One of the problems with social media – and conventional media more generally – there is the belief that everybody should practice politics and governance should not be reserved to the experts. While in a democracy, citizen participation is an important of governing, citizens should be one input in many, and not every person should be practicing politics.
Moreover, government workers should not be held in such high esteem. It’s long been a plot by government agencies rather then pay employees fairly or increase employee safety at the work place, to instead celebrate the venerated employees. Why make a police officer’s or soldier job better, when you can offer them a parade with lots of flags? Speeches, ceremonies and flags are cheap.
The truth is most of the things government does isn’t particularly relevant to you. While it’s kind of important the traffic lights and potholes are repaired on the roads you drive, a lot of things that are reported in the news as controversies aren’t particularly important. Most news is more about self-aggrandizement of the government workers, rather legitimate public concerns in your own life. How important is the doings in Washington, if the lights come on when you turn them on in the morning?
People would be a lot better off if they didn’t let politics become so self-consuming in their life, if they stopped reading and studying the news so carefully. It’s good to have a passing knowledge of what is happening directly out of your line of sight, but so much of what is happening in this world is irrelevant crap to your own life, when you would better off at a focusing on domain-specific knowledge relevant to issues directly impacting you. As they say, there is only two forms of news that matter to most of us – traffic and weather. I mostly care about the later, as I ride my bike to work.
I do give credit for the social media advertisers who do many different creatives to appeal to unique demographics. After days like yesterday in the office, I wish people would use more targeting. It’s a powerful thing.
Kind of dark and cloudy to start out the day, 🌅 but then again we are kind of into the meat of autumn within a week there being more night thenday every day. Happens every autumn. Hopefully with the new windows upstairs things won’t be so drafty come winter, though that door downstairs is kind of a mess.
Last night was the hearing over the Comphrensive Plan in Guilderland, 🌲 and I was there again with Save the Pine Bush advocating for stronger protections for the Pine Bush. It was just another busy day in the office but I also got a few things posted to the blog and made some maps up. 🗺️ Got more GIS work to do for Save the Pine Bush some point today, though I think those projects should be relatively straightforward load of MapServer layers, though it looks like I am going to have to hand draw the zoning districts for the Village of Colonie, because we’ll, they don’t them have them loaded into a MapServer.
Today I am going to head in a bit early so I can get bananas 🍌 so I have something to snack on in the office, and will ride downtown on my bike to get to the Farmers Market and talk to the bank about adjusting my credit limit so I can in theory put my eye surgery next week on my card to get the points. 💵 If not it’s the end of world, I think the credits are only about $50 or less if I do it that way versus the expense of getting a bank check for a buck. 🚲 Riding in today, kind of sucked catching the local bus to work, I don’t know about this winter.
At some point soon I need to grocery shop 🛒 and maybe get to the laundromat and drive out to my parents house to check on the cat. 🐈 I was thinking about taking off Friday, I am undecided about that. Need to decide today. Clams are cheap, so I could enjoy them along with sweet corn. 🌽 Things are so dry but there might be good color out in the hill towns due to autumn coming early with the dry conditions. 🍁 Need to be careful with fire, 🔥 no burn ban and things are still fairly green but things are dry too. Not April though for sure. I would bring extra water 💦 and keep the fire small. The following week I’ll be recovering from my eye surgery 👀 so I’ll be stuck at home.
So it was just kind of a long day yesterday, 💤 and by the time the hearing was done, I was completely exhausted. Really taking the local bus in and transferring to shuttle just makes the day so much longer and exhausting. I could drive in but it’s really not something I particularly enjoy. People were ribbing me about my office and big shots salary yesterday, 💵 but it’s not really like that with things so expensive these days. And then that difficult client with the targeting, 🎯 always wanting to do things district wide and upset when we pointed out they’re well over limit for the year. 🤷♂️ Difficult people are just difficult at times.
For the first time during an odd-year since 2015, I will be not going to West Virigina this year. I know I said that in 2021 and ended up going for a while and burned up my wheel bearing to boot after a few nice days at Camp Run but this odd year I am totally serious about not going to West Virginia in favor a shorter trip up to the St. Regis Canoe Area in the Adirondacks.
There are many reasons. For one, I feel like I’ve spent enough time poking around Canaan Heights, especially after 2023 when I set up camp on Forest Road 13 and stayed there for seven nights, spending only two nights away from camp when I overnighted one night at County Bridge Campground and one on way back to New York at Long Pond. I know I would’t take I-81 back through Penna again with all the traffic. County Bridge Campground now requires reservations in advance, including an extra out of state fee and a reservation fee, which makes it far less of a bargain for a primitive campground.
But another is that Big Red is getting old and there is no guarantee of a reliable ride much less a worrysome trip. Simply said, I don’t want to get stranded 500 miles from home. Plus with the stock gears and only slightly better brakes, the lifted truck is such a dog on the hills and hollows of West Virginia. The beat suspension almost guarantees it would be be a shit ride both down there and back to say nothing about the washboard roads.
I do hope next autumn in November – probably Veterans Day Week to get down to West Virginia for a week. After the election and all the craziness. The tourists will mostly gone but if I go all the way to South Western Virginia to see the New River Gorge there will be some color left. And by then I’ll have my new truck and it should be well broken in after the Michigan trip in the summer.
I’m not sure why I like West Virginia so much. Yes the hills and mountains are impressive but also so much is the public views of the state. The blank faces when I tell people I’m going to WV. What to buy coal? Hang out with a bunch of rednecks and poor people? Plus it’s an excuse to drive through Penna. Rednecks are fun people, they burn a lot of shit.
