Another unemployment haiku

Might not have mentioned
Unemployment really sucks.
No, I mean, really.

Fifth-generation fighters aren't as easy as they sound

It would appear that Russia is having as much trouble with its fifth-generation fighter aircraft as the U.S. is, given recent reports. Granted, America's latest fifth-generation effort, the F-35, has its problems, as we have mention here, here, and here,  But Russia is approaching the effort from a different starting point. The F-35 has problems because it is intended to fill all roles for all services, which is an unrealistic goal for an aircraft. Not sure why anyone would think that is a good idea, but that is the basis of the F-35 program, so the aircraft is destined for mediocrity at any given role, even if it is adequate at all roles.

The problem for Russia's fifth-generation fighter is different, but equally predictable:

Reporting from the Singapore Airshow 2016, IHS Jane's reports that "Russian industry has consistently referred to the Sukhoi T-50 PAK FA as a fifth-generation aircraft, but a careful look at the program reveals that this is an 'in name only' designation."
This is largely because of a lack of evolutionary technology aboard the plane compared with previous jets that Russia and the US have designed. Indeed, the PAK FA's engines are the same as those aboard Russia's 4++ generation (a bridging generation between fourth- and fifth-generation aircraft) Su-35. Additionally, the PAK FA and the Su-35 share many of the same onboard systems.

 Russia simply doesn't have the technology to field a truly fifth-generation fighter. We might field a fifth-generation fighter, such as the F-35, that can't do everything it is intended to do better than any other fighter in the world, but the F-35 likely will perform any of its individual roles better than any fighter any other nation might be able to put into the air.

For instance, while the F-35C might or might not be the best-ever vertical-takeoff fighter -- I suspect the AV-8B Harrier was better -- it likely is better than anything any of our enemies can put in the field, and by enemies I mean Russia and China, the only potential enemies we have who can field more than armed crop-dusters. Likewise, the F-35 might not be better at ground-support than the A-10 -- an excellent reason to keep the A-10, by the way -- or at air-superiority than the F-15 -- also an excellent reason to keep the F-15 -- but I suspect it will be better at both roles than any aircraft any one else has.

My doubts creep in with respect to ground-support, as the A-10 is magnificent in that role, but I suspect the F-35 is adequate. I don't think that is the standard, of course, but we seem to have settled for that. I would prefer role-specific aircraft that are the best at what they do, but that appears to not be the direction the US is heading in. Pity.

Fortunately, our opponents appear to suck at creating opposing aircraft to take the sky against us. For instance, their stealth aircraft may be something less than that:

The question of stealth is one of the largest factors influencing perceptions of the PAK FA. In 2010 and 2011, two estimates from individuals close to the program estimated that the plane's radar cross section would be 0.3 to 0.5 square meters, RealClearDefense notes.
In comparison, the US Air Force has hinted that the radar cross section of the F-22 is as small as 0.0001 square meters. The F-35's RCS is larger, but it is still minuscule when compared with that of the PAK FA, as it has an RCS of roughly 0.001 square meters.

I guess we'll see how this all plays out. Frankly, I hope we don't, since that would mean our aircraft meet in combat, which can only turn out badly in a strategic sense. To the extent that we have an advantage over Russia, I can only assume we have at least that large of an advantage over China, which usually buys aircraft from Russia and them copies them, either under license or otherwise. For the moment, I believe we still hold an edge technologically. Continuing to squander that edge on stupid shit like do-everything aircraft, though, might not be the way to go. Just because the aircraft is OK at everything doesn't mean we should use it for everything. Our enemies won't be behind us forever.

Unemployment haiku

Yeah, still out of work, which means it is time for an unemployment haiku:

I'm still out of work
No sign of relief in sight
Sucks bad to be me

I am setting some goals for summer. Yeah, the goals are a little unusual.

I once did a post -- completely out of the blue -- about rivers I have crossed without benefit of bridge or boat. In other words, I swam. Frozen rivers don't count. I came up with four rivers. As one of my goals for this summer, I have decided I should double that total. Look, I don't know why. But I plan to try. Just off the top of my head, I think the Shenandoah, Monocacy and Potomac rivers are all possible. Not sure what the fourth one will be. Maybe the Rappahannock, but sure as hell not down by Fredericksburg. That sucker is wide there. Guess we'll see. I'll keep you updated on my progress.

Oh my word, is it farming time again?

It might seem early to a lot of folks, but farm folks know that farming is a year-round business. So I went to Farmer Tom's place Saturday to start working out what we'll be doing this planting season. Naturally, Jeb the Wonder Dog came along:

The beds are in need of a little work:

All of them:

But we worked out a couple general plans. In the next couple weeks we'll be planting cold-weather crops, like lettuce, spinach, peas, broccoli, maybe cauliflower. Got to figure out where to put the corn, even though planting is a couple months off for that. Right now, too damn wet to work in the dirt, but carrots and onions aren't far off, either. Yeah, almost time to start planting.

I think the bridge over Lake Linganore has a fundamental problem

As I reported back in August, the county is building a new bridge on Boyers Mill Road across Lake Linganore, taking a pretty good horseshoe curve out of the road. In August, things looked like this:

Looking bridge-like, but clearly far from done. Now, a fair amount of progress has been made, although I don't think we're anywhere near done:

Also, I notice a key problem that will limit the usefulness of this bridge at first. Look at the right side of the bridge:

Connecting the new bridge to the roadway is going to require taking out the old bridge, meaning that we will essentially have a one-lane bridge on a busy road for an indeterminate amount of time. Should be fund. I would say I'm sure they have a plan to deal with this, but we're talking about government here, so the plan probably is, hey, why don't you stupid tax-paying fucks just deal with a one-lane bridge. Maybe they can fit two lanes to the left. We'll see.

Yeah, I rule the Caribbean, too

Antigua and Barbuda at long last have yielded to the siren song of Eff  You and paid the tiny island nation's first visit. But what is Antigua and Barbuda, you ask, besides a line in a Jimmy Buffet song? Funny you should ask:

Antigua and Barbuda . . . is a twin-island country in the Americas, lying between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It consists of two major inhabited islands, Antigua and Barbuda, and a number of smaller islands (including Great Bird, Green, Guinea, Long, Maiden and York Islands and further south, the island of Redonda). The permanent population numbers about 81,800 (at the 2011 Census) and the capital and largest port and city is St. John's, on Antigua.
Separated by a few nautical miles, Antigua and Barbuda are in the middle of the Leeward Islands, part of the Lesser Antilles, roughly at 17°N of the equator. The country's name was given by Christopher Columbus in 1493 after discovering the island, in honor of the Virgin of La Antigua in the Seville Cathedral. The country is nicknamed "Land of 365 Beaches" due to the many beaches surrounding the islands. Its governance, language, and culture have all been strongly influenced by the British Empire, of which the country was formerly a part.

The nation is part of the British Commonwealth, meaning the official head of state is Queen Elizabeth II. Being a tropical Caribbean nation, it is no surprise that tourism dominates the economy. I found this information on the nation's military fascinating:

The Royal Antigua and Barbuda Defence Force has around 260 members dispersed between the line infantry regiment, service and support unit and coast guard. There is also the Antigua and Barbuda Cadet Corps made up of 200 teenagers between the ages of 12 to 18.

The defence force, then, consists of maybe a company of actual combat troops (about 60-100 soldiers, probably closer to 60). I guess they're not worried about an invasion from, say, the Netherland Antilles. Personally, I'd invade. I would capture this for my headquarters:

This would be my naval base:

So let's all give a big Eff You welcome to Antigua and Barbuda!

I totally own Central America

Honduras, bitches. Take that. I've been all over Central America, but this is my first visitor from Honduras. Honduras, of course, is best known for getting in a war with El Salvador over a soccer game. Of course, Honduras underwent a coup at the beginning of the Obama administration, during which Barry chose - - badly:

“The unaccompanied children crossing the border into the United States are leaving behind mainly three Central American countries, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala. The first two are among the world’s most violent and all three have deep poverty, according to a Pew Research report based on Department of Homeland Security (DHS) information,” reportsNBC News. “El Salvador ranked second in terms of homicides in Latin America in 2011, and it is still high on the list. Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador are among the poorest nations in Latin America. Thirty percent of Hondurans, 17 percent of Salvadorans and 26 percent of Guatemalans live on less than $2 a day.”
The fact that Honduras is the biggest source of the exodus jumped out at me. That’s because, in 2009, the United States government — under President Obama — tacitlysupported a military coup that overthrew the democratically elected president of Honduras. “Washington has a very close relationship with the Honduran military, which goes back decades,” The Guardian noted at the time. “During the 1980s, the US used bases in Honduras to train and arm the Contras, Nicaraguan paramilitaries who became known for their atrocities in their war against the Sandinista government in neighbouring Nicaragua.”
Honduras wasn’t paradise under President Manuel Zelaya. Since the coup, however, the country has entered a downward death spiral of drug-related bloodshed and political revenge killings that crashed the economy, brought an end to law, order and civil society, and now has some analysts calling it a “failed state” along the lines of Somalia and Afghanistan during the 1990s.

Who could imagine that  Barry would make a shitty foreign policy decision? After all, a guy who always picks the socialist is right, right?

In any event, I'm sure Honduras is nice:

Honduras . . . officially the Republic of Honduras . . . is a republic in Central America. It was at times referred to as Spanish Honduras to differentiate it from British Honduras, which became the modern-day state of Belize.[5] Honduras is bordered to the west byGuatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, and to the north by the Gulf of Honduras, a large inlet of the Caribbean Sea.

Tourism is important, and the country is right nice looking:

So, go there on vacation, I guess.. Pretty, right?:

We wlecome Honduras with open arms. Everybody, please give Honduras a big Eff You welcome. Come back soon, and bring your friends!

Well, at least he didn't go golfing

Emperor Barry I, having declined to attend the funeral today of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the longest serving member of the court, revealed that he has far more important things to do today. He stayed home:

In an insult to Justice Antonin Scalia and the nation, President Obama is not attending the Scalia funeral today. He is scheduled to remain at the White House all day while Vice President Biden attends instead. Fortunately, he at least won't be headed out to play golf, which is what he normally would do on a beautiful Saturday.

I guess you can't really blame him -- why would he want to go hear a bunch of people say really nice things about someone he just fucking hates? I'm not giving him character points for staying off the golf course. Any idiot would know that was too much, and Emperor Barry is not just any idiot. He's the Idiot-in-Chief.

President too busy to attend Justice Scalia's funeral

Yeah, Barry won't be going tomorrow when they put Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in the ground tomorrow. Wonder why?

I'd bet a lot on that one.

Wow. That was quick

Yesterday afternoon at about 2 pm, one of the suits from the agency came in to announce that two-thirds of the people on the project were about to be cut. That day. Shut up and wait for the email. Given my interactions with my project managers, I wasn't worried.

Should have been. Logic plays little role in these cuts often. So, I'm looking for work, and the swordfish is out of the water:

That's all, folks!

My shortcomings documented, photographically

The other day, we had a refrigerator repairman coming over because of certain cooling failures. This required us to take pretty much everything out of the freezer and fridge and put it on ice. So we did. The only things supposed to be left in the fridge were things that wouldn't be hurt by being unrefrigerated for an hour or two during the repair visit, and the Canadian bacon, which Mrs. Wolves must have every morning or heads will roll. So Wednesday morning, I got these photos in my email:

 The photo above shows the main body of the fridge. The photo below shows the door racks:

Please note the complete lack of Canadian bacon in either photo. I put it in a cooler. When she called to complain, I was sure I had left it in the fridge. Then I got these pictures. I will never live this down.

I guess the weather is getting better

Mrs. Wolves let the kit-tays lie in the open window yesterday. Of course, the high was in the mid-30s, but it was sunny:

I'm sure they kept a good eye on things:

More of these days to come soon, one hopes.

Yes, Jimmy Carter is and has always been a complete fucking moron

Any questions?

The swallows return to Capistrano

The project I am on is primarily a project to draft a privilege log. For those of you who are not attorneys, a privilege log is a document that lists the documents you have withheld because they are protected by the attorney-client privilege or other privileges too complicated and nonsensical to explain. The key here is that you have to provide a description of the document that establishes that the document is privileged without actually revealing what the document says. This actually isn't that hard, unless the document isn't actually privileged and some partner on high has decided that privileged means "I don't want the other guys to see this document because it is embarrassing/sensitive/damaging/fill in the blank of your choice." Yes, this happens.

The other thing that happens as surely as the sun rises in the east is that, at some point in every privilege log project, because of time pressure to finish or whatever, an email will be sent by the powers that be stating that you are no longer allowed to change the privilege call on a document, no matter how unprivileged the document might be, you are simply to find a fucking way to log the document as privileged.

This happens on every single privilege log project, bar none. The email will come down, saying, "Log the fucking document." I cannot reveal privileged communications that have come to me from my superiors on this project. I can, however, say that the rest of this post stands, without correction or modification. Like the return of the swallows to Capistrano, it happens every time.

While we're doing kit-tay photos . . .

Might as well throw these in. We had some snow this morning -- only 3-4 inches, but it was supposed to be followed by freezing rain in the afternoon and evening, so I decided to not tempt fate and stayed home. The freezing rain continues to fall as I write this, and having just walked Jeb the Wonder Dog, wishing I had ice skates, I'm sure I made the right decision. Of course, I was called in to take kit-tay pictures. The girls were cheek-to-cheek:

Earlier in the morning, when Mrs. Wolves as able to move enough to take a picture of the kit-tays on here lap, they looked like this:

Yes, it is tiresome having kit-tays so cute.

They do have a tendency to get comfortable

I guess I can't blame Mrs. Wolves for taking cat pictures. They're really cute, and she spends a lot of time with them. Murder looks pretty content here:

Look, she takes cat pictures

I want to stay married, OK? Mrs. Wolves takes a lot of pictures of the kit-tays. They tend to come sleep on her, and she takes pictures of it, because they're cute. Face it, they are:

They are. Really.

That's some strange shit

Not sure what to make of this:




But the crab looks like he knows how to use it.

Happy Valentine's Day, y'all

Nice Valentine's Day at Chez Wolves. I worked 5 hours, then ran some errands, and now we're going to Cpl Wolves' for dinner (which I am cooking). Managed to remember to get Mrs. Wolves some flowers.  Murder liked them:

She liked them so much she wanted to eat them:

She tried hard:

And managed to knock a few petals off, which she promptly hunted down:

Not sure if she actually ate the petals.

In addition to flowers, Mrs. Wolves received a half-dozen Shari's Berries -- those chocolate-covered strawberries that are so good. I guess they were, because 24 hours after their delivery, this is what was left:

No, I didn't get any. Why do you ask?

I don't know what they're looking at . . .

. . . but they're all looking at it:

There apparently was nothing outside that  seemed particularly noteworthy. To a human, at least.

Crushed like bugs

I don't know why these folks thought they could get away with this except to say that temps always think they are smarter than everyone. Let me explain.

This project is being run at three sites -- one in Los Angeles (where, as near as I can tell, everyone is stupid) and two in D.C. At one of the D.C. locations (not the one I am at), a project started up at a law firm across the street recently. Apparently, a number of people at the other D.C. location were unable to resist the temptation to bill two projects at the same time. These folks signed up for the other project, and then shuttled back and forth across the street to work both projects. I assume they billed full hours to both projects, meaning they were double-billing. Otherwise, all you are doing is giving up overtime hours on both projects. I doubt they were doing that.

This kind of behavior makes no sense to me. Sure, you might haul in a couple thousand extra dollars, but you might also get your law license in DC suspended (or you might get disbarred!) and not be able to make any money as a lawyer in this town, at least for a while. Why do that?

Anyway, I have no idea how many people got whacked, but it apparently was more than one.I doubt any Uber fucks will cut me some slack, but at least I'll have this song in my head:

Good times, good times.

Probably not the reaction he's looking for

Former Va. Gov. Jim Gilmore apparently is running for president. Still. Hell, he's in seventh place among Republicans. That's because everbody besides him and six other guys have dropped out, of course, but still, just a couple days ago he was in 12th place. Shooting up like a rocket.

His only problem, of course, is no one has heard of him. Including Virginians, who think his name sounds vaguely familiar. He was an adequate but forgettable governor. I'll bet he meets people and gets this:

Him: Hi, I'm Jim Gilmore and I'm running for president.

Them: Gilmore? I thought you died in The Executioner's Song.

Can't possibly bode well for the future of his bid for the presidency.

She's artistic. What can I say?

I don't know what Mrs. Wolves used to create this image, but create it she did:

Tolja she was artistic.

Anybody surprised?

Not me.

More than a third of practicing attorneys in the United States are problem drinkers and 28 percent struggle with depression, according to a new study conducted by the American Bar Association and the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation.

My first year out of law school, an ABA survey found that 70 percent of lawyers would do something else for a living if they thought they could. Lawyers are a miserable bunch. No wonder they drink and kill themselves.

Yeah, it snowed again, but nothing stops the work machine that is Raised By Wolves

So, there was snow predicted for Tuesday. Not much -- 3 to 5 inches -- but enough to make me check early to be sure I could get to work. So, when I got up at the butt-crack of dawn, this is what I saw looking west:

And, of course, looking east:

No problem. I went to work at the usual time -- 0:dark:30 -- and Mrs. Wolves picked up the slack on the picture-taking. She is, needless to say, much more artistic than I:

I think these are cardinals, but I am never at home and awake at the same time as Mrs. Wolves, so I could be wronge:

Winter wonderland, people:

Sleigh bells ring, are you listening?

In the lane, snow is glistening. OK, enough of that shit. Here, Jeb the Wonder Dog looks for a place to unleash evil:

All in all, we got a nice dusting of winter:

I would say we got 3-4 inches. Nothing like the recent blizzard, but enough to notice. And I hear that winter is not done. We'll see.

Yes, Mrs. Wolves still takes kit-tay pictures

After all, when you have kit-tays this cute, what are you supposed to do with them? They nap:\

And they crawl in bed with you:

Seriously, what's not to like?

Oh, for God's sake, grow a pair

Actually, Jeb the Wonder Dog still has a pair. Nonetheless, he defers to Sadie the Auxiliary Backup Dog when a pig's ear is in the dog treat equation. You can tell he wants it:

No way is he going to try to take it from her, though. He knows she can kick his ass. Yeah, she chomped up the whole thing with no challenge from Jeb. Sad.

The religion of piece

Considering how "concerned" American feminists claim to be about the "culture of rape" on U.S. college campuses, where FBI statistics indicate the rape rate is lower than for the general population, I wish I could say I was surprised that they don't seem concerned about what largely Muslim immigrants are up to in Europe. Some of these incidents are getting a little old -- around the first of the year -- but they keep on coming, so I decided to go ahead and do a post.

I don't know why they call this a "grooming ring" -- sounds like a child sex slave ring to me:

A teenage girl abused by the Rotherham grooming ring was forced into daily sexual relations with men for years and used as a commodity to settle her abuser’s debts, a court has heard.

The girl, who was in and out of care from the age of 12, was allegedly taken around the country and made to perform sexual acts up to three times a day on different men, becoming pregnant twice, once when she was only 14.

She had just turned 16, and was still in local authority care, when her abuse became a daily occurrence, the jury was told. She terminated the first pregnancy but later gave birth to a boy who was looked after by her mother.

The girl is one of 12 allegedly groomed in a child sexual exploitation ring led by seven people, including two sets of brothers and two women, who between them are accused of 51 counts of abuse including rape, indecent assault, false imprisonment, abduction and procurement of girls for prostitution or for sex with another.

Naturally, they can't refer to the gang as "Muslims," because that would be rude. So they call them "Asian," which is the British press euphemism for Muslim criminals from Pakistan and India. I hope they put them under the jail, but they undoubtedly won't get what they truly deserve.

If these guys had been Anglicans who were distant relatives of Alfred the Great, I don't know how The Guardian would have referred to them -- probably wouldn't have mentioned their religion at all, same as with the Muslims. But they certainly would have referred to them as "Rotherham residents." Give The Guardian some credit -- they seem to have purposely used the "Asians" reference so people would know these were Muslims.  Hat tip to Ace for this one.

It would be nice if that were the only story emerging lately about the "migrant" situation in Europe. Not close. In response to the sexual assault festival in Cologne on New Year's Eve, we get this:

Cologne has beefed up security for the city's annual carnival, after many women suffered sexual assaults and robberies there on New Year's Eve.
The city in western Germany has put 2,500 police officers on the streets for the week-long event.
Germany was shocked by the New Year assaults, largely blamed on migrants. More than 100 women were victims, but the full scale only emerged later.
Separately, police have arrested three suspected Islamist militants in raids.
The raids on flats and offices took place on Thursday in Berlin, Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia.
The two men and one woman detained are among four suspected of links to the so-called Islamic State group.

Mind you, this is from the BBC, which thinks that Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East, is pure evil, while the Palestinians, who do not have their own country only because they decided in 1948 they didn't want to live next door to Jews and waited for their Arab brethren to exterminate the Jew scum -- still waiting, by the way --are the salt of the earth, never mind all that terrorism stuff. Not exactly an anti-Muslim news outlet.

And please note the ISIS operatives who slipped in with the innocent freedom-seeking migrants, who just want a little nookie. Even if the women they target aren't interested. What's that? Didn't hear about the rampage of sexual assaults on NYE? Must only read US media, which ignored this:

More than 100 women and girls have come forward with reports of sexual assault and robbery by gangs of men in the German city of Cologne on New Year's Eve.
Victims have described chaos outside the city's main station, as the men carried out dozens of attacks with little apparent response from the authorities.
Correspondents say the identification of the attackers as North African or Arab in appearance has caused alarm in Germany because of the influx of more than a million migrants and refugees in the past year.

You should probably read the whole thing. Of course, don't believe for a second they only assault women:

A 10-year-old boy was so brutally raped by an Iraqi migrant in a swimming pool cubicle that he had to be hospitalised for his injuries.
A lifeguard immediately called an ambulance after the boy went to him in floods of tears, while the Iraqi was entertaining himself by repeatedly jumping off the three-metre diving board.
Police arrested him on the spot at the pool in Vienna, and during an interrogation, he told them that it was a 'sexual emergency' as he had not had sex in four months.

Four months with no sex is a long time, I guess. Who wouldn't slam it to a 10-year-old boy after a drought like that. The story mentions that police are reluctant to release details of such incidents because of sensitivity toward the poor, poor Muslim "migrants. Then they mention stuff like this:

Reports emerged on Facebook and police said they must be sensitive about cases involving migrants, who have 'been through a lot', but that there would be zero-tolerance.
However, police have now officially announced the details of the shocking crime.

Austrian media have also been following another case of a 13-year-old girl who is allegedly repeatedly being raped by her 26-year-old husband, who she married in Syria.
However, the teenager has not spoken against her husband, who is claiming that he has the right to have sex with her after their marriage was consummated, under Islamic law.

If that's zero tolerance, I'd hate to see what Austrian police consider laissez faire.

In all fairness, this next incident involed seven Muslim youths, but only five of them were "migrants" seeking a better life and some of that sweet, sweet unconscious pussy:

HORRIFIC footage has emerged of a group of young men, including five migrants, laughing, dancing and singing in Arabic as they gang rape an unconscious 17-year-old girl.
It is believed the attack happened after the girl passed out after drinking at a party.
One of the rapists later told police: "She can't complain. Women must obey men."
The shocking assault happened in November but was only discovered this week by a teacher at a school in Ostend, Belgium.
A police probe was launched after a 14-year-old boy at the Ostend Technical Institute bragged about a photo of himself dressed in military fatigues and holding a sub-machine gun.

The idiot who had the gun-toting photo on his phone apparently also had a video of the rape that he took with his phone -- presumably, somebody else took over filming while he had his shot at it. Or maybe he did a selfie. I don't know. But this is revealing:

It was reported that during police interrogations only the eldest suspect denied rape, while the others admitted having sex with the girl and even suggested gang rape was normal in other parts of the world. One claimed the girl had consented, but footage showed she was unconscious.

One of them said it -- rape is OK where they come from. It's not an outlier -- the 26-year-old mentioned above said he had a right to bang his 13-year-old bride whenever he wanted, regardless of what she wanted. These are not isolated incidents -- I could go on all day. I don't know why people don't want to admit that a culture that is not at all like Western culture is, in fact, not at all like Western culture. And I really don't know why they want to bring these people in in large numbers, even if the terrorist infiltration concerns were not real. Those concerns are real, but at what point do we stop being accepting of other cultures? Is acceptance of rape as commonplace that point? Maybe not. I'm not hearing cries of outrage from the usual suspects.

As pep talks go, that one was pretty much a failure

The project is nearing the end, but it is in that nether region where we still have plenty of work and heavy hours, but know that the situation could change any day and we'll be suddenly unemployed. Apparently, the agency has been getting a lot of questions about how much longer the project will go on. (I never ask these questions -- when my assessment of the remaining documents tells me it's almost over, I set up my escape plan. If I wind up leaving a little before the project plotzes, well, as the French say, so fucking what?)

Anyway, the agency, in a rare fit of candor, sent one of the suits down to give us a pep talk. Basically, the guy acknowledged that the project is nearing the end. One rumor apparently was that the project is ending Wednesday, because the suit went out of his way to deny that. What he couldn't say was how long, whether hours or temps would be cut back (I can answer those -- yes to both), when those cuts might happen if (when) they happen, how many people might be kept on to finish things up or who those people might be.

Despite having introduced tremendous uncertainly, the suit then went on to urge us not to jump. Oddly enough, he invoked loyalty (nonexistent, in either direction), ethical duty to the client (not applicable), and -- the really weird one -- the reputation of the agency. Apparently, people jumping would hurt the agency's reputation and could lead the firms to take their business elsewhere. He didn't explain why we should care about this, since we would just go work for the same firms through a different agency. Here is his speech, paraphrased:

Look, some of you have heard the project is ending Wednesday. Not true. We don't know when the project is ending, but it isn't Wednesday. So don't jump to another project. Sure, you need to earn a living and can't afford to get left unemployed, but we want you to ride this down, all the way in until it crashes in flames. It's all about ethics and shit. And loyalty. Don't forget loyalty. You committed to see this thing through, so do it. I know, we can fire you anytime and we didn't commit to keep you around to see this thing through, but work with me, people. Don't make us look bad.
Yeah, hours might get cut. Yeah, some of you might get cut early, and you'll all be fired eventually, but if you quit you'll make us look bad So, sure, we don't know when, how many or which ones will be fired, but stick around to find out, even if it means there is no project for you to go to after we fire you. I'm telling you, don't quit. Hang around so we can fire you without at the time of our choosing.

Oddly enough, this speech did not go over well. Pretty much everyone on the project is contacting other agencies, looking for projects starting in the next week or two. I guess this guy's attempt to inspire the troops failed. Joey Porter, he ain't.

I guess the sailors were happy*

Sunday Mrs. Wolves and I went to dinner at Cpl. Wolves' home. Always good to see the Cpl. and Married Into Wolves. But on the way over, we had to pull over so Mrs. Wolves could take these pictures of the sunset:

It was even more astoundingly beautiful live.

Mrs. Wolves certainly takes a good picture.

* The title of the post refers, of course, to the old sailors' saying, "Red sky at morning, sailors take warning. Red sky at night, sailors's delight." I have no idea whether that has any scientific validity.

This is why we can't have nice things

After several days of people burning popcorn and stinking up the office, yesterday we had a popcorn-burning incident that put all the others to shame. Some dipstick put her popcorn in the microwave and walked away. It damn near caught on fire -- smoke and noxious fumes that linger today. Well, the fumes, anyway. It stinks.

This time it was bad enough that the other office tenants on the floor complained about the stink, and building management expressed concern that future incidents of that magnitude might set off the smoke alarms, which would be, to use a term of art, bad.

Naturally, because some temps are too stupid to make popcorn properly, the email went out letting us know that a popcorn ban was under consideration. What I believe to be an unofficial sign went up on the front of the microwave at issue, instituting a popular ban.

Naturally, the woman at fault, because she is a temp, believes she did nothing wrong. Because she is a temp, she also probably will assume that the unofficial ban, and any official ban that might come down, does not apply to her. Over-under on somebody burning popcorn again is Saturday at 3 pm. It will happen. This is TempTown.

I'm working stupid hours these days, so I'll just do a stupid traffic post

January was the blog's best month since May 2015, and the fourth-best month since the beginning of the blog. Granted, that is not much in comparison to the numbers drawn by blogs that are actually popular, much less widely read, but it works around here. Thanks for coming by, keep it up, and bring your friends.