Time To Move On

This blog has been at this location for over ten years.  In the early going, I had switched my free domain name from www.clydestuff.blogspot.com to just clydestuff.com.  And it has remained that way since then.  And although my writings over the past few years have been infrequent, this domain was always part of me.  It was mine.  I owned it. 

Every year since then it has renewed automatically.  Over the past couple of years it has renewed it using my credit card I use for other Google things such as My Play and Google Drive.  But not this year.

Now Google wants to force everybody into using their biggest new thing, Gsuite.  Gsuite is their latest entity to round up businesses and get them to use Google for all everything.  At a price of course.  But no exceptions.  You use Gsuite, or you’re out whether you want it or need it.  And beyond renewing my domain, I don’t really need it. 

And using the free Gsuite to try and renew this domain was an endless nightmare.  Yet, it renewed a domain I no longer need or use, and should have expired back in May at the least, earlier if you want to take into account that it renewed the domain automatically on my credit card that was on file for other things Google besides blog renewal.  But getting and renewing this domain just wasn’t going to happen.

Even clicking on any help link or “speak to someone” did nothing but run you in circles one way or another.  Most of the time it brought up repetitive canned answers.  Or it would invite you to upgrade your Gsuite account at a huge fee to talk to a live person.  Talking to a live person (supposedly but probably not) on Twitter was about the only upgrade I could afford.  And guess what?  It did nothing but give me the same canned response I had read over and over and over and over and over for hours.

Finally after hours wasted on this, and accomplishing nothing it dawned on me that because I didn’t have thousands of dollars to stuff in Google’s wallet, that my blog and my problems meant nothing at all to them.  I mean, they’re a multi-hundreds of billions maybe trillions of dollar company.  Me?  I’m just a freeloader who paid a crummy $10 a year for my domain and $9.99 a month for storage.  So much for that.  This was my final response to them on Twitter:

I wrote some rather nasty replies last night but after calming down, I deleted them.  I have every right to be angry, but realized it accomplished nothing.  I've never had any trouble with Google until now, but when you guys step in it, you step in it bigly.

I did everything you suggest.  The best I could do was to get logged in under an old blog name that I never use anymore and should have expired a long time ago.  But I figured that would work for both of my blogs.  I was wrong.  I paid $10 and got a renewal on a damn blog I haven't used in over a year, and which should have expired a long time ago considering that credit card was out of date since 2014.

But somehow for two years, you were able to use my other credit card, the same one that pays for my Google storage, to renew my domains for two years.  But not this year.  This year you insisted that I go through Gsuite, although I have no real business, and my blog was never anything more than my own personal writings, reviews, rants and opinions, written for the most part to please myself.

And to make matters worse, I received emails from Gsuite, and emails from Enom.  I had never gone through Enom before and figured it as being Spam.  Who wouldn't?  But I tried.  Boy how I tried to renew through Gsuite but it just wouldn't let me sign in under www.clydestuff.com and did nothing but run me around in circles.  I could only hope it would renew on my same card I used for other google services including Google Drive and Google Play.  It didn't.

And last night after finding my domain gone, I tried every which way possible to renew it.  But it absolutely refused to acknowledge I had a second domain beyond the old unused corporate owned USA.  It's ridiculous that you wanted to force me into Gsuite, that I have no use for as an individual with a blog and no lofty expectations.

Initially, it wouldn't even let me revert it back to the old clydestuff.blogspot.com.  I had to finagle and jump through hoops just to get that done. It still won't even redirect people from clydestuff back to that one.  So thanks to whatever you guys think you are achieving with this, I'm basically screwed.  And enom?  I finally tried them.  They linked me back to you and your endless tail chasing.  Go figure.

I'm of a mind right now just to close up shop, take the writings that I really want and move over to Word Press.  Frankly, I don't even need Google Drive I'm paying $9.99 a month for and have mostly kept as a matter of convenience.  I can get one Terrabyte of storage on Amazon for way less than that and I'll probably do that.  They win by default after I had already planned to stick with you guys.

I suspect I'll post this letter somewhere.  Maybe I'll take a screen capture video of all the steps I tried to go through just to renew my domain, which should have been nothing more than having to update a credit card.  Then post it on youtube.  Instead, I had to have something forced down my throat which in the end, never enabled me to do what I needed to do anyway.

So I guess I'll be moving on to other pastures. Maybe not greener, but this experience has really darkened my opinion of Google blogs and unnecessarily so. I'll keep you informed.

This and That: You know you’re in the 60’s when

One of the characters who is pregnant, in labor, and in a hospital lights up a cigarette like it was nothing. A doctor actually shedding tears over losing a patient. Marvel when the Chief of Staff lights one up right outside the surgical wing.  Then there’s the woman who is getting ready to have a C-Section.  This is when they gas her up like she’s Barbara Graham. 

Dr. Kildare, Season 2, Episode 1: Gravida One

While Kildare assists in the case of a pregnant woman who shows a lack of enthusiasm and even hostility to the idea of giving birth to her first child, Gillespie is involved in the case of the hospital's original benefactor, who is suffering from a perforated ulcer.

Bill Maher On Trump’s 3rd Week as So-called President.

“The only one interested in getting into Ivanka’s pants is him (Trump)”

It’s the stupidity, Stupid 100.1: So it begins. Trump picks Climate Change denier to lead the EPA transition

We knew this crap would happen.  Many Most of the Trump  followers are climate change deniers.  Followers such as the big corporate farmers that grace the local landscape with whatever crop suits them.  Where I live, it’s mostly Almond Trees.  We are still mired in a four year, going on five year drought in California, and these harvesters of water hogging almond orchards want their water. 

Drought?  Not in their vocabulary.  Climate Change?  Not around these parts.  It’s just all one big California conspiracy to deny them the water they need so that we can have Almond Joy bars from now until the end of eternity.  I even saw one farm with a big sign blaming Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi for not turning on their secret spigot, even though Republicans hold control of both the House and the Senate.  Well, I guess you have to blame somebody.

But now that Donald Trump is president, I have no doubt that they expect he will turn on the big heavenly water spigot in the sky and all will be right with the world.  Uh…huh.  How does that Joni Mitchell song go? 

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Til its gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

With the harvest from one particular local farm bringing in 20,000,000 dollars, I guess it pays to keep denying the obvious.  Trump has taken his first step in giving them a helping hand by doing what we all knew he would do. 

Gut the EPA and fill it with Climate Deniers so that he and all his other buddies can drain the fuck out of Lake Meade so they can take a shower in their Vegas Hotel Suites.  Remember the name when you go to flush your toilet and that turd just sort of lays there kind of helpless like: Myron Ebell.

From Scientific America:

In a biography submitted when he testified before Congress, he listed among his recognitions that he had been featured in a Greenpeace “Field Guide to Climate Criminals,” dubbed a “misleader” on global warming by Rolling Stone and was the subject of a motion to censure in the British House of Commons after Ebell criticized the United Kingdom’s chief scientific adviser for his views on global warming.

More recently, Ebell has called the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan for greenhouse gases illegal and said that Obama joining the Paris climate treaty “is clearly an unconstitutional usurpation of the Senate’s authority.”

He told Vanity Fair in 2007, “There has been a little bit of warming ... but it’s been very modest and well within the range for natural variability, and whether it’s caused by human beings or not, it’s nothing to worry about.”

But whatever. So I guess Climate change isn't real, and with the GOP will be in control, I'm sure they'll be turning on those super secret water hoses they have stashed away at the White House just in time for spring. Meanwhile, here's Joni Mitchell while we wait. But just remember this: It's the stupidity, Stupid.

It’s the Stupidity, Stupid! - 100.0: Yes mom, women can be self hating misogynists as well!

One could argue that those who voted for Führer Trump, did so solely out of racism, homophobia, or misogyny.  And I’m sure most of those people did, although some still are trying to stay in the closet and pretend, “No, it was not I!”

But whether it’s just an acquaintance on Facebook, a friend (or as is more likely, former friend), or even a relative, trying to hide their White Superiority Trashiness, they’re fooling no one.  Least of all me.  

I read somewhere that many of the white bigoted Obama hating woman hating cowards who make up a huge chunk of the electorate, came crawling out of their rat holes to cast their ballots for the first time.  They did this because Trump spoke to them like a godly vision confirming that it was okay to hate minorities and people of color and to publicly cheer them on.  Even last night as Trump was making his victory speech, someone hollered out, “Kill Obama” more than once. 

trump supporter sayin "kill obama" while trump is giving a speech.. This is what u mean by make America great again? pic.twitter.com/J4i7zp8zFC

— . (@Iilcanon) November 9, 2016

But really, do we need all those labels?  It all boils down to one thing.  Almost half this country is wallowing in their own stupidity and seem to be damn proud of it.  And there is enough blame to go around for the fact that if these people went looking for their own ass to wipe, they’d probably be hard pressed to find it.

Case in point: Women who support Trump.  It’s not just that they are stupid in regards to their own glorification of bigotry, but when it comes to misogyny, they can out do any man on the planet.   Is it now any wonder that women in this country have such a time gaining equal footing when apparently half of them are filled with self-hatred for themselves and their own gender?

I’ve shared this particular disgusting picture of pure idiocy on Facebook more than once.  The shirt says Trump can feel her pussy, but you just as well put, “Yes, I’m stupid, and I hate myself and every woman I know” on the back.

 

It’s stupidity run amuck, and a woman who would wear this crap is either desperate for attention, or is so full of self-loathing that she needs a man to tell her she’s worth a plumb nickel.  Even one who makes a habit of bragging about sexual assault.  We can only hope this woman has no offspring to brainwash with her drivel, but that’s probably wishful thinking.

But it gets worse.  I ran across this article at Raw Story which was written before the election where we get these gems:

While it’s jarring to hear a woman defend sexual assault, Robertson isn’t the only female who attends rallies for a candidate who has demonstrated on numerous occasions that he thinks of women as second class citizens who deserve to be called “fat pigs“, or worthless if he doesn’t consider them attractive.

Wisconsin voter Debbie Shields says she believes that Trump is a “loving and compassionate father who was chosen by God “for a time as this.” Another Wisconsin woman who only goes by Shirley also told CNN that Trump’s character flaws aren’t really that big of a deal. She believes Democrats “have no issues they can win on, so all they can do is try to pick on Trump and his character.”

When TYT field reporter Jordan Chariton asked an unidentified female Trump fan whether she would in the very least be happy about the possibility of Hillary becoming the country’s first female president, she replied “Absolutely not. I don’t believe there should be a woman President…I just don’t believe it should be female leaders.”

The writer of the article, goes on to explain it this way:

What I never seem to understand about feminist-bashing conservative women is their inability to see how ironic it is that they attend political rallies, share their opinions and cast their ballots when the America they’re nostalgic about wouldn’t allow them to do any of those things. If a woman thinks that females have no place in politics, why isn’t her deplorable ass in the kitchen making her husband a ham sandwich? Women are not to be heard, right? And to be honest, I wouldn’t mind never hearing from someone that ignorant again.....

This election unequivocally proves that right wing Trump supporters don’t really care about the safety of women. Females have been a convenient prop to fit their discriminatory agenda, but when protecting them becomes inconvenient, the right kicks them to the curb. In fact, as soon as one of their own is accused of harming women in any way, they’re indifferent to say the least.

What I'm wanting to say is that it’s time for women to speak out against the ignorance of those other “ladies” who want to live their life as the ultimate female media stereotype: Dumb and stupid.  You can’t give them a pass anymore than you would Donald Trump, who could title his next book, “The Art of Misogyny: To Serve Man”.  Because unless more of you get on the same page, you’re simply treading water.

So when you see or hear from one of these self-hating, woman demeaning ladies just remember one thing: It’s the stupidity, stupid.

Q. What do you call it when a man grabs a woman's genitals without consent?
A. In America, we call it Presidential.

— John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) November 9, 2016

Clyde’s Movie Picture Show Quick Quiz 101.0

Every once in a while I would get an urge to throw up a quick quiz on my Clyde’s Stuff Facebook Page.  Sometimes they were fairly easy.  Others were real stumpers.  I never could tell which would be which. 

Generally when I think up these questions, it’s while watching a film or just browsing through my library.  I’ve been trying to get a copy of the film from which I made these screen captures and finally succeeded in a roundabout way.  I try to make these quizzes as offbeat as I can and not the usual run of the mill bull crap the now proliferates your timeline on Facebook like a case of the Zimbio bubonic plague.

The actress in this scene deserved an Oscar.  Well, she would have deserved one if they had a category for best actress being dead while your corpse melts in phony assed flames that come no where near you.  But the film was a monumental work of art.  I say that because it carries a 5.2 rating on the IMDB whereas I wouldn’t have given it more than a 2.2.  If that much.  So there must be some artsy fartsy thing going on here that I don’t know about to not see it’s 5.0 or better greatness.  This is definitely Clyde’s Movie Palace material if I ever get back to doing that gig.

Enough of that though.  It’s very simple.  Name the actress being charbroiled, and the name of this legendary movie. The prize?  There isn’t one. Not unless this blog starts filling my pocketbook with a big influx of cash and that hasn’t happened in the ten years it’s been here.  But it’ll make you feel smarter than anybody else so that’s your reward. 

Rambo…..and friends.

 

Sylvester Stallone doesn't get older. He only gets more wrinkles. Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the jungle...or wherever, here comes Rambo: Last Blood.

And it looks like Rocky may be coming back as well. This time as a trainer for Apollo Creed's Grandson.

No word on if Gabe Walker will be climbing Mt. Everest in the near future. Come to think of it, I think Michelle Joyner may still be falling and hasn't landed as of yet. There may still be time for Gabe to race down the mountain to catch her, but only if he hurries.

If you've never seen Cliffhanger you'll have no idea what I'm talking about so that's on you.

Variety:

After months of speculation, Sylvester Stallone has finally announced the title for the fifth (and seemingly final) “Rambo” movie, “Rambo: Last Blood.”

The actor simply tweeted earlier this week that he’ll be filming a gangster biopic about Gregory “the Grim Reaper” Scarpa after shooting “Rambo: Last Blood.”
Seven years have passed since Stallone last reprised the role of Vietnam vet John Rambo. The last film, “Rambo,” earned $113 million worldwide.

Since 2008, he’s talked about both retiring the character (who first appeared in David Morrell’s 1972 novel “First Blood”) for good and bringing him back for a last hurrah. Stallone apparently decided on the latter as he’ll be writing and directing and “Rambo: Last Blood,” in addition to starring in the film.

Stallone will be returning to another familiar franchise this month. He also tweeted that he’s headed to Philadelphia to play Rocky Balboa for the seventh time in director Ryan Coogler’s “Creed.” He’ll play the trainer of Apollo Creed’s grandson, portrayed by Michael B. Jordan. Coogler last directed Jordan in 2013’s critically acclaimed “Fruitvale Station.”