PTINS

Vulcan was before I was a teenager. Closed before I came of age. "You said rape The Armadillo twice." I liked The Armadillo!!! My favorite music venue ever, nothing else even comes close. Saw so many bands and groups there, perfecting their craft, on their way to bigger things. Austin was a laid back, comfortable, Willie & Waylon and the boys kinda town. But the energy in Austin was different. And the Armadillo, on those hot steamy nights, was off the charts. Musicians bouncing around the stage, sweat running down their faces, with that glaze in their eyes, "They want more, ... I have to give them more!" The Armadillo was small, everyone was close to the stage. They sold more beer than the Astrodome. KLBJ night for $.94 and their 3 for a $1 nacho's makes me smile every time I think about it. Re; Springsteens love of Austin; The raw, high energy Boss at the Armadillo was magical. He was not alone. I saw Tom Petty at the Austin Opry House in '79, and again at the Erwin Center in 2017. He expressed similar sentiments of Austin. No comparison to seeing those shows in the smaller, more personal venues. I probably saw Freddie King at the Armadillo more there than any other musician. I'm not sure if this is the same painting from the Armadillo, and later, Threadgills, bit it captures the feeling between musicians and the Armadillo, and Austin. I listed mostly '69-'79 venue's, as that was my golden age of seeing quality live music in and around Austin. I lived elsewhere from mid '79 til 2015. My Bad. Still there. My neighbor and coach took me there after an American Legion baseball game. I was 15. Not the same as it was, but its still there, at least. "I dance country at the Broken Spoke". Still got he bumper sticker. I wish!

Don’t go to a parking lot. Go someplace with trees that have individual leaves, so you can see the crescent shaped shadows.

I am not defending Excel. Period. I am pushing back on the notion that everything done by every utility is driven 100% by profits. Is sounds like Excel was notified the pole was "snapped' in two, certainly damaged beyond repair, and the replacement should have been repaired prioritized. I'm pretty sure any bad pole in the 50,000 square miles of West Texas is in a dry and windy area. Re: The Bastrop fire; I commented that I read reports early in the process that a controlled burn got out of control was a cause of a fire proximate to Bastrop. I have not read the final reports and have not seen any info pertaining to any litigation of same. Buried power lines are easy for new developments. For retro fits, they are extremely intrusive and expensive. Damn near everybody I know with power lines on their property has issue with trees encroaching on the power/phone lines, and have chosen to keep the majority of the trees rather than cutting back the trees to the "recommended" distance. I don't live in areas with above ground lines, and don't live close to "green belts" that are really high pressure O&G pipelines. Shit happens and people make poor choices.

I don't believe any other country has the litigious nature and punitive cost structure of the US.

A fire may have started in the vicinity of a damaged power pole ... "its facilities appear to have played a role" A busted pole does not necessarily mean it caused the fire. Re: The Bastrop Fire, I thought it started from a TAMU Forest Service controlled fire, that under windy conditions, got out of control. "Similar litigation" ... Sue the big company because they failed to do their tree trimming. Were they in the vicinity of the fire? No, it doesn't matter, they failed to do their tree trimming, so pay me and I'll go away. Damn right. Every tree and every branch in proximity to every power line must be trimmed after ongoing, repeated inspections, every week?, month?, or year? (because, you know, those damn things keep growing back). If it was up to utilities, there would be no trimming involved, because there would not be a single tree or branch encroaching in the Right-of-way. Period. Just laser straight ribbons of grass with power lines running down the middle. Instead, you see things like this every place you go. Layers and layers of people, HOA's, agencies, foundations and companies, each with their own attorneys, saying you CANNOT trim that particular tree, branch, limb, twig or leaf. Either you clear the ROW, or you don't. Kinda like being pregnant. No grey areas. The O&G industry is allowed to clear the ROW. In my experience, they fly the lines on a routine basis, identify encroachments (trees, barns, houses, driveways, buildings etc.), and remove them. In my first job, we had people walk from Tulsa to St. Louis, to document any abnormality along the pipeline route, things that could be identified from an airplane, which was the federal regulation. That was not normal or routine, or required, but something that was deemed necessary to ensure public safety and the operational integrity of that particular asset. Granted, power lines don't usually explode. So, $4+ Billion for attorney's fees, and the rest into a trust. Money is set aside for the expressed intent of repairing and maintaining facilities, including ROW. And, invariably, some one will sue them to prevent them for doing just that. "FWIW, every day folks take their work seriously." I have read that the pole was damaged, or snapped off (broken into 2 pieces, which doesn't necessarily mean the business end was touching the ground, maybe he hanging suspended in the air, or fallen. Each of those mean different things, and each would be addressed differently, including the time frame in which thet would be repaired or replaced. Some would say if it can't be replaced immediately, just cut off the power until it can be. That is the only way to be 100% safe. Do you agree? I agree. It is compounded by the fact that power lines and the power generation facilities are owned by different entities. When the legislature privatized the "public utilities", there was not a lot of forward thinking in their decision making. How can going from a public utility to a mosaic of for-profit companies be a bad thing? Addressed above. Well for one, we have a populace that demands to be catered to, without having any real idea what they are talking about. There has to be balance between science and economics. We could build planes that never crash, but nobody would be able to afford to fly. If something is done to 100% satisfaction, they are deemed to be negligent. Their has to be an allowance for failure, including people occasionally making a poor decision. Saddling an entity with a $10+Billion judgement because one individual made a bad decision is ludicrous, but that is the world we live in. Thanks! I guess I could have just made a shorter post. To be clear, I don't accept compromising safety for profit. I have the scars to prove it. But shit happens.

Per the tweet, Russian radar planes Russia has 2 types. These are the Beriev A-50 and the Beriev A-100. Both are built on the basis of the Ilyushin Il-76. The Conversion and repair plant is located in Taganrog. Happy Hunting!

Mom's still kicking at 94. Kicking be the operative word, so be nice! She took us to see the Batman World Premier at the Paramount in 1966, and to see Led Zeppelin in '69 for my 13th birthday. Sleepy little town getting a bit older? Let's see ... The Paramount, Municipal Auditorium, The Teen Club at Bergstrom AFB, City Coliseum, Kings Village, Antone's, The Armadillo, DKR-TMS, Mother Earth, Austin Opry House, The Back Room, The Armadillo, Continental Club, Soap Creek Saloon, Silver Dollar, Broken Spoke, Rauls >> ???, Club Foot, 3rd Coast, Super Drum >> Erwin Center, C-Boys, COTA, Moody Center,

I remember the '77-78 Inaugural season of the Super Drum that included Texas beating Arkansas' Final 4 team w/ the "Triplets", and Texas winning the NIT Championship and Abe Lemons winning the National Coach of the Year. Abe had a national following and recruited Johnny Moore (PG) from NYC, CO-NIT MVP's Ron Baxter (PF), the LA HS Player of the Year, & Jim Krivacs (SG), a transfer who earned All-America honors, and Ovie Dotson, a future Harlem Globetrotter. I played pick-up games w/ Krivacs in Gregory Gym, before I knew who he was. F*cker! The Super Drum was big step up in concert venue's from the Municipal Auditorium and City Coliseum. Back in the day, you could buy an annual pass for Intercollegiate Athletics for ~$30/year and Cultural Entertainment for $10/year. Oh, ... for the good ole days.

His NFL Combine interview is worthy of the time you spend watching it. You can’t hear the questions so you have to read between the lines. His HS sophomore track times is the last time he ran track. Covid took his JR year and he graduated early his SR year. He thinks he could run a 10.2, maybe a 10.1. He came to the Combine to get the record. Thinks he has a very high football IQ, maybe higher than anybody at the combine. I don’t dIsagree with him. Knowledgeable of most NFL offenses and players, said repeatedly that whatever team he was asked about runs the same run first offense as Texas. Great endorsement for Sark & Texas. He knows who all the fast football players are. He is not just a speed guy. Thinks his start, and stop & go quickness is his strongest attribute. (Different video, but his HS Coach said the same thing.) Thinks he has good hands, he just needs to have more focus. Prefers running the short and intermediate routes. He committed to Harbaugh and his pro style offense. When Michigan screwed up his paperwork, he committed to Sark without ever seeing Texas. From a Pat McAfee video, Pat said the Ewers moon shot at Alabama came down like a bottle rocket falling from the sky. I only mention that because X tracked that ball very well, and at other times that has not been his strong suit.

I fucking love this video. 4.21 without the benefit of pushing out of the blocks. I was going to say that's a fast MF, but nothing but respect for X. Fast. Fast. Fast. Look at all the other players take off running towards him after his time posts. He's also earned the respect of his peers. Even Stacey Dales in her pink blazer took off jogging to get to Xavier. Great moment for him. And us.

I did a few turnarounds back in the 80's. I worked the 7pm-7am graveyard shift for 2 weeks inspecting the companies old and new pipes at the processing plant, and then I stayed at the swankiest hotel in Enid, Oklahoma. Coldest I've ever been in my life, standing outside in below zero weather with the wind blowing hard enough to blow the welders bead out of the pipes they were trying to weld. The only thing between Enid and Canada was a few fences. Don't talk to me about hard working conditions. As far as "...inspecting rich old dudes pipes in the middle of the night ...", I got nothing.

That video is brutal to watch, the fire spreading eastward with the prevailing winds, and then the cold front sweeping down across the plains from the north. FYI, a million acres is equivalent to a ~ 1,550 square miles, or an 8 mile wide strip along I35 from Austin to Dallas, or this: Pray for help from Mother Nature.

Patchouli?

Looks like the 30 km "Tsar Train" is not the deterrent Russia thought it would be.

Per a Google Map screenshot, the "Tsar Train" from Olenivka to Volnovakha (shown in magenta) is on the existing main RR between Donetsk to Mariupol (light blue). This is the only pre-war RR serving Mariupol from the North (Donetsk) and East (Russia). It appears there are parallel tracks, so the line may not be completely blocked. There were earlier posts of Russia constructing 2 new RR, one along the coast between Rostov and Mariupol (red line) and one new east-west line kinda in the middle of nowhere, spurring off from the Rostov-Donetsk line running southeast from Donetsk. Ukraine had previously attacked a bridge crossing on this new line. No idea if either line was constructed or operational. Geographically, everything east of the "tzar Train" towards the coast appears to be coastal plain/agriculture, void of any significant population or industry. Not obvious why they would put a rail barrier here, other than it prevents casual movements across open country.

The first concert I took my son to was Britney Spears ~ 2003. The "Disney" production was not unlike ... a Super bowl halftime production. There was no way in hell Britney wasn't going to be wildly successful. Did she perform well and entertain? Yes. Can she sing? Don't really know, it was hard to tell with all the theatrics and army of musicians and backing vocals on stage. This. Most kids anymore are groomed by personal coaches and "professionals" at an early age. Kids play select sports instead of little league and a lot of them choose a sport to focus on before they reach puberty. Some of them reach the pinnacle. Most of them don't. Zero risk, like spending every waking moment pursuing your dream to realize you can't sing? Most parents would think having your kids dreams crushed before they are teenagers is a big risk. "Just a generic pop act?" You mean the cute girl with an intergalactic following that generated an army of Chief's fans, in Munich? You be you. This. You can fake it til you make it, but either you got it or you don't. Really, my post focused on the symbiotic Reid-Mahomes relationship as the force in the NFL. Don't think anybody responded to that. Its all about Taylor. She does check off a lot of boxes.

Each of Reid and Mahomes are top of the food chain, together ... better hope your you're a Chief's fan. Andy Reid has been a known offensive talent since forever. His Donovan McNabb coached teams went to 4 straight NFC Championship Games. McNabb was an quality, above average QB, but he was never a super star that was going to carry a team on his back. Reid leaving Philly was good for him, getting away from the microscope and going to the calming stability of the Hunt's was as good as he could hope for. Getting Mahomes, was perfect. I remember some one, Phil Simms I think, talking about Andy Reid getting Mahomes, "He finally has a QB that can run his offense." Reid was a fixture in the NFL post season w/ McNabb, and he finally has a QB? Mahomes was a very good athlete, dripping w/ raw talent. You can tell he played baseball by how he cleanly he slides to avoid contact, and the accuracy of his side arm, short stop flips, or flings. "The Gods reached down and turned your right arm into a thunderbolt. You got a Hall-of-Fame arm ..." The Gods blessed Mahomes a second time, by giving him the opportunity to get coached by Andy Reid. Far from pissing it away, Mahomes listened. Not only could he make every throw, he had an offensive coach who could design plays, and get players, that were damn near impossible to defend. I always liked the Chiefs. Lamar Hunt was a sportsman, so he started his own football league. Hank Stram and "65 toss power trap." Bonus; they draft a lot of Longhorns. Nothing but love for Tay Tay. She has talent, and has earned, and built an empire. She is not a Mickey Mouse girl who had a Disney support network to guarantee her success. She deserves to be happy. Same for Travis Kelce. Incredible talent who put in the work to achieve success. Taylor probably brought more eyeballs to the NFL than any person in the history of the league.

Or inside/outside the tackle box.

Well, for the 2 million people in the Austin metro, I live in the country 😊. We anticipated growth, that is why the new HEB's are ~10 miles away. Not quite the long range views we have at the ranch, but the country grocery store in Utopia is only 4 miles away from the ranch. We have access to fiber optic at the ranch, but not at home. Go figure. Every year (10 years), we've had baby deer born on our property, and I see (not hunt) trophy deer at home every year, usually bigger than the ranch. That's my definition of being in the country. Love it when the cousins come to play.

Interesting thread. Enshittening? Entropy is the word I learned, - the degradation of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inert uniformity. Entropy is the general trend of the universe toward death and disorder. Like the waves in the ocean, the decay and dumbing down of society is inevitable. TLDR. Stop now, and save yourselves. I'm older (not retired, not working and not looking for a job.) I'm comfortable financially and have the freedom of choice. I started my career before cell phones and the internet, when companies made products and provided service. If you didn't do that, you probably worked for the government in some capacity, or were born on 2nd base. Every engineer I went to school with had a job before they graduated. Companies that came to recruit late in the cycle couldn't get people to sign up for interviews. Most people had jobs already. If I had worn a blue suit to my interview, I would have went to work for IBM instead of Oil & Gas. By the time I realized I should have been a doctor, or a lawyer or a banker, it was too late. I worked for 4 companies that got bought by other companies and lived in Houston 4 times, Oklahoma 3 times, as well as Denver and Lafayette, and traveled to damn near every oil & producing producing region in Texas, and the lower 48. I know about sacrificing and paying your dues. In 1991, my "company", one of 5 business sectors, was carved up and cannibalized into 5 asset groups. When I asked by new boss for a job description, he wrote "Make Money" on a sticky not and asked which word didn't I understand. Later on, when asked what I could do for a prospective company, that was my answer. Didn't get a lot of follow up questions. I learned a long time ago business decisions benefited the guys in the chairs more so than the companies they worked for. With that said ... I agree with this conceptually, but from two different perspectives; as an employee v. as a consumer/investor. I worked in the O&G industry, the Midstream sector before there was a midstream sector, just upstream and downstream. Gas Processing was the interface between production and processing/marketing. There was a symbiotic relationship with our customers, on both sides, in that none of us could survive without the other. Fucking people over was NEVER an option. Once a company got that reputation, they were toast. The competitive marketplace would not accept that behavior. The opposite was also true, once you got those customers, they were yours. Executing 10-20 year contracts, and over servicing those contracts worked. Long term contracts meant long term relationships. That industry and business model is much different today. Everything is MBA's and business models that tell you how to make money, now. All driven towards a favorable earnings release every quarter. I blame 2 things for the ... decay. Personal computers and Y2K. Personal computers gave people with 4 function calculator brains access to higher level mathematical tools, and Y2K invited techies into the board room with a disproportionate amount of influence. As a consumer, I can take it or leave it. I can still go to the local HEB, Home Depot & Walmart for most of my needs. Add Amazon, and that is ~ 90% of my consumer spending. As an investor, I luv me some FAANG companies, or whatever it is now. Not that I don't care about social and privacy issues, but financial preservation and growth is a much bigger driver. Some have store fronts and sale products. Others consolidate information and package information for consumption by others. Are they too big? too powerful? who cares? They make money, hand over fist. The vast majority of $ invested in the stock market has exposer to these companies. What is good for them is good for most people. Their decisions are numbers on paper computer screens. Their offices and cubicles are not going to explode and kill and main people. Are they good companies to work for? Don't know. I remember hearing Ken Lay speak to his employees (pre Enron days) at a luncheon, and someone made a comment about shorter term goals compromising longer term security. He said something to the effect he didn't remember telling anybody that long term security was ever the priority. Consumers vote with their spending, and their habits. You get what you pay for, always has been, always will be. If you don't like it, don't buy it. There are always "Peter Principle" employees in organizations that have mastered the technique of staying employed, some of which rise to the management level. The filtering of information at lower levels leads to decisions made on less than the best information available, and Voilà, corporate America. My first job out of college I made more money than my boss. It was probably that way for 10-15 years. Having to explain things to your boss is a hard way to make a living. Compensation moving from salaries to incentive compensation plans and stock options fueled the short term decision making, get it now while you can. "Tragedy of the commons" ?. I like that. Too bad I'm a common. If only the concept of "Fuck you Money" was a thing in my younger years. Ok, it probably was, but not for anybody I knew. My kids always complained that I complained when my quarter pounder had cheese on it. "Just eat it dad, you like cheese anyway." That wasn't the point. That is not how I ordered it. Good thing I didn't want my kids to do everything I did. But it served me well. "You don't get what you deserve, you get what you negotiate." The HEB catch all. My favorite store, and company. Not unlike Disney, Southwest Airlines, and Apple, in their prime. It all starts with hiring the right people. I like all the HEB personal shoppers; you never have to go far to find someone who can tell you exactly where a particular item is. We live in the country, ~ 10 miles from 4 different HEB's, 2 brand new. They have different layouts, yogurts, beer options, etc. If I have to leave the house, I usually go by HEB, just because I'm out. Wife still works full time, I don't. For general shopping, I'm a late morning shopper. Not busy, shelfs fully stocked, lots of stay at home moms. For an item or 2, I'm a mid afternoon shopper. Free wine and snacks is the greatest thing our society has to offer.

I ordered a Prime Rib and they don't serve it w/ Au jus. Big WTF for me.

Like Billy Joel writing "Just The Way You Are" for Christie Brinkley.