Eviction Chonicles - Moronic Poker Game

First visit - Eviction Chronicles - 422.

So this week, not only was the house I rent scheduled to be auctioned off....but that criminal deadbeat landlord of mine had summoned me into court for *non-payment* of March rent and/or eviction.

Recall that the thought all along, professed by the Moron himself, was that he would declare bankruptcy at the last minute in order to delay the auction another 3 months - 3 months longer that he could milk the properties of rent - 3 months longer that he could procrastinate *moving on* with his life.

I called the bank on Monday - the auction was still on. And I called again the day before the sale - auction still on.

So what was going on here? Was there a chance that he wasn't going to file bankruptcy? Was there a real chance that he was finally going to do the right thing and let go of that which he can't hold on to?

My wife and I arrive at Quincy district court the other day. She had to take a day off from work. AND we had to pay someone to watch our kids to deal with this BS. (Even more of an imposition, was the fact that I had to put on non-jeans and a sport-jacket!)

At 10am, we piled into a courtroom with a bunch of criminals(!) not knowing at all how this process works. I looked around, and there was no sign of the Moron. Ten minutes later, he was still not there!

Pleasant thoughts are streaming through my head, "maybe he won't show!" - but I smother them.

As our names were called, two clown attorneys in front raised their hand - apparently they were going to represent him in absentia. "Is this even permitted?", I wondered.

The court clerk guy (magistrate?) offers *mediation* to us, and the attorneys accept.

WTBleep was going on here? There's nothing to mediate! He filed a motion to resurrect his previous eviction attempt. I was pretty sure that a judge might throw out his motion on procedural grounds. I wanted to see a judge - if a judge told me I had to pay March rent even though the house was being foreclosed, and even though this dimwit already had my last month's rent (plus another $1200 that he owed me), then so be it.

But all this happened so fast. The next thing I know, I was whisked away into a room with these incompetent attorneys, two court mediators, and some observer (a youngish chick who, well, let's just say had trouble IMPARTIALLY not-laughing at some of my outbursts).

We go in there, and after a long preamble from the mediators about confidentiality, etc., they open up the session.

The lead hack attorney looks at me and says what do you want?

What do I want? "YOUR client filed the motion!....I want to go home."

And then it got bad. Real bad. I was as fired up as I've ever been. I described my landlord as a *criminal deadbeat* and his attorney started waving his finger at me, calling me *unreasonable* and *uneducated*; he said I was engaging in *defamation*.

Whatever.

CaptiousNut - Why do I have to pay rent when the house is getting auctioned off TODAY and when even after not paying for March, my landlord still owes me money???

HackAttorney - There's no auction.

CaptiousNut - I called yesterday and they said the auction was on. That's all the information I have to go on.

HackAttorney - There's no auction.

CaptiousNut - What? Did he do a midnight bankruptcy declaration or something?

HackAttorney - NO!....It was 48 hours ago.

CaptiousNut - What's the difference?!?!?!

I was incensed. Not only should I not have even been at the courthouse. My friggin' landlord doesn't even show up and he sends this hack attorney in to represent a case he knows nothing about.

Mediator - I'm detecting a lot of tension.

CaptiousNut - I FEEL LIKE I SHOULDN'T EVEN BE HERE. THIS WAS A TRUMPED UP MOTION. HE'S TRYING TO VACATE A PRIOR DISMISSAL - ONE OF WHICH I HONORED ALL THE TERMS.

HackAttorney - What were the terms?

CaptiousNut - I start to read off ALL 2 bullet points - 'That we pay him February rent and that he considers the return of our security deposit to be January rent.'

HackAttorney - Can I see that? (pointing to the paper)

CaptiousNut - No. What? IT'S RIGHT THERE IN THE COMPLAINT YOUR CLIENT FILED AGAINST ME....(to everyone else) OH MY GOSH, HE DIDN'T EVEN TAKE A GLANCE AT HIS OWN CASE!

(*independent* observer chick chuckles...)

CaptiousNut - I'M WASTING MY TIME HERE....A JUDGE MIGHT THROW OUT THIS ENTIRE MOTION BECAUSE IT IS PROCEDURALLY INCORRECT. WHY SHOULD I MAKE ANY DEAL HERE?

Mind you, my wife is kicking the $hit out of me under the table. When I say I was fired up, I mean as much as I've ever been - nostrils steaming, etc. She'll attest to that.

At that point, the mediators suggested that they meet with us separately.

What a colossal waste of time! I needed to get before a judge and who knows how long that would take after this detour now. I should have rejected their request for mediation right off the bat. I didn't because, admittedly, it took me by complete surprise.

At this point, my idiot landlord shows up. I see him out in the hall in a $1,000 suit, loudly yapping on his cell phone like he was....well, not a guy who just declared bankrupcy. Only the mediators won't let him in. They say that since he wasn't there to start, he can't join in now.

We went first with the mediators. But I couldn't come up with an *offer* for them.

So my wife said, "Tell them to pay us the interest on our last month deposit and the water bill that they owe us." (The mediators scribbled it down.)

I scoffed. "That's not an offer....They are suing us for MONEY and to EVICT us. They aren't going to go for that."

The whole thing was ridiculous. We left the room and I steamed out in the hallway - I had to walk as far away from my bleepin' landlord as possible!



Ten minutes later we went back in.

Mediator - They are offering to pay you the $1,200 they owe you today, and accept March rent as paid (via pre-paid last month), so long as you move out by the end of the month (that's in less than a week).

WOW.

So they went from suing me for money....to offering to PAY US money.

I guess the attorney was scared that his motion would be thrown out by the judge.

I guess all my screaming and fuming (that my wife scolded me for) paid some dividends.

My wife and I had to discuss this for a moment. "Tell them we want to stay until the end of May", we asserted.

Now my head was really spinning....I figured they were going to come back and say they'd give us until the end of April to get out; I figured they'd midpoint the negotiation.

But the Morons didn't. I felt like I was a sober person playing poker with a bunch of drunken monkeys...

The agreement was drawn up where he'd pay us the $1,200 he owed us right then and there; that we'd pay $2,500 for April rent; that we'd pay our usual $2,500 for May rent; and that we'd vacate the house at the end of May.

So we were made financially *whole* - we have all our money back now. And we get to stay AT LEAST another two months if we want to.

But I was still most displeased.

At this point, after all this harassment, legal and otherwise, I deserved to better than *even*. Or, at least my landlord deserved to be in the *negative*. I really should have resisted the mediation and gotten a judge to throw the whole thing out. Almost everyone thinks that I won but they are only right to an extent. I, an amateur attorney, may have shot even par and won the tournament....but I very easily could have shot 5 under.

Heck, I offered an even better deal to my scumbag landlord two weeks ago and he wouldn't even respond. So he endured the hassle of court and paid an attorney to get a WORSE outcome!

I'm going to continue fighting and torturing the Moron. He's crossed the line with me too many times; he's simply got to pay. I got him cited by the Board of Health for rodents, septic issues, etc. last week. Of course he hasn't done anything about that - so I have grounds to withhold rent - though I won't for April.

My wife consoled me...."We'll just stiff him for May rent. We'll stiff him on the way out."

Note the new auction date is scheduled for mid-May. So y'all can expect a sequel to this tale in about two months; expect him to take me to court again for *nonpayment of rent* while his house is being auctioned off on the front steps. And next time I'm not going to fall for the *mediation* trap.

Sidenote - the auctioneer did show up the other day for an auction that was cancelled. He told my wife that he had a minimum of *what was owed on the house*. Well, the house is worth less than 50% of that figure. So the bank was prepared to *buyback* its property; and unprepared to take the capital loss on its books, still.

Handcuffed By Statists!

Sorry for the recent blogging silence.

At the moment I am wrapped up in *legal proceedings* with the landlord: eviction, bank auction, Board of Health citations, personal bankruptcy filings (landlord), etc.

I should have a good update for y'all tomorrow.

For background, see - Eviction Chronicles - Episode 422.

Thou Shall Not Be Amorphous

From Free Republic:

U.S. Immigration Opposes Asylum Decision

In a deeply disturbing notice, the United States Government Agency for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has lodged an appeal of Judge Lawrence Burman’s grant of asylum to the Romeike family. The appeal was sent to the Board of Immigration Appeals in Fairfax, Virginia on February 25. In it, the ICE called homeschoolers too "amorphous" to be a "particular social group" and that "United States law has recognized the broad power of the state to compel school attendance and regulate curriculum and teacher certification” as well as the “authority to prohibit or regulate homeschooling."

On January 26, Judge Burman granted the Romeikes asylum after determining that the German government’s treatment of homeschoolers was “repellent to everything we believe as Americans,” and that Germany was denying the family “basic human rights.” The judge determined that the German state’s policy of imposing increasing and potentially crushing fines, the loss of custody of children, and possible criminal prosecution over homeschooling amounted to persecution. However, ICE pointed to the denial of an application in the European Court of Human Rights in the Konrad case as evidence that “the public education laws of Germany do not violate basic human rights.” ICE criticized Judge Burman for "improvidently disregard[ing]" the decision of the ECHR. In other words, it appears that ICE is arguing that U.S. judges should follow international law—rather than U.S. law.

Michael Smith, president of HSLDA, says that American courts should only rely on American law.

"American judges should use American law alone in making decisions about cases in American courts," Smith said. "Polls show that Americans by an overwhelming margin reject the idea of using international law in American courts to decide American cases. The use of international law in American courts is a threat to American justice and should be opposed."

In its appeal, ICE argues that the U.S. government has the authority to simply prohibit homeschooling, and this should disqualify the granting of asylum. ICE further asserts that Germany’s harsh treatment of homeschoolers is mere prosecution, not persecution. ICE lawyers wrote that "[e]ven were such fear[s] objectively reasonable, these sanctions would only amount to prosecution.” ICE argues that the judge’s ruling is "speculative" because sanctions had been applied in a “limited number of circumstances” and that the Romeikes had failed to “make any effort to locate an acceptable alternative school." These claims were fully argued in the first Romeike hearing and shown to be false. ICE also noted parenthetically that the "Immigration Judge did not address how under various state laws of the United States a person can be similarly prosecuted for not sending one’s children to school."

HSLDA Staff Attorney and Director of International Relations Michael Donnelly, who will continue to coordinate the Romeike family’s legal defense in this case, said he was not surprised by the actions of ICE or the arguments they presented.

"It is disappointing but not surprising that ICE has appealed," Donnelly said. "Judge Burman appropriately noted that homeschooling is legal in all fifty states, and his decision reflects U.S. law which upholds the right of parents to direct the education and upbringing their children as an enduring American tradition, entitling the family to protection from persecution. ICE argues that Germany’s denial of a parent’s right to homeschool for any reason is acceptable. It is shameful that ICE, and by extension the U.S. Government, supports the persecution of German homeschoolers."

So...

*US Immigration* thinks it fine (and worthy of Amnesty!) for border-jumpers to break into the the country, steal Social Security identities, send their kids to government school, and use emergency rooms as free drop-in medical centers...

But all those homeschoolers seeking political asylum from Nazi ancestors, yeah, THEY are a real threat to America!

Obviously, the idea that we should look to *international law* for how to run this country is ludicrous.

Though I was more off-put by the notion that prosecution is not the same as *persecution*. Heck, in this country if a so-called minority isn't merely granted a mortgage or enough representation on a color television sitcom it's deemed DISCRIMINATORY.

And it's not at all inconceivable that Big Government, one day, just goes out and bans homeschooling altogether. After all, look at the hugely unpopular cram-downs of recent times: Wall Street bailouts, Obamacare, etc.

So what would I do if homeschooling were suddenly illegalized?

I guess I'd either start up a new *private* school or send my kids to one that had liberal attendance enforcement.

Telling Insight, From The Student Penitentiary

"I can always tell the children who've been to kindergarten from the ones who haven't," a first-grade teacher told Susan.

"Are they much further ahead?" Susan asked.

"No," she said, "but they already know how to stand in line."

Hah!

That's from an education book I grabbed yesterday. As always, I will deliver a full summary when I'm done with the remaining 600 pages...

Yet Another Free Educational Resource

For those few non-Morons out there who are taking the LEAD ROLE in the education of their brood...

Check out this site - ThatQuiz.org - that I just came across tonight.

It's got some good exercises on it that my son has already enthusiastically attempted. Tomorrow, as part of his *work*, he'll be directed back there to learn the South American rivers, some Calculus, German verbs, and whatnot.

If you haven't already, make sure your kids check out that terrific US Map Quiz which I linked to in - So Much Free Stuff Online...

G.K. Chesterton - Orthodoxy

I just finished another of his books - Orthodoxy - which is one of his earliest works. It's so old (1908), in fact, that the binding of the one I borrowed is disintegrating....and that the copyright seems to have expired. The book is online for free!

Chesterton's writing doesn't make for good excerpts; nonetheless here are the only passages that I transcribed into my notes. In no way do they summarize or encapsulate this book. In fact, Wikipedia and other places on the web will do a much better job.

Poetry is sane because it floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion...To accept everything is an exercise, to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits. (p29)

The whole secret of mysticism is this: that man can understand everything by the help of what he does not understand. The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and succeeds in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. (p49)

Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity is centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in its nature; but it is fixed forever in its size; it can never be larger or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its shape. Because it has a paradox at its centre it can grow without changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travellers.

Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this deep matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The one created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the light of which we look at everything. Like the sun at noonday, mysticism explains everything else by the blaze of its own victorious invisibility. Detached intellectualism is (in the exact sense of a popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light without heat, and it is secondary light, reflected from a dead world. But the Greeks were right when they made Apollo the god of imagination and of sanity; for he was both the patron of poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary dogmas and a special creed I shall speak later. But that transcendentalism by which all men live has primarily much the position of the sun in the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a blaze and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and unmistakable, as recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid on a blackboard. For the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon is the mother of lunatics and has given to them her name. (p50-51)

But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert - himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt - Divine Reason. Huxley preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is so humble that he doubts if he can ever learn. Thus we should be wrong if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop from working altogether. (p55-56)

See also - G.K. Chesterton - The Everlasting Man.

Protecting Wards Of The State

I learned the other day that it is ILLEGAL to homeschool a foster child.

I guess that is because they are still wards of the state or something.

It's a shame because those kids probably need the benefits of *family* more than anyone, no?

In other words, foster *parenting* is a bit of a charade. With the kids locked away all week the foster family amounts to little more than an outsourced orphanange.

Pig Flu Bogeyman - Up For Slaughter

Hah!

I'm not kidding when I say, over and over again, that Massachusetts actually has the dumbest people in the country!

And that's a direct consequence of it being the most *educated* state.

Schools, as currently run, DO NOT liberate or inform minds. No. Instead they render them useless. They create a self-unconscious mind slavery that can work wonders like....impel residents to vote FOR taxing themselves, etc.

Thirty-six percent of residents were inoculated against the swine strain, also known as H1N1, compared with 21 percent nationally. Seasonal flu vaccinations were administered to 57 percent of the state’s population, compared with 37 percent of the country.

As of March 18, 32 deaths had been confirmed in Massachusetts, all but five among people who had underlying medical conditions, according to the state.

Only 5 deaths???

And the clown asserts that:

About one-third of the population has already had H1N1, and another third has been vaccinated. That level approaches what public health specialists call "herd immunity,"...

Okay. There are 6.5 million ma$$holes...

And allegedly one-third of them caught the pig flu...

So out of 2,166,666 *victims*...

ONLY 5 DIED!!!



People here don't wear seatbelts but are scared to death of innocuous *pandemics*! This can only be described as a triumph of idiocy and propaganda.

Herd immunity???

So long as they are talking about SHEEP.

You know, it seems like just yesterday those medical quacks were defending pig flu hysteria in my comment section...

See also:

Massachusetts - The Dumbest State, QED

The Bizarro World Of Pig Flu Hysterics

More Pig/Bird Flu Fraud

More Pig Flu Nonsense

Swine Flu Cooties

Pig Flu Quack-ccine

Nonstop Alarmism

A Silly Funny

The Lone Ranger and Tonto went camping in the desert. After they got their tent all set up, both men fell sound asleep.

Some hours later, Tonto wakes the Lone Ranger and says, "Kemo Sabe, look towards sky, what you see?"

The Lone Ranger replies, "I see millions of stars."

"What that tell you?" asked Tonto.

The Lone Ranger ponders for a minute then says, "Astronomically speaking, it tells me there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. Astrologically, it tells me that Saturn is in Leo. Time wise, it appears to be approximately a quarter past three in the morning. Theologically, the Lord is all-powerful and we are small and insignificant. Meteorologically, it seems we will have a beautiful day tomorrow. What's it tell you, Tonto?"

"You dumber than buffalo $hit. It means someone stole the tent!"

Plateaued Blogs

One of the older blogs out there is Little Green Footballs. I used to peruse it many years ago. I believe its real coming out party was an exposé it did of the infamous Dan Rather documents - one that just about proved them a forgery.

Recently, when writing Dead Blogs, I decided for the first time in probably 4 years to check out LGF.

I must say I was surprised to see the term *wingnut* used so pervasively. From past, albeit ancient, experience I more expected to see that pejorative's polar opposite - *moonbat* - littering the content.

I also noticed the traffic on that site seemed to be only a little more than I remember it being 4 years ago - though I could be wrong. But I would have expected it to have risen substantially, as *blogs* in general have gained exponentially more traction in that time.

"What was going on here?" I wondered...

I had a notion, but wasn't interested enough to research the matter.

Then just now I saw this post - Charles Johnson: Why I Parted Ways With The Right - over on that coward Barry Ritholtz's site.

(Yeah, BR is a coward for a few reasons. Here, for example, he who claims to be a *both sides basher* is at it again, but only links to the dirty work of others. He outsources his clueless vitriol, like a real man! Also, Barry's a coward for what he did to me a few months ago. See here and here.)

From what I can tell, Charles Johnson has undertaken a personal crusade against *global warming deniers* and *religious* people - which is fine, and totally his perogative.



And it looks like he's taken to deleting unfriendly feedback. Perhaps Charles Johnson should go back and read his own posts on cognitive dissonance!

All this might explain why his site seems to have stagnated. A self-styled libertarian who believes Big Government has a mandate to protect that little, all-encompassing thing called *the environment*???

Well, it's certainly a niche demographic he's targeting! Good luck to him.

It really is a truism that the faster they (civilizatons, countries, companies, celebrities, blogs, etc.) rise, the sooner they fall...

Airborne Morons

Recall my Small House, Big Boat theory. That's when you see a tiny chicken shack, perhaps in a more rural location, and just after you think how nice it would be to have THAT tiny MORTGAGE/RENT, you notice littered around the property....that whatever *shelter savings* the occupants enjoyed....that they just squandered them on a swimming pool, a camper, dirt bikes, ski-mobiles, and/or a Big Boat parked in their driveway.

It just doesn't well matter how much money American earthlings earn - invariably they spend between 98% and 110% of their income!

I had to drop something off at a relatively new friend of ours house the other day. I pulled up into the empty driveway assuming nobody was home. But the *mom* and her two daughters answered the door.

After mentioning my presumption about the empty driveway, she told me they only had *one car* - and that her husband had taken it to go to work that day. That's fine, right?

Only that one car was a BMW SUV. Furthermore, this *mom* informed me that she usually drives her husband to the commuter boat every morning at 7 FREAKIN' am. (And obviously has to pick him up each evening as well.)

So she not only has to be up and out early each morning, she also has to rouse her two daughters, ages 2 and 5, and get them into the car EVERY SINGLE MORNING.

Now, lots of people make due with one vehicle - and I applaud anyone who goes against the grain in doing so. But might they not be better served with two cars that cost as much as one BMW? I submit it's pretty cruel to put the wife and kids through this each morning when they could just buy a clunker for 2 grand that *dad* could use to shuttle the mere 3 miles from his house to the dock each day.

BUT, get this...

This *one car* family actually owns an airplane - a four-seater! - that they keep down on Cape Cod.

This is CRAZY!

They might well be the only ones on the planet who don't have more cars than planes.

Another Gatto Gem, Unearthed

The following is a quote from homeschooling patron saint, John Taylor Gatto:

When Bill Clinton was nominated by the Democratic Party for the presidency in 1991, I think that was July 17th, the New York Times printed his acceptance speech for the nomination. The speech ended with the tribute to a college professor who had been Clinton's mentor at Georgetown. Clinton said that this professor had seen the future more clearly than anyone. His name was Caroll Quigley.

Well, you could knock me over with a feather, Mary, because I read constantly and anybody who is worth knowing about I should at least have heard of. I never heard of this guy. So I went to the public library, and there was exactly one book in the files by Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time. I ordered it; it was out. It never came back in. I travel constantly, so a few days later, I was in San Francisco, and I went to the San Francisco Library, and Quigley was in the files, book stolen. I went to Dallas, Quigley was in the files, book stolen. I made seven or eight other tries to get it, with the same result.

All of a sudden I'm beginning to smell a big rat. Here's the future president of the United States paying tribute to a man whose book is unavailable in the United States.

Some dentist out in California heard me on a radio show, saying that I was looking for the book. He called me up and said that he had a copy and I bought it from him.

Well, I saw why the book was unavailable. Quigley claims to be the only man ever allowed access to the private files of the group that has taken this project under their wing. We call it the Counsel on Foreign Relations in this country, but in fact there are 23 bases worldwide. Quigley said that he was allowed to read all their papers from its inception, and that the CFR had a clear, organized, rational plan to eliminate war and to make life - ah - efficient.

Quigley's book was printed in 1966 by Macmillan, hardly one of your conspiratorial publishing houses. In his book, Quigley said that he approved of the plan; what he didn't approve of was the secrecy.

But right before he died, about ten years ago, Quigley gave a series of lectures at Georgetown, called the Oscar Iden lectures. In the Iden lectures, Quigley said that he no longer accepted this as a moral or a decent thing to do, and that we had to take up arms against this plan.

So what we have is upper-level documentation by a major scholar, who in fact is paid tribute to by the current president of the United States in his acceptance speech. I was already started on the path of tracking down these players, but Quigley took me much, much farther than I could have gone alone. With Quigley's clues to what was happening, I was able myself to assemble from mainline scholarship, again, not from conspiracy books, a real outline of what had happened, and in particular what was happening in the schools. We're trying to make a film about this now...

While I found that item in particular interesting, the rest of the interview is much better and well-worth reading. It's especially insightful on how to raise animated, driven children - even for those outside the homeschooling world. So click the link!

For more on at least the excerpted quote, see:

Children of the UN?

Unity, A Ruse

On The Elite

And for my master John Taylor Gatto link, click here.

Oh Pagan, Heal Thyself

I caught this guy on the dial of my color TV the other night....and found it blogworthy:



Actually, few historians would call Jesus Christ imaginary. Plenty question his divine nature, but there's significant evidence that he walked the Earth. In this vein, I even read once something like there's *no proof* that Alexander The Great was a real person - whether or not that's true, I don't know.

I actually watched the show for a few more minutes. After this *bit*, the scholar went on to explicitly say that everyone who criticized President B. Hussein Obama was a RACIST.

One last thing on this clown - who thinks everyone else a Moron:

In October 9, 2009, on his HBO show, Maher debated the effectiveness of flu vaccinations with Bill Frist and stated, "Why would you let them be the ones to stick a disease into your arm? I would never get a swine flu vaccine or any vaccine. I don’t trust the government, especially with my health."

Weigh that against what he said 1.5 months earlier:

On August 24, 2009, Maher was a guest on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and on the topic of getting universal healthcare legislation passed, Maher stated that Obama should forget about trying to get 60 votes for it, "he only needs 51". "Forget getting the sixty votes or sixty percent - sixty percent of people don't believe in evolution in this country - he just needs to drag them to it, like I said, they're stupid; get health care done, with or without them."

So, jam federalized health care through....even though *I don't trust* the feds with my health care???

I'd call that IMAGINARY logic.

Subtracting Math

Last week Peter Gray wrote - When Less is More: The Case for Teaching Less Math in Schools.

It was an interesting piece and worth a few minutes of your time. I won't summarize it beyond saying that someone did an experiment decades ago where they delayed teaching math until 6th grade. It turns out, that within a year of normal math instruction, these students had caught up to their peers who'd been studying math since kindergarten.

This evidence supports the tack of the Sudbury Valley School. There I believe the head honcho teaches all of K-12 math to his willing pupils within a matter of weeks - when they are 15-17 years of age.

But I fear that the *case for teaching less math in schools* could easily be misinterpreted. Just because age-graded, government schools, as they are currently staffed and run, do a poor job of imparting mathematical knowledge....that doesn't mean the subject ought to be eliminated or de-emphasized. If anything, it's more evidence that government schools shouldn't have ANY students under their care in the first place!

I do agree that the K-12 math curriculum is so small that it can be digested rather easily. AND, I've just about proved it - with my 5.28 year old son going from *counting* to 7th grade *algebra* in only about 1.5 years.

Next they'll be saying, "Because an inept Big Government can't get drugs off the streets....we ought to just legalize them."

See also:

Sudbury Valley Empriricism

Book Rec - Withdrawn!

Eviction Chronicles - Episode 422

With my house scheduled to be auctioned off next week...

On that very same morning, I have to appear in court - my landlord has filed a motion to *vacate* the dismissal from his last attempt to evict/rob from me!

Here's the story.

Given a public notice to foreclose on the house I rent, I told my landlord that March was my *last month*. In other words, I wasn't going to pay rent to him and have my pre-paid last month get blown into the wind. Realize that post-auction, I'd have a new landlord, one who'd be looking to collect rent from me April 1st. One who'd be indifferent to the fact that my prior landlord robbed me.

There's a bit more to the strategy here, but I'm going to omit that for the time being. It suffices to say that I have to appear in court next week.

At first, I didn't know what the *notice* he served me with was. I had thought it was a *summary for eviction* but it wasn't. It is a motion to throw out our prior agreement - where he agreed to consider my January rent paid by the legal return of my security deposit. Why does he want it *vacated*? Because this will allow him to accelerate the eviction process. It will allow him to get a court date quicker - I believe.

As far as I can tell, if he wins the motion, I'll get a day in court to make my case.

But if he loses, he has to start the process over again, and do it correctly.

I don't know, and couldn't find out, the specifics of this legal procedure. I think he may have *procedural* issues with what he did. For one thing, there seems to be some statute of limitations on vacating dismissals - ten days or something (he's at like day 30). Secondly, the only stipulation of the agreement we signed back in early February was that I pay him the $2,500 of February rent. That I did with a check and thus can't be contested.

This Moron articulated something to the effect in his complaint that my signing that agreement, I agreed to pay him rent going forward. Say what?

Another issue entirely came up....like the house being repossessed!

But I don't know the law. Perhaps two *Notices to Quit*, regardless of whether or not they are legit grant a landlord an expedited eviction process. It certainly seems like my Moron is attempting an *end-around* due process. I know. Restrain your SHOCK.

The lawyer I consulted warned me that the Court is a *zoo* and that I could get some idiotic judge who, for whatever reason, rules in my landlord's favor. And while though the motion is nominally to *vacate* a prior dismissal, in the complaint he's also asking the Court for *possession*. So in the unlikely case that I lose and some loony judge grants hims possession....I'd have maybe 10-12 days to pack up.



I will be representing myself in court next week - which invokes that old saw, that I have a Moron for my lawyer and my lawyer has a Moron for a client!

(Don't forget, he's probably going to declare personal bankruptcy a couple days before my court date. Next week certainly is *crunchtime*.)

Better Blogging Chronicles - 2

In - Better Blogging Chronicles - 1 - I promised more discussion of the professional bloggers I've been researching.

The first gurus I came across, wrote the above book. I plopped down the $15 for it and read it last night (only 200 light pages).

And I also read Daniel Scocco's free ebook - Make Money Blogging.

And I discovered Yaro Starak's blog and perused much of his free online content. (He charges wannabes $600 for blog coaching!)

I must say that while I know plenty about blogging as a hobby, in a few short days I've learned that I knew little about blogging as a business.

I had just never before looked at my blog as a commercial enterprise before.

It turns out, that a lot of the stuff I do has very little potential in terms of monetization. The bloggers who make money, in contradistinction to moi, are *narrowly focused*. And they generally choose subjects that are inherently very commercial like cars, cameras, trading systems, techno-gadgets, etc. There is almost nothing I can do with say a snippet of a Boston Globe article and an insightful, witty take on it. There's almost nothing I can do with anecdotal posts which rip the Morons I come into contact with. (Of course, the reason I rip them is *therapeutic*!)

Also, as far as Google Adwords go, mostly only dumb, docile people click on them - that's the polar opposite of my intended readership. Michael Davey even confirmed this for me. He said that his trading blog doesn't have nearly the *ad hit rate* that his original blog - Wordlab - does.

But the book that I read last night also gave me some encouragement. It said a blogger had to be original, somewhat prolific, write great blog post titles, skillfully use pictures, etc.

All that I've got down pat. Thank you.

But I have to make my posts, my content, more *searchable*. I need to stake out some territory (demarcated by *keywords*), focus on it, and steadily climb the search results if I want to increase my blog hits (not the same as *readership*).

By jumping around from trading to movies to homeschooling to eco-pagans to golf, I am spreading my keywords around too thin, apparently. The search engines get confused about my *authority* and unfairly knock me down in results pages. So again, the advice from the *monetizers* is to stick with one subject.

Now I happen to think that's one of the problems with our Moronic society - the elevation of specialists and the dearth of genuine polymaths. But let's move on.

Another thing I learned from these guys, is that to climb in the search rankings I have to re-title and re-focus my content. It's good that I write posts full of practical information, like posts about how I'm teaching my kids. But these experts would have me frame the content differently. They have me title it, e.g., "How To Create A Math Genius", "How To Teach A Toddler To Read", or "How To Teach Long Division".

Why?

Because people routinely search for precisely "how to raise a math genius" and the like!

You see, as a blog that desires more traffic, I have to get in front of people by answering SPECIFIC QUESTIONS that they may Google. These experts bleated this over and over again: good content is important, but the content has to USEFUL and DESIRED to drive blog traffic. This all seems like commonsense, and it is. But, again, I'd never before looked at my blog this way. My traffic has been steadily rising since I started so I was just content with that.

Click the following graphic to enlarge. It's some *Google Webmaster Tool*:



Those are my *impressions* and *clickthroughs* from the past week. Sure I look at total hits and occasionally where they come from. But never before have I looked at an analytical tool such as the one above.

Notice the glaring absence of the term *homeschooling*!

According to Google, I have no *authority* on the subject.

This I'll have to set about fixing.

See also:

Better Blogging Chronicles - 1

Better Blogging Chronicles - 3 - Aesthetics

The Risks Of Small-Minded Tattling

Dispute Between Neighbors

A city councilman in Utah, Mark Easton, had a beautiful view of the east mountains, until a new neighbor purchased the lot below his house and built a new home.

The new home was 18 inches higher than the ordinances would allow, so Mark Easton, mad about his lost view, went to the city to make sure they enforced the lower roof line ordinance.
The new neighbor had to drop the roof line, at great expense.

Recently, Mark Easton called the city, and informed them that his new neighbor had installed some vents on the side of his home...

Mark didn't like the look of these vents and asked the city to investigate.

When they went to Mark's home to see what the vents looked like, this is what they found...





It appears to be a 100% true story!

Not to defend the guy here, but who wouldn't be pissed when their neighbor erected a monstrosity which eclipsed a mountain view?

One Dumb Woman

About a year ago, I was talking with a local *mom* whose life partner worked for Bank of America, and thus owns a substantial amount of company stock.

She was beyond despondent because her husband's shares were in the sewer. That genius Ken Lewis had successfully driven the stock into the ground. In fact, it was right near the bottom of $2.50 a share (down from a peak of $52 or so) when I had this conversation. Her eyes were literally tearing up, she was that upset.

A few months later, with the bear market bounce in full swing, the stock was back up around $15 if memory serves me. I saw her again and she was in much better spirits - almost downright giddy.

CaptiousNut - Why don't you sell the stock here?

DitzySpouse - The *insiders* say it's going to $20...

CaptiousNut - C'mon. It's going back to $5. They are bankrupt.

DitzySpouse - The *insiders* say it's going to $20.

I wasn't going to push the issue; just take notes and put into the *blog* file.

I saw this same woman last week and we enjoyed a little palaver.

I asked how work was going for her husband, a ghost who I've only seen ONCE in the 2.65 years we've been neighbors. "Fine," she said. And I reminded her about the conversation we had almost precisely one year ago.

DitzySpouse - Yeah, and now the stock's up to....like $35!

CaptiousNut - (laughing) Well, it's up but not quite that high.

DitzySpouse - It is! It's like $35.

CaptiousNut - (laughing) NO. It's closer to $16.

But I only whispered that last line as we said goodbye. Who was I to burst the bubble that is her head???



I think if you're bawling at $3 a share, you ought to be selling a little at $16.

AND, when that stock is back down to $5 and I see this airhead....I'm going to say, "It's really $25, don't worry about it!"

Forget *Green* - Boston is Brown!!!

Is it wrong that I got a big kick out of the overflow of a local water treatment plant amid the flooding of the past few days?

QUINCY — About 15 million gallons of untreated wastewater was diverted into Quincy Bay on Monday in an effort to keep sewage from backing up into homes and flooding the Nut Island sewage facility, Massachusetts Water Resources Authority officials said.

Twice on Monday workers redirected the plant’s surging inflow of rain and sewer water into the ocean through a discharge spout a half-mile off the city’s shore.

Frederick Laskey, executive director of the MWRA, said the first "controlled bypass" was ordered about 1 p.m. after sewage overflowed a pumping station in Houghs Neck and "came over the floorboards" at the Nut Island facility.

"It would have flooded Houghs Neck and Island Avenue," Laskey said. "Eventually, we would have backed up all the way to East Milton Square.”

"This is the storm from hell," he added.

Hah! I love how they call poop soup or raw sewage...."untreated wastewater"!

I wouldn't direct my untreated wastewater on you if you were on fire!



Above is the picturesque Wollaston beach in Quincy. It'd be a nice little beach if it wasn't in the poopy wake of all that untreated wastewater and whatnot. I saw a sign up there this past summer announcing that the *swimming was prohibited* on account of polluted water.

"Wow. That stinks", I said.

Then an adjacent *mom* informed me that the beach had been *closed* for a full decade when she was growing up (1980s?).

They're just soooooo green here in Boston!

Winged Fury

***This is an actual letter from an Austin woman sent to American company Proctor and Gamble regarding their feminine products. She really gets rolling after the first paragraph. It's PC Magazine's 2007 editors' choice for best webmail-award-winning letter.***

Dear Mr. Thatcher,

I have been a loyal user of your 'Always' maxi pads for over 20 years and I appreciate many of their features. Why, without the LeakGuard Core or Dri-Weave absorbency, I'd probably never go horseback riding or salsa dancing, and I'd certainly steer clear of running up and down the beach in tight, white shorts. But my favorite feature has to be your revolutionary Flexi-Wings. Kudos on being the only company smart enough to realize how crucial it is that maxi pads be aerodynamic. I can't tell you how safe and secure I feel each month knowing there's a little F-16 in my pants.

Have you ever had a menstrual period, Mr. Thatcher? Ever suffered from 'the curse'? I'm guessing you haven't. Well, my time of the month is starting right now. As I type, I can already feel hormonal forces violently surging through my body. Just a few minutes from now, my body will adjust and I'll be transformed into what my husband likes to call 'an inbred hillbilly with knife skills.' Isn't the human body amazing?

As Brand Manager in the Feminine-Hygiene Division, you've no doubt seen quite a bit of research on what exactly happens during your customer's monthly visits from 'Aunt Flo'. Therefore, you must know about the bloating, puffiness, and cramping we endure, and about our intense mood swings, crying jags, and out-of-control behavior. You surely realize it's a tough time for most women. In fact, only last week, my friend Jennifer fought the violent urge to shove her boyfriend's testicles into a George Foreman Grill just because he told her he thought Grey's Anatomy was written by drunken chimps. Crazy!

The point is, sir, you of all people must realize that America is just crawling with homicidal maniacs in Capri pants... Which brings me to the reason for my letter. Last month, while in the throes of cramping so painful I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus, I opened an Always maxi-pad, and there, printed on the adhesive backing, were these words: 'Have a Happy Period.'

Are you f------ kidding me? What I mean is, does any part of your tiny middle-manager brain really think happiness - actual smiling, laughing happiness, is possible during a menstrual period? Did anything mentioned above sound the least bit pleasurable? Well, did it, James? FYI, unless you're some kind of sick S&M freak, there will never be anything 'happy' about a day in which you have to jack yourself up on Motrin and Kahlua and lock yourself in your house just so you don't march down to the local Walgreen's armed with a hunting rifle and a sketchy plan to end your life in a blaze of glory.

For the love of God, pull your head out, man! If you have to slap a moronic message on a maxi pad, wouldn't it make more sense to say something that's actually pertinent, like 'Put down the Hammer' or 'Vehicular Manslaughter is Wrong', or are you just picking on us?

Sir, please inform your Accounting Department that, effective immediately, there will be an $8 drop in monthly profits, for I have chosen to take my maxi-pad business elsewhere. And though I will certainly miss your Flex-Wings, I will not for one minute miss your brand of condescending bull$hit. And that's a promise I will keep.

Always. . .
Wendi Aarons
Austin, TX

Hah!

Now scroll back up and revisit that pic with a more *discerning* eye...

Better Blogging Chonicles - 1

The goals of this blog have always been self-amusement and self-edification. By that metric I consider it an unqualified success. For example, I shudder to think about the course of me and my family's life had I not, in the course of my online adventures, discovered John Taylor Gatto and homeschooling.

Despite humble origins, every endeavor from a child bouncing a basketball to a high schooler busting their butt for *grades* is loosely connected to larger ambition - like the NBA or a good college/good job. And my blog is no different; if I'm going to spend the time AND I enjoy it so much, then I might as well see if it can lead to better things - money, fortune, and fame!

How cluelessly arrogant, right? Yep, as ridiculous and dreamy as any aspiring American Idol wannabe with a home karaoke machine.

I'd always thought that if I simply built a decent, stimulating and amusing blog, that people would come - a la the Field of Dreams above.

But, again, I've done some targeted research on that and discovered, well let's just say, other theories on generating traffic. Going forward, I will regularly discuss what I've learned and specifically what I do in efforts to promote this blog to another level. So let's get started with my notes from last night:

They say a blog has to climb the Google search rankings to get increased traffic. So how does one effect that?

Well, it seems the key is to have people all over the web LINK to your blog: direct links to your blog, other links to posts of yours, etc.

On this front, at best there may be 5 other bloggers whom I know of that LINK directly to Marginalizing Morons. How could I increase that? Well, they say to put links to other blogs on yours and hope (or ask) for some reciprocity. But here's the problem - I DON'T READ ANY OTHER BLOGS. I just don't have the time anymore. Occasionally I find a good one, keep up with it for a year or so, then I move on satisfied (or bored) that I got that blogger's shtick. I can't well put someone's blog in my margin if I no longer read it - just as I'd never tell anyone to make a trade that I wasn't doing myself. If I put the 10 blogs I read on my front page, and some of them reciprocate,....then I'll just feel bad in a few months when I have to replace them all.

Another strategy to increase blog traffic, all the experts say, is to write articles for other sites (for free of course). What you get out of that is two-fold: one, you get the exposure of another site's readership and two, this *backlink* to your site should propel your own blogs *search rank* and whatnot.

The site that everyone talks most about for article submission is EzineArticles.com. I checked it out and it seems a little cheesy. People write little articles like 10 Good Reasons to Homeschool, Best Ways to Bind a Book, and How to Get Your Ex-Boyfriend to Fall For You Once Again? Here's a Guaranteed Technique!. Sample it for yourselves.

Though I feel like writing articles alongside some of those clowns dilutes my profile, I figure why not give it a try - write and submit a couple of posts and see what happens. Only when I checked out the submission page, it seems that one has to write under their real name - no anonymity allowed!

And that's not the first time I've encountered the *name* obstacle. Google Analytics wants my real name so I go elsewhere for web stats. And these *pro bloggers* that I've been reading also seem to unanimously recommend going with your full baptized name - and a head shot instead of my more marketable midriff!

One way to get more clicks, I've seen first-hand, is to comment on other people's blogs. They say to comment on *likeminded* sites because it follows that the people who read the other site may well be interested in your content. One *pro blogger* that I read said to post *20 comments* per day on other people's blogs. Twenty? That sounds spammy to me. My personal blog commenting strategy has been strict - I only comment when I have something germane to add. I'd never click on someone's backlink if they were obviously a link-hound - and I figure most others agree. People who talk a lot but say nothing are the bane of the blogosphere.

Now I did decide to start commenting Mish's blog recently but never got around to it. He gets probably 70k hits a day from libertarian types so I'm 100% positive commenting there would get me some new readers here. Except I've had some problems trying to post. He uses JS-Kit for commenting that supposedly has *OpenID* support. And supposedly I can simply use my Google/Blogger CaptiousNut identity to post comments but I can't for the life of me figure out how. Solving this will go to the top of my agenda.

The last thing I'm going to mention that I recently learned from the *pros* is that I should take my blog off Blogger.com. They said that by using this free service I run the risk of offending (via copyright or whatnot) Google who owns it. What could happen? Well, they could take my entire blog down at their whim - say, if someone with deep pockets threatens to sue them over something I posted.

I, an experienced and prolific *offender* in my own right, never really thought of this. I'd hate to have five years and 2000+ posts obliterated from the web. Heck, I don't even have back-up copies of my content.

I always figured, however, that using Blogger would help my Google search rank. In fact I'm sure it has to.

And hosting my own website will surely cost money - money I don't feel like spending at the moment.

In my next *Better Blogging* post, I'll list some of the sites and *pro bloggers* I've been reading.

See the next installment - Better Blogging Chronicles - 2.

The Nine Lives Of My Moronic Landlord

A while back I mentioned how the idiot almost killed himself. See - More Landlord Recklessness.

Above is a pic of the actual car that he somehow, miraculously survived; that's the eyesore that he dumped in my backyard praying for an MTV bailout.

Dollop Of Wisdom

Eviction Self-Defense

Really busy today so blog output is light.

Since my Moronic, criminal landlord stiff-armed reason and initiated yet another eviction proceeding against me....I decided enough was enough and launched my counter-offensive today.

The first strike - I had the local Board of Health come by my house for an inspection. From what I can tell, they are going to *cite* the BLEEP out of him: rodents, septic, illegal garbage disposals, etc. It just so happens that I had a *whole folder* of pics and videos at hand that I gave to these two government agents - two town hall types that, well, let's just say already had unfavorable impressions of my landlord.

I sincerely doubt he has the cash or the energy to take them on. So they can, if they want, condemn the place. What does that do? Well, it makes it *unrentable*. So even if he successfully gets me out (unlikely) with an eviction, he won't be able to nab another unsuspecting renter (and bilk them out of their last month's rent and security deposit).

If the citations go out quickly, he might even think twice about declaring bankruptcy *2 days before* this house gets auctioned later this month. Recall that was his scheme to buy another 3 months - 3 months more of *denial* and 3 months more rent from a tenant.

So they'll cite him, threaten him with fines, and he'll just ignore them, right?

Maybe. I mean, he doesn't have the cash to fix anything.

But these citations will probably give me sufficient cover to *not pay* rent for next month, in the case that he does declare bankruptcy, forestalls the bank auction, and is still my legal landlord come April Fools Day.

We'll see how this first salient goes, but I also have a couple of other things up my sleeve. For example, I am going to send a pointed letter to the State Attorney General(Martha Coakley) suggesting they investigate him for *subprime* crimes. Let's just say the big-mouthed Moron told me more about his *business* than he should have way back when. I don't know that they'd really dig into this guy - as offices like these tend to go for headline-grabbing culprits, e.g. *corporations* and serial rapists, but I have already spoken to a friend's friend in that office who strongly encouraged me to *complain*.

That's enough on this crumb for tonight except for one more item.

I just received an email from one of my look-outs; it said that a *notice to foreclose* was just given last week on the Moron's personal residence as well.

So where's the C-Nut family going should this place be boarded up???

That's a good question. My wife is meeting with some folks next week in Manhattan about a new position. All they have to do is give her a bit of a raise...

My First Flood!

Well, it's sort of...

Personally, my life here isn't underwater to any great extent - though my basement water level is getting dangerously close to the pilot light of my water heater.

But as you can see by the pics, many parts of greater Boston are brimming.





I mean it when I say this is my *first flood*. The 10+ inches of rain the past 3 days represent the closest I've ever been to any type of natural disaster, I think.

We here in the Northeast have always felt left out. It seems like we're the only part of the country that doesn't regularly suffer tornadoes, hurricanes, mud slides, earthquakes, floods, or forest fires!

McBastard

Roadkill

Movie Skip - All The Right Moves

Neither I nor my wife had even seen this classic 80s flick before last night.

Turns out, we hadn't missed anything - it was awful, essentially a *B* movie in terms of plot and quality. Even the soundtrack, usually a saving grace for 80s cheese, was particularly brutal.

I am surprised that Comcast had it rated *3 out of 4 stars*.

IMDB users have it right - 5.6 out of 10.

To see my recent movie *recs* and *skips* - click here.

My Anti-Social Networking

Click that graphic to enlarge if necessary.

Those are all *social networks*, according to this site anyway.

I have barely a surface level understanding of what most of these animals do.

And that, according to my recent research, is definitely limiting the traffic to my blog (to about 1,000 hits a day).

I've spent that last couple of days poring over *professional blogger* sites in an effort to improve my blog. While there were a few dissenters, there seemed to be a consensus among the rest that utilizing Digg, StumbleUpon, Technorati, Facebook, Twitter and the like is absolutely essential to growing a blog's audience. So I'll see what I can do on that front.

They also tell me that I should encourage people to subscribe to my blog's *feed* something I always thought would decimate my traffic. (That's why, as of now, I don't have a *feed button* atop Marginalizing Morons.) Furthermore, they unanimously assert that I should put a *subscribe by email* button on my blog as well.

Other recurring advice: write articles for other sites, allow guest commenters here, become active on other like-minded blogs - commenting and whatnot, hide my archives on a back page to get my search rankings up higher, get my blog listed in *directories*, truncate my posts with a *read more* link, significantly increase the use of my keywords, e.g. "Moron", "Marginalize", write and either sell ebooks or give them away to my loyal readers, etc.

But all of that seems like a lot of effort. In fact I gave up not only commenting on other blogs, but I also completely stopped READING other blogs so I could dedicate my time and energy to producing my own content.

In my younger, more stubborn years I would face-off with empiricism without blinking. But I'm a bit wiser now....so I'm going to set my *old* thinking aside and try out some new things here.