IowaStorm05

A few light flakes going on out there but looks like nothing substantial yet

Maybe y’all won’t get a parking lot measurement from me on this one. Might have to use the lawn adjacent to it.

Could they seriously be trying to debilitate Ukraine by destroying their nuclear power plant and not minding if it melts down? That would be one hell of a war crime in my book. It would definitely mean that they are more interested in destroying Ukraine than occupying it, all the while telling the world “oh this isn’t war, we love Ukraine they are one with us”. This brings on the rage. Me thinks there is a chance we are seeing the peak of gas prices, maybe not fully done rising but the vertical slope is finished.

Me thinks that the gas prices have begun to peak and reach a plateau. They may go up more then, but I think the vertically angled slope upward is through.

Humans are most definitely prone to ruthlessness in exerting power and persecution over others for whatever is the hate flavor of the week. Hate is addictive too so if somebody looks to hate, they will make sure to make up and manage to believe lies about somebody else in order to MAKE the facts fit their narrative. Because I get symptoms of psychosis and have autistic spectrum, it has generally been difficult for me to find my way around society over the years. These disabilities affect judgement and resilience. Quite a few people have been nice to me over the years and lately people have been helpful to seeing me succeed as best as I can in spite of having trouble with, for example, holding down a job. But having what I have means sometimes I exhibit poor and erratic judgement and when you throw technology into the mix, it has resulted in me being targeted and persecuted by some vicious people who have more money and power than me, people who would have never had seen me go crazy if I wasn’t online. This is because advanced technology results in giving more people access to the mind of a troubled person, when if it were year 1900 that person would not be “out there” as much and would just keep to themselves. Rather than taking an opportunity to coach and help be on a better track when I have had trouble, a lot of people have instead seen it as an opportunity to exert hate upon me and throw shade and otherwise try and push me further down than I already am as a result of having trouble thinking in the first place. Having been a member of LGBTQIA over the years most likely had a big hand in getting stalked and persecuted by people who are vicious and go out of their way to make weaker people’s lives miserable, and my experience totally matches researcher’s claims that people with schizophrenia or other mental illness get exploited. Trust me, we do. I do participate in some forums like this to contribute to the subject, but you pretty much won’t find me on social media anymore because of what I have just explained. I will likely be reclusive for the rest of my life. I was in Hollywood when I was young and was getting into entertainment right when my mental health started really deteriorating. This resulted in my failure to live up to the expectations of the folks on top there. Instead of getting me help, you had people like Lady Gage releasing music that said “I learned love is like a brick you can, build a house or sink a dead body”. This of course was a few years before they publicly feigned love for me and feigned wanting to work with me while their minions stalked and tortured me in order to prompt me to act out in anger so they could say to the world “but we loved him and he left us boo hoo he’s the Antichrist, boo hoo”. That all may sound like I’m being crazy right now but I’m not, I’m simply explaining how people behave nowadays In the context of people being aggressive, behavior such as invading sovereign countries for no reason and getting civilians murdered, including children, while you continue going to church as if you’re some kind of saint. People on top murder all the time whenever they feel like it. It’s ok, because they’re on top, and they are OK at church. But if you’re an underling, that’s when you’re going to hell.

It doesn’t matter how you slice it or what propaganda you’ve run across, I think the collective acceptance of the normalcy of lifting the privacy of everybody and connecting merely peoples minds and speech to a conduit where it can be mined is just pure evil. You could perhaps say well it helps when a woman poisons her husband and claims it’s a suicide, but usually things like that with actually dangerous people can be dealt with just fine without invasions of privacy. It can be used to abusive ends, and destroy peoples lives who without the advent of technology would be perfectly fine and function in society itself just fine. I don’t stand for that.

Well not only that, but I kind of feel like technology only makes it more dangerous. It gives the people on top the ability to control, monitor, and persecute people within the lack of privacy of their own homes. I get it when you say that as a whole human nature is knarly so things aren’t really getting worse and maybe on a millenial level that is true. But in a mid term sense it is most certainly getting worse especially in this country. The deterioration of the common man’s access to financial well-being has degenerated by an order of magnitude since the early 1980s, and the advances of technology serve to place greater levels of control and surveillance over underdogs than ever before in history. You can’t have a conversation in your house without “them” technically being able to hear it. In the US there are definitely more protections than, say, China, but how long will that last? Humanity seems to gravitate once again toward alpha-male autocracy because that’s what it knows how to do, only this time they have otherworldly technology to invade and spy on the underdogs in a way that never was in the past. That is definitely worse. In the past I have mocked the advent of loss of privacy by saying all kinds of insane things online just to see how people would react, because I was angry about the personal invasion. Somehow I fear governments of other countries much more than ours in the context of internet espionage, and I have thus exercised restraint of pen and tongue in recent times while discussing other countries online.

We have a 35 mile commute for $18 an hour, but it is sedans that get 38 to 40 mpg highway. I deleted my brief post about who would be best in office in the WH for this situation, but I feel like the military got too picky for who it lets in to our armed forces. Back in the day they would even have people who get in trouble go to the military to get themselves righted.

I have started really picking up on patterns that virtually everything is just propaganda, and I am not included in having access to the pie slices of prosperity nor are tons of other people. And while I consider myself quasi conservative in certain ways, I find myself horrified by the general state of affairs on multiple fronts, and if I had the option I would exit the world and head for Greener pastures. That does not mean I am interested in killing myself, it just means I don’t like this place, and I don’t have enough reason to trust the keeper of the universe whoever that is. Seems like a rather volatile place.

This is correct. But I did not forget it at all, earlier today I was talking about how people forgot the late 2000s and early 2010s prices in the context of causing SUVs to become semi taboo. But then the prices of gas fell in the late 2010s and auto makers wasted no time ushering them back in, sometimes to the exclusion of Sedans. what you say seems to confirm my suspicions, that perhaps this is the actions of psychopaths or maybe a mere shortage of workers. $4 in 2008 is equal to $5 now. The problem is, It is probably not going to stop at $5 now… and despite knowing we don’t have the whole mortgage crisis deal this time, I would imagine if gas averages went north of $5 in the US, it will trigger a recession. It could also create a situation of people springing for electric cars, serving to inflate the price of those. As usual, people in lower economic status will get the shaft, they cannot spring for a $37,000 dollar electric car at the drop of a hat. Still, if gas prices really stay this high, it will accelerate investment in electric cars overall and given how much more they are ubiquitous than the were in, say, 2012, this could actually backfire on big oil somehow by leading to permanently lower demand. But that could take years. But then my question is how much of big oil is fueled by driving, and if that could play out this way.

This is dangerous. I am not an oil expert, so I can’t really make any definite accusations but I am left with the feeling that you have a bunch of traders jumping up and down with joy over profits at the cost of triggering a session and economic malaise of a lot of people. It’s not like I can really judge someone for seeking to make more money in of itself, but they really should have something to make sure gas can’t reach something like $10 per gallon or it will shut the country down. I’m assuming $10 gas would require $200 per barrel there really is a fundamental problem with energy costs with the system if gas would be $1.85 in 2020 and then $6 or $7 in 2022. That is a severe shock. It’s not an optional luxury. It’s frickin energy.

I put a huge write up right here actually about gas prices a couple days ago but I actually quickly deleted it because it was a massive rant and I felt it was too silly. But now I will say a shortened version... Gas prices had been low for a long enough time that SUV demand ratcheted up again in North America, and late in the process several auto makers began actually discontinuing sedans or sports cars or both. I have little doubt a recession is imminent, even in America. How severe is less certain, I just don't know. I have been struck with disbelief at how quickly we forgot what it was like to have an SUV while gas prices are high. SUV's made in the late 2010s are notably more fuel efficient than their 1990s or 2000s counterparts, but they are still not ideal for $6 gas. A lot of people now have SUVs instead of cars but those SUVs are mostly the unibody crossover type of a smaller variety. Still, Me thinks that Sedans are suddenly going to look appealing again because they are stlll more fuel efficient, to say nothing of electric cars, many of which are finally beginning to not cost 50,000 dollars. I wonder what a sudden recession materializing does to the corporate trend of having no problem jacking up consumer prices to ensure good profit margins. I realize companies need to survive, but I really get to feelin' that some of the people who are high on the totem pole of corporate finance and pricing are possibly psychopaths, and just don't care to give consumers a break even if it would not endanger the company's prosperity.

Those Iowa tornadoes struck pretty dang close to where I lived there.

Guys, the ice slab and piles left from that sleet storm have kept hanging on all this time: 8 days now? There have been some pretty warm days too. I know it was a long time ago to mention this but yes they did get at least a couple inches of sleet even down in E Lyme. Up here there was just enough snow mixed with the sleet to give it a white color to refuse the sunlight. The piles from plowing became pure ice mounds and are treacherous to walk on. The biggest piles could even outlast tomorrows rains? I can see why it is meteorological spring now. Lots of 60s slipping in.

I am working on stocking up with food and things like that. A question about the situation is how likely will we always have electricity. If we have electricity, then Rice and Breed are a thing. You simply need salt, sugar, yeast and flour. How much does it cost to use electricity to bake said bread? Because if you don't count the cost of the energy to bake bread, you are talking about 45 cents for the ingredients. Then there is baking a few loaves of bread at once. That helps. Otherwise, we just filled our tanks with gas and we have begun stocking up on canned food of varying types and saltine crackers. I don't have the following ability because of my living arrangements but if I did, I would probably have a few 55 gallon drums of gas stowed someplace TBH, but stowed safely so to not be a fire risk?

I know the knee jerk reaction is to be livid at Putin because of his behavior. But the truth of the matter he is the leader of a huge and powerful nation. He is upset about behavior of the West, and I read that his main pain is involved in the Russian's hand in helping defeat the Nazi's not being recognized enough by the west. That leads me to questions of my own, just how we became bitter rivals in the first place. I think it is a shame because we have ideological similarities with regards to lifestyle and religion to modern day Russia. I have had some really angry thoughts about this man, but the fact is, this is an important time to try and figure out what is causing him to behave erratically and see if there is a way to remedy it SOME HOW. I KNOW that sounds ridiculous to some of you but this guy actually has the potential to do some very serious and fatal damage to the West. I can't quite say I am behaving like a neutral mediator today. But rather, I do prefer not entering an escalated conflict. The things I have been reading lately bring me chills. The things I have read about leaders and human behavior in recent comments on this sub are pretty much true. And it is not just Humans. It is Chimpanzees. Chimpanzees form COALITIONS and PLAN wars and Chimp Wars can last for several years and do not resolve until they resolve, which sometimes involves an entire group being slaughtered. They have leaders who are very aggressive. I keep bringing this up because it helps with perspective about our own nature. It makes me personally feel less alone to know that there are genetic causes for awful behavior being a feature of life. It is how I comfort myself.

I am still completing my daily Ukrainian lessons. The internet says it will take a few years before I become seriously useful in Ukrainian.

Am I not wrong for suggesting that as nifty as it is, modern civilization is a cancerous aberration of earth? I think humans are predominantly programmed for a simple hunter gatherer lifestyle. And we are not really indicated for expansion to living in all kinds of climates either. We should really only be present where other great apes are. It is my contention that since we are currently manifesting a mass extinction, the links that are being removed from the global ecosystems are eventually going to catch up to the food chain causing a high magnitude sequence of famines. After that, human population will be reduced to about 1/10 of what it is today. If you stretch this forecast out further, there could be a chance that humans will mostly only remain in tropical climates where food is readily available. Weather and geologic movement will reclaim the environment in other climates and our former presence in those areas will become less obvious with time. Civilization and technology has advanced far faster than human evolution has. And you want to know why this is a problem? It messes with peoples mental health. There is a link between urban enviornments and schizophrenia. People don't like going to work every day in a lot of jobs that are not pleasantly engaging, because we were not designed for it, so it lacks in stimulating reward centers of the brain and is downright grueling. Intelligence of humans alongwith anatomical makeup allowed people to manage to develop advanced technology. But we were not genetically designed for that to happen with purpose. As a matter of fact it took hundreds of thousands of years before the required sequence of actions for the swift accumulation of learning required to get advanced technology fell into place. We were not intentionally cut out by nature to develop modern technological society. We just did because we could. Eventually. The above theory I delivered applies if you rule out things like God or alien civilizations having a direct hand in human civilization and technology progressing. And I think that my theory is a likely one because when you look at the big picture, there is still a lot of randomness and loose ends with modern civilization so it is probably not some heavenly utopia tailor-made for people to enjay. A very special thanks goes out to Stephanie Stattler, Brenda Frampton, Chris Darling, Virginia & Rob Peters, Vonda Prentol, Barbara Franceton, PJ Watters, Bonnie Fish, Tye Roland, Christy Timme, Ronnie Vye, Pam Vandeltar, Roland Eckarde, Penelope Walters, Jo Von Welt, Shontae Haun, Joe Andersen, Felicity Van Poole, Quentin Byers, Peter China, Jan Garcia,

Human folly and erratic behavior is depressing in of itself yes. But if we lost 90 per cent of our population through some unexpected but possible means, life would totally go on and many species would make a comeback as well. That is no problem in the long term. What is a problem to me is the temporary nature of habitability of the planet. There are probably only some 600 million odd "Good years" left for complex life before the climate on the planet reduces life's complexities, and everything goes extinct within 1.5 billion years.

In shuffling myself to a doctor's appointment this morning, I negotiated the icy conditions on the ground. Most of the parking lot is under a thick glacier of ice. It is because of that sleet storm, which set up a very dense slab of ice. This slab is extremely robust. It is going to take more than one torch for it to melt and to some extent this is probably going to be there for the rest of the winter.

Did Covid cases really drop precipitously, or is it just that everybody has their hands on at home test kits? My mom fell ill today with chills and really bad aches. We live in close quarters. I've never had it, I was negative last month and actually, oddly, hallucinated getting sick.

I am of the belief we are actually responsible for an ongoing mass extinction. As much as I love people, we have manipulated the hell out of the face of the earth, creating some strange strange stuff out of the elements in the soil. Me thinks that once you cause enough puzzle pieces of the ecosystem to get wet and warped, you would end up with trouble farming.

I had much more naive and optimistic outlook about the nature of the world and humans at the turn of the century when I was a kid. NOW I am convinced that, after armchair study of chimpanzees, that humans are essentially a patriarchal society who will always manage to place a very powerful King. Unlike chimps, humans are a little bit closer to neutral in this matter, and will occasionally manage democratic strategy and even more rarely, economic prosperity encompassing the majority of the population. I have contemplated the grim idea that the mid to late 20th century in United States prosperity was an anomaly. Abject poverty, inability to own property and iron-fisted autocrats is what humans seem to gravitate to when all things are equal. Democratic society might be struggling to remain in place because humans are, by their nature, not good at managing it. What happens is things start getting messy and we don't have the genetic capacity to keep a democratic government stable for long periods. When things do get hairy, it creates a chasm for some new aggressive autocrat to come out of the woodwork. It scares the **** out of me, because with the advent of modern technology and the ability for the ones in power to monitor the entirety of a populace inside of their own homes, who the hell knows what is possible. Because the evolution of that technology has been gradual, it is not alarming people and at most, people complain passively on their blog. I am not a very political person. I don't take many sides outside of modest benevolent goodwill.

What's funny about war is how religion fits into it. A lot of nations throughout history have devout religious identity, but somehow, nations manage to magically fit war into their portfolio of passable actions when it comes time to go take a piece of territory they want. This behavior is as old as time, throughout history. And nobody ever really explains how that works out.

I came across energies that are involved in fame, power and ultra wealth. I did not like the energies, and I ran for the hills. When I did that, the devil punished me, just like in the song Dark Horse by Katy Perry. All of my friends and influence evaporated in an instant to an extent that rendered me minimum wage for life. I am a simple guy who loves simple things. I am not the kind of guy who feels a need to assert control on places that are no longer associated with me. I think the world is abraisive and troubling enough as it is. I don't want it to get worse than it already is.