I don't actually need to reseed it for next fall's turnover.  posted by Desert Cat @ 9:53 PM | permalink Wednesday, April 11, 2012AgorismCommentsposted by Desert Cat @ 6:10 PM | permalink Monday, April 09, 2012How Many Compartments Are Breached?Guest Post: Ten Minutes After The Titanic Struck The Iceberg | ZeroHedge
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Frankly I'm surprised it is still lurching along as well as it is right now. But I have my foot in the lifeboat and am prepared to make the jump whenever required. I consider it by the grace of God that I am given this additional time, and you should too, using what resources you have available today to cushion your tomorrow. posted by Desert Cat @ 5:52 PM | permalink RACISS!!If this is "raciss!!" then I must be "raciss!!".
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Sorry, but the truth is an absolute defense to charges of libel, slander and "raciss!!". RIP, NRO. Best wishes, Derb. The Talk: Nonblack Version - Taki's Magazine What the left (and indeed, the squishy center-right) cannot tolerate, is for anyone to peek under the hood and report, however rationally, on what they see. The facade *must* be maintained at all costs, and anyone who mentions anything about the Emperor and his apparent lack of apparel is shouted down as "RACISS!!" This is, of course, utter nonsense. I am a born and raised Minnesotan, FFS! We pride ourselves on our open mind and non-judgemental attitude toward people of other ethnic background. But I won't deliberately delude myself about cold hard reality, nor anyone close to me whom I care about. What is, is, people. Deal. posted by Desert Cat @ 9:29 AM | permalink Sunday, April 08, 2012Progress, No PicsJust squint your eyes and look at previous week's photos. Same stuff, different week. Getting closer, but not yet quite done running conduit, setting boxes, etc.
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I had to come into town early to fix a computer disaster. An attempt to update Zone Alarm remotely resulted in two gimped computers, cut off from remote access, and indeed all internet access. Once back in town, some manly technical competency (together with much creative thinking and dark muttering under the breath) brought them roaring back to life. For the record: Zone Alarm is a piece of shit. Buy a different security package. posted by Desert Cat @ 9:57 PM | permalink Friday, April 06, 2012Where have all the good men gone?"Hattip to Bob, found this far down the page on Ian's Red Pill Room blog:
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“Where have all the good men gone?”SKEWERED! Read the whole thing here: "Where have all the good men gone?" posted by Desert Cat @ 3:09 PM | permalink Thursday, April 05, 2012The Red Pill RoomStudents of Game, take note: I've added The Red Pill Room to the blogroll.
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This guy is a copywriter for a living and his writerly style shows in his posts. Often lengthy, but invariably insightful. In other news, with the proliferation of game blogs lately, I'm considering unmasking one of my hidden blogs. The original purpose of it being hidden is largely passing, and, with a few judicious deletions, may make a modest contribution to the blossoming Manosphere. posted by Desert Cat @ 8:52 PM | permalink Tuesday, April 03, 2012Progress PicsA few days delayed. Blogger was in the throes of an update Sunday night, and I couldn't upload photos.
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More outlets. Woo.    I am getting closer. These are all of the last holes to be cut, save for one. They are not all wired yet. Perhaps next weekend, and then I can start on pulling conductor through the main spine conduit. I was fending off the Bird Flu--the H1N1 virus that was making people around me drop like flies. I never really got sick (because I took the vaccine in the fall), but it dragged me down some and reduced my productivity. Feeling better now. ("I feel happy!") Bob.  The vetch and rye cover crops are looking super lush and nearly ready to turn under for new spring cover crops. South garden:   posted by Desert Cat @ 8:43 PM | permalink Monday, April 02, 2012For DaisycatCommentsposted by Desert Cat @ 9:54 PM | permalink 
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