Rusty's Ramblings

[Rusty Edge]

The assistant DA was cross examining Kyle today, and ran afoul of the judge multiple times, sometimes in front of the jury, sometimes with them removed.... now one of the defense attorneys is asking for a mistrial on the basis of prosecutorial overreach. And the judge's phone just went off with some loud music in the middle of it.

I was posting to say that the assistant DA had said something to the effect of - please be quiet and don't interrupt me until I've finished ..  TO THE JUDGE! That did not go well. Other issues were the prosecution trying to re-argue pre-trial motions and repeatedly criticizing Kyle's multi-month silence , while the judge was affirming Kyle's 5th Amendment right.

I don't know if they'll finish this trial or not. It could be a mistrial and a do-over, OR a mistrial due to prosecutorial misconduct with extreme prejudice and which means that they drop all of the charges.

Now the judge is yelling at the assistant DA again.

The judge is going to proceed.

I think the fair thing at this point is to declare a mistrial and let an appeal determine if there is another trial. The DAs are screw-ups, they botched the prosecution and prejudiced the judge against them. I think it's incompetence rather than malice. Both the accused and the victims deserve a fair trial. I hope there's a new trial.

[Rusty Edge]

Well, it's all over and Rittenhouse was found not guilty on all counts.

I see it as a validation of vigilante justice and I'm concerned that we'll see more of it in Wisconsin as a consequence.

[Buster's Uncle]

...IF, and it's a mighty big if, what Rittenhouse did was not a crime, it Should Be.  -See also George Zimmerman.

See also OJ - it is Bad For Society to see people getting away with serious crimes (see also the Pig's speech on Nazi Wednesday) in front of God And Everyone, no matter who gets away with killing whom.  (See also crows deaths passing three quarters of a million recently, and the Pig isn't in prison or going to be.  [See also Dick Cheney.])

[Rusty Edge]

It's been stressing me out for many days, but I've made my peace with it. I figure we're done for when we stop respecting the validity of elections and juries.

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm respecting the jury when I don't call for punishing the Murder Kid anyway.

-I do wonder whether it was a state or federal trial, and wonder if whichever it wasn't can't try him now...

[Rusty Edge]

It was local. The only federal charges that might result would come from the firearms aspect.
There's talk of civil suits, but they are aimed more at the local authorities.

[Buster's Uncle]

No way Murder Kid ever had money, so I wish them the joy of that.

-Well, at least that way he never WILL have money...  George Zimmerman says "Hi".

[Rusty Edge]

I'm reaching the contact the dealership phase of car buying.  I'm starting to wonder if the supply won't dictate my choice, but I've procrastinated longer than is prudent.
Wish me luck.

[Rusty Edge]

That was a different experience. I ended up ordering a Toyota Highlander. Probably won't have it until April. Still better than Ford, who said they could have one ordered in up to six months.

The only 2022s I could find that met my criteria were still on the lot because the dealer had $7500 of unadvertised mark-ups that I didn't find out about until I said I wanted to buy it, even though I read all of their fine print. I really hate a bait and switch. They wanted to test drive my car to assess a trade-in value. I had to ask for my keys 3 to go home times before they gave them back. I was contemplating placing a call to 911.

Glad to be done with the process.

[Geo]

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[Rusty Edge]

 I thought that the orthopedic surgery we had for two of our pets in recent years was expensive. Much the same with a new car.

The bills are rolling in for my wife's surgery.  I have reconsidered.  All of them together were less than the list price of her surgery. This is the first major claim against our current health insurance. It remains to be seen what it actually costs us out of pocket.

[Geo]

At my end, there's sofar a lack of (medical) bills coming in. Last Fall I had a scan of the joints in my hands, and sofar no payment slip dropped in my postbox. Similarly, I had to let myself be tested to go abroad (I'm vacationing on the Canary Islands now), but the test center didn't request me to pay on the spot, while usually tests for traveling  purposes should be paid by the client.

[Rusty Edge]

Been a long year.

 As it happened, the Platinum Highlander showed up the end of January, and it's been semi-marvelous. Lots of tech. Much of it I set once and forgot how to do it. I really like the camera system. Great for parking in my garage, which has minimal clearance. My favorite part is being able to cram the back of the car full of stuff, and still be able to see behind me, and to watch the boat to make sure it's not having problems like fishtailing at high speeds or having a tire problem. 

Also great is all of the driver assist tech which watches blind spots, the car ahead of me, etc using a combination of cameras and radar. Speaking of radar, I also like that the navigation system can super-impose a live weather map. I like the power -295 hp and I'm getting overall gas mileage in the low 20s. A big improvement over the 250 hp and 17mpg city/22 highway that my previous station wagon had. Quality control- first new car in my family that didn't have to go back to the dealer for a recall or repair in the first year. Beyond that all of the seams fit and nothing is loose.

The not so great is that 1) the 3rd row seats are a contortion test for adults, not something they could tolerate for even 20-40 minutes. 2) I'd much prefer a lower, stiffer suspension. At 8 inches of ground clearance, it's difficult for my wife to climb in with one bad arm. (we have a stool) Since the styling is boxy, and the suspension is on the soft side, it tends to rock in a cross wind or driving past a truck or being passed by a fast car on the highway.

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As it happens, our health insurance did what we needed to covering all of the costs of my wife's shoulder reconstruction above our deductible. Now, it probably wouldn't be easy for me or a normal person to get everything straightened out, but my wife was a chief accounting officer in her previous life.
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While we were in PA, we had a freezer failure. Must have been a power surge, because the surge protector melted. The appliance survived, the mostly meat, fish, and corn that I'd processed was a total loss. Beyond that, it was a lot of work cleaning it out and getting rid of the smell. Mostly a success, but I suspect there's still some dried blood/fish juice underneath the appliance which smells when the freezer works and makes it warmer. Since it happened at the same time that the hurricane was hitting Floridians, we figured ourselves fortunate not to experience their other hardships, like mold and extended power outages.
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Speaking of power outages, we had one for about 20 hours. Wind storm. Not the 100 mph winds Uno gets annually, but 75mph, and our trees simply aren't used to that. A lot of them went into power lines. In my opinion the utilities don't trim the trees thoroughly enough here, compared to PA, but whatever. I'm thinking it's a climate change foreboding of the new normal. I expect more prolonged power outages until the trees and the utillity companies adjust. Wind blows as hard from a new direction, and we'll have the same problem all over again.

On the bright side, while we were expecting to dump everything that was in the refrigerator (We kept it closed the whole time while they continued to extend the estimates for power restoration.), when I opened the refrigerator freezer door the ice in the bin wasn't melted, it wasn't even wet enough to re-freeze into a lump. When we checked the temp in the refrigerator proper, it was still under 40 degrees, so we kept everything. To be fair, my wife likes our home at 66 degrees, so the temp differential wasn't as great as you might expect, but it's nice to know that our fridge can safely go 20 hours.

On the other hand, we have electric recliners, and my wife was stranded in hers. I was able to upend it so that she could get up and go to the bathroom, then she switched to a manually operated chair and hated it. But what if I weren't there, or my back was out? Call some relatives (although the cell tower was slammed for the entire outage)? Call the fire department? (They were very busy judging by the sirens). Considering an uninterruptable power supply for her corner. I can also see the merit in a solar powered generator. There are one or two homes in the subdivision with natural gas-powered generators. I think that happens when one of the residents gets dependent on medical equipment. We're not there yet.

Enough for now.

[Geo]

On the other hand, we have electric recliners, and my wife was stranded in hers. I was able to upend it so that she could get up and go to the bathroom, then she switched to a manually operated chair and hated it. But what if I weren't there, or my back was out? Call some relatives (although the cell tower was slammed for the entire outage)? Call the fire department? (They were very busy judging by the sirens). Considering an uninterruptable power supply for her corner. I can also see the merit in a solar powered generator. There are one or two homes in the subdivision with natural gas-powered generators. I think that happens when one of the residents gets dependent on medical equipment. We're not there yet.

Enough for now.

A busy year it seems.
Regarding your concerns of an uninterruptable power supply, a couple engineers from one of the universities here started a spin-off company and are busy designing a commercial solar panel that directly collects hydrogen from the air for distribution or local storage. The local storage part seems to be interesting  for your situation.
Mind you, they're expecting their system to be on par with the current type of solar panels pricewise by 2030. But perhaps you only need a really independent energy source by then?

[Rusty Edge]

My wife doesn't feel the urge to spend that money at the moment, but I'm sure that when it happens again her tune will change.

Maybe not so busy as I haven't been keeping up here.