Day 895 – The Tale Continues but first more bitchin’

Saturday, July 1, 2023

We got home. More on that later in this screed, but two, maybe three things.

One: I am, once again learning more legal and Constitutional sh*t than I ever cared to learn, due to the recent Supreme Court decisions and the Mothers for Liberty.

I also read a piece about this woman who has tirelessly worked to overturn Roe and ban all abortions because she saw the phony movie “Silent Scream” years ago.

The right, I am told, is worried about “grooming.” This seems to mean that children are being manipulated to believe certain things and then act in ways these folks don’t like. Their two big concerns seem to be that children will become queer and boys will pretend to be girls so they can sneak into the girls’ bathroom. (What ever happened to the old peep hole?)

Ya know, the people who seem most concerned about these things seem to project the vertical y behaviors they say they want to prevent.

I too am worried about grooming of our young people. Take for instance the graphic comic approach to selling the Junior AR15. First you need to know there is such a weapon. What’s it for? It’s for kids. Yeah, it’s a weapon of mass murder made for and marketed to kids. They market it via graphic novel layout. They show young people defending property with the JAR15. They show a boy dressed in t-shirt, baseball cap turned backwards and cargo pants with their weapon slung across his body defending property. Does it work? You betcha. Just look at what Kyle Rittenhouse was wearing the night he killed someone trying to stop him from killing someone.

The Mothers of Liberty is the latest way the right is trying to push their pseudo-Christian white supremacist ideas on us and destroy our country. This involves mainly suburban Republican women dressed up in red, white, and blue  trying to take over school boards and local government posts so they can divert money from pubic schools and put it in religious segregated schools. Talk about grooming! And, oh yeah, destroying public education.

Then we get to the Supreme Court. Let’s start with the last item first. Clarence Thomas says he didn’t know he had to report trips with friends on his financial forms. He’s going to amend those forms. Great. Case closed. Nothing to see here. I mean doesn’t everyone get all paid for vacations on yachts and stuff? As Shawn Hannity would say, “Honest mistake.”

And Thomas got into it with the other black person on the bench. Speculation is he doesn’t like not being the only black person on the court. However, I disagree. I don’t think he likes the law being explained to him by someone who is way smarter than him.

It is stunning the sh*t this court is trying to pull off. I’m no lawyer, but even I can see how outrageous it is. Last night I learned that in order to bring a suit someone has to be hurt (ie damaged), and I learned that a court does not rule on hypotheticals. That is until now. 

In one case a woman wanted to know if she expanded her business to wedding websites would she have to design a website for a gay couple? Okay, she’s not in the business as of now, but she might be someday (hypothetical) and she hasn’t been asked nor does she have a gay couple wanting her services (double hypothetical). But the court took the case and said, “No, you don’t have to do it.”

Next thing ya know, some guy who owns a restaurant is going to ask if he has to serve people he doesn’t like, or believes they are devils, or something. Maybe maybe, they are black? Maybe, he doesn’t like black people? Maybe, his religion says black people are devils so for religious reasons … This isn’t a slippery slope this is a greased track, a double black diamond.

Then there was the case that several states brought including Missouri (I think it was Missouri, maybe Arkansas) and it was about abortion or god – I forget. However, the state was arguing for a company, Amy what’s her name the last loon appointed to the bench asked, “Why isn’t the company here making the case?” The answer was simple. They didn’t want to be involved. As in, they wanted nothing to do with the case, but the state lawyer said that they, the state, could represent them. Wait. The company didn’t want to be involved, oh, and said they weren’t harmed. So what have we got? No harm. A hypothetical and the court listens? WTF?

This is what it’s come to. The highest court in the land is ruling on hypotheticals and listening to cases where the people being represented want nothing to do with it, and aren’t harmed.

And we have justices that don’t seem to know that they can’t take all expense paid trips from “friends” without reporting it. (Kind of reminds me of Ron White when he said if he got rich he’d be with “his new friends” in Palm Beach.)

Okay, back to the exciting “Adventures in Newark!”

Let me make it clear, we could have gotten out Day One on a train. However, Amtrak charges a lot if you book day of – like $360 for what would have been a $32 ticket two months before.

I could have waited on the phone ninety minutes or more to get United to do something or we could have waited in line at the customer service counter. You know it’s bad when you look at the evening news and they show the very ticket counter you opted not to wait in-line to talk to a rep. Shelby met one couple that did wait – 3 hours, moved ten feet.

Okay, so, picture this. We are in one of four hotels surrounded by high speed highways. It’s a giant oval. The only restaurant you can walk to is The  Café at The Courtyard. Otherwise it’s what you hoarded from breakfast or bought at the little store in the hotel.

I called one place, asked if they delivered, “Yes,” but not there and they hung up. I went to the front desk and they shared three menus of places that did deliver: Chinese, deli/pizza, and Thai.

We got subs day one and Chinese later that evening. The next day we did the super interesting wet/carby breakfast bar and hoarded gorp. I had bought a bottle of white wine to go with the Chinese the night before, so I had that and some left over red. I had gone to the Courtyard (a happening place, btw. They had a bar with people at it!!!)

I bought two tiny Ben and Jerry’s cups and two pints – thirty bucks. One pint. was a Twixt Chocolate cookie thing and the other was some yogurt like ice cream or maybe it was soy – who knows?

At 2pm we had to leave our room. That was as late a check out they would allow. We’re sitting in the lobby. I finished the red in the room and the Twixt. So I’ve got the gorp, white wine and the soy/ice cream/ yogurt thing in a bag. Our flight is at 8:20pm. We decide to hang out in the lobby. The DING bell isn’t going off much because it’s kind of low volume at the front desk and market in mid afternoon.

I’m reading a book about the decipherment of Egyptian Hieroglyphs. I call United, answer the robot questions and am referred to an associate, I am informed the wait will be 90 minutes. At least they didn’t have a loop of ads with things like “Did you know? … Thanks for flying United.” Instead they played very bland quiet music on hold. I left one ear bud in and read 60 or 70 pages before someone came on line about one hour and 45 minutes after being on hold. 

We had gotten our flights with our miles. We got our new flight with more miles. However, the new flight had cost significantly more in miles, because it was booked at the last minute. Well, the quiet man on the other end of the line said we’d have to take that up with the redemption unit or whatever he called it. And like so many people who were kind enough to give us advice which always started with, “Just tell them …” To which I responded “After ninety minutes …”

He put me on hold for twenty minutes while he got our refund started on our original leg.

“What about paying for the hotel? etc.”

I don’t know. didn’t ask. Didn’t come up. My experience with North West years ago was that under “amenities” they mention that only First Class and International travelers get accommodations.

I had never thought to look under amenities for getting screwed.

So maybe there’s a chance we’ll get some compensation. Just call and tell them …

Oh and so I was in the lobby, waiting for the shuttle to take us to the airport. What to do with the pint of unopened soy/ice cream whatever. Well, I wasn’t going to drink the warm slushy mess. I walked to “the Market” DONG! opened the freezer door and put it in there next to the frozen pasta. I noted the upper shelf was now full of little Ben and Jerry’s cups. Nice.

As I went by the front desk I mentioned that to the women that they now had ice cream. They tittered. I wondered what would happen when someone tried to buy that pint of soy whatever?

“I’m sorry. We don’t shoe that in our computer. Let me call someone. … Yeah. I don’t know. We don’t have it on our screen. It says … sir, can you show me that again? Cookie dough Soy … Yeah, I think the Courtyard sells it. It doesn’t scan here. I don’t know.”

Will the person in front of the desk get my soy stuff or will they not?

A question I will never know the answer to.

Maybe, I should call the Fairfield and ask? “hey I left a pint of soy ice cream in the freezer. Would you mind sending it to me?”

The story should end here but it doesn’t. We got to the airport about 5:30. Our flight is at 8:20. It’s delayed until 9:20.

The flight in front of us was delayed so our flight delayed leaving, waiting for the gate to clear.

Then we were delayed until 10:20. Then they announced a gate change. It was in the other arm of the terminal. I was tired. My back hurt. Oh and when we checked our bags for the flight I was over weight. So here I am pulling out socks and underwear, much to the chagrin of Shelby, to get down four pounds. the pisser was, I had checked my weight with my never fail weigh scale. I had already pulled out books and stuff so my carry on and my backpack were already heavy. This guy comes out from security and stops right in the stream of traffic and looks up. There’s nothing to look up to at that point. It’s like the people who take the down escalator, which is packed and stop when they get off, then get angry when they get pushed. I plowed into the guy. Too tired to go around. I don’t know if he minded or even felt it. He was pretty oblivious and I was moving so who knows?

I mumbled, “Sorry” to no one in particular.

We got off the ground at 12:01am and landed in Richmond a little after one o’clock in the morning. I was trying to get an Uber while waiting for our bags. Weird responses. “We can’t pick you up there” What? Blackish screen. I kept trying. Nothing. By nothing I mean I couldn’t find any part of my phone’s screen that would respond to being poked or prodded. While I was doing this Shelby was looking for our bags. The luggage conveyor had stopped there were six army duffel bags on the track and that was it.

Was it going to start up again?  A guy with the yellow kneepads on said no that was it. I continued to poke at the Uber app. All of a sudden there was Shelby’s with our bags. “They were in this room. Must have come on the earlier flight. I had to crawl over a bunch of bags to get them.” An older couple was standing at the doorway of the luggage room wondering if they should go in. “Do you see your bags?” “Yes, They are over there.” “Well, hat are you waiting for?”

We went out to the street and joined the gang waiting for Ubers. Ta-dah the app now worked. We got home after 2am. Hauled the bags into the garage and up to the entry way and left them there. I showered. We slept like the dead.