November musings

  In 2016, my birthday and Election Day were the same day. It started out with Mom, Dad and me going to the polls to vote. I wish I could say that things turned out well, election wise, but that didn't happen. In a show of unprecedented stupidity, we elected Trump to be the next president. This man insulted Mexicans, Muslims, women, the disabled etc. and was rewarded with the highest office in the land. He offered to pay the legal fees of any supporter that attacked people protesting him and selected as his running mate the man responsible for SB 101. For my take on SB 101, look here. His candidacy was endorsed by both the KKK and the NeoNazis. This is the man that's going to be our next president. And to make matters worse, after running what had to be the most divisive campaign in history, Trump has the unmitigated gall to ask everyone to unite with him. But enough of this fucktard.
  Election Day afternoon was spent at Red Lobster indulging in an Ultimate Feast. This dish consists of breaded shrimp, shrimp scampi, crab legs, rice pilaf and a lobster tail. Add to that some mashed potatoes and a warm apple crostada and you have one incredible meal. My birthday movie this year was the latest Marvel movie Dr. Strange. I'm not going to go into detail about the movie because I have no wish to spoil it for anyone that hasn't seen it yet. I do highly recommend seeing this movie though. The Marvel movies and tv shows form an integrated universe where events in one movie or tv episode have ripple effects that turn up in other movies and tv episodes.
  November 29th would've been my brother Scott's 56th birthday. It's hard to believe he's been gone 6 years. I still mourn your loss and wish you were here with us.

Catching Up

  It's been a while since I last made a blog entry so it's time to catch up. In early July, I had finished the first of four rounds of chemo. I felt pretty good and I worked that Fourth of July. Since it was a holiday week, I had the next three days off. Things went downhill very quickly. It turns out that my immune system had been severely compromised by the chemo and I ended up catching pneumonia. An ambulance had to be called and I spent about a week in the ICU.
  GenCon got cancelled. I couldn't risk the possibility that I could get sick again while in Indianapolis. This fucking sucked because I was looking forward to the gaming events I had scheduled. As compensation, I ordered three books from Cubicle 7 for The One Ring rpg; Erebor, Horse Lords of Rohan and Journeys and Maps. I've received the Horse Lords book. The other two will come after they're printed.
  Another item I purchased was a paracord slungshot I saw in a YouTube video. It's referred to incorrectly as a Monkey's Fist. Technically, the monkey's fist is the knot wrapped around the 8 ounce phenolic resin ball that gives the weapon its flail like head. Here's the video. As you can clearly see, it's a nasty weapon. I've had to straighten out a snafu with my FMLA paperwork. Fortunately, things worked out and I'm covered until Sept. 30th. I'm debating whether or not I want to order a Sharpshooter keychain. This device is a form of self defense keychain that allows you to do Kubotan style strikes. In addition, you can deploy a length of paracord that allows you to lash out at your attacker with flail like strikes from your keys. Here's a video.

Undergoing Chemo Again

  Tomorrow will my third of twenty chemo treatments. So far, there's not much to report. None of the side effects have kicked in yet but that's simply a matter of time. My hair will, in all likelihood, start falling out sometime in the next three to six weeks. How much nausea I'll suffer remains to be seen. Each session starts out with me receiving anti-nausea drugs and I have three anti-nausea drugs at home; prochlorperazine, ondansetron and Dexamethasone. The first two I take as needed, the last one I take on the Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays after that week's sessions. It's a five days on, sixteen days off cycle. Four cycles total. I'm going to try to work during the 16 day off periods and I'm still thinking that I'll be able to attend GenCon this year. My oncologist worked out the schedule so that GenCon falls during an off period.

A Couple of New Rants

  A couple of new things have been pissing me off lately. First off is a spoiled, arrogant, elitist little cocktard named Brock Turner. This degenerate spawn of upperclass inbreeding received a six month sentence for raping a young woman at Stanford University.  Where exactly is the justice in that sentence? All this little slap on the wrist is going to do is convince him that money and power will let him pretty much get away with anything. It seemed like too many people, including Judge Aaron Persky and Brock's father are worried about what effect this will have on him and his future and they don't give a flying fuck about the victim.
  Here's the punishment Brock needs for his "20 minutes of action". First, you wind some rusty, shit encrusted razor wire around his genitals and tighten the loop until they're removed completely. The only medical treatment he receives for this is cauterization of the wound to stop any bleeding. Next, he needs to learn that rape is bad by being gang raped on a daily basis for six months. Please note that none of the people raping him will be checked for STDs. After all, why should we show him any consideration? He obviously didn't show any to his victim. In between gang rapes, his ass will be plugged with the classic glass Coca Cola bottle. That way when he's out and about after his sentence he'll be periodically reminded that rape is still bad.
  My second rant concerns the Orlando shooting at the Pulse night club. Like all the other mass shootings that have taken place in this country, this one will result in nothing substantial getting done regarding gun control. Despite a 25 hour sit in by House Democrats, no compromise could be reached regarding the 4 gun bills that came up in the Senate. Why? Here's my theory on this matter. First off, too many Republicans are licking the shit out of Wayne LaPierre's ass crack in order to get NRA campaign cash. Second, Wayne LaPierre is licking the shit out of the ass cracks of his masters, the gun manufacturers. The gun manufacturers want these mass shootings to happen because it's good for business. They want people scared because scared people are more likely to buy guns. They also want to keep drumming home the lie that any form of gun control is just the government's way of eventually confiscating everyone's guns. As long as the gun zealots have their way, nothing will get done.
  While we're on the subject, it should be noted that the Orlando shooting took place at a gay night club. Most, if not all the victims were gay. Have you noticed how Conservatives went out of their way to avoid mentioning this fact? I get the feeling that deep down inside, these bigoted fuckwads were happy that the LGBTQ community was targeted. Most can't admit that openly for fear of repercussions, but they were secretly enjoying what happened. What do you expect from a group that routinely tries to pass laws that discriminate against the LGBTQ community?

Random Bits

  After spending about $1,200.00 on medical bills, I decided to indulge myself a little. First up, on 4/15/16, I placed an order with The Cabil for the latest editions of Hol and Buttery Wholesomeness. I'm still waiting for them to arrive and my email inquiries regarding the status of my order have gone unanswered. If something doesn't happen soon, I'm going to inform PayPal about this order and see if they can get a response. Second up, I've ordered a ballhood on eBay. Since it's a custom order, it will take a while to get here but it will be worth the wait. Now I realize that this wasn't the smartest move. Why order something like this when I have no sex life? It seems pointless and wasteful. Still I want to see what it's like to wear one and I had some extra money.

  A second CT scan has revealed that the lymph node has gotten bigger. This is both good and bad news. It's bad because it means whatever caused it to enlarge is still present. It's good because the doctor feels that they can retry the ultrasound technique that failed last time they tried to biopsy it. I'll be undergoing said procedure on 5/31/16. My biggest fear is that the biopsy will reveal that I have another form of cancer and I'll have to undergo more chemotherapy.
  Plans for this year's GenCon are progressing. The hotel room has been reserved and event tickets purchased. Despite my planning, things didn't work out as I'd hoped they would. I had to wait almost 4 hours before I could make my hotel reservation. As a result, I'm several miles outside the convention area and I'll have to drive to it everyday and pay for parking. It's either that or find a bus or shuttle service to and from the area. When it came time to register for events, I logged onto my account before registration went live, picked 7 events that I wanted to play and put them on my wish list. The second registration went live, I submitted my wish list for processing. The problem was I ended up 5,744th in line for processing. 5 of the 7 events filled up before my list was processed. I couldn't add any replacement events until my list was processed and then I had to get back in line. When all was said and done, I ended up with 4 events, Wraith, Doctor Who, The One Ring and Luchador. I've been paying on my credit card bill and I want to eventually shift some money to my Serve and Simple card accounts so I'll have some spending money for the convention.

Murder Gun for Sale

George Zimmerman is back in the news again. This time, he's trying to sell the gun he used to murder  Trayvon Martin. He's like a malignant hemorrhoid on the ass of society and no amount of Prepation H can rid us of his presence. He thinks that murdering an unarmed 17 year old kid makes him some kind of American icon. This miserable prick and his deluded followers are part of the reason why no meaningful gun legislation ever gets passed. Right wing fucktards like Geraldo Rivera would rather ban wearing hoodies than deal with the gun problem in this country. Gun zealots in the NRA and other organizations oppose a variety of laws that would help keep guns out if the hands of criminals. Straw purchases, which are illegal, still happen with astonishing regularity. They also oppose the use of smart guns which use biometrics to render the gun useless to anyone except the registered owner. They even oppose letting the CDC do research on gun violence. They feel that something like this will eventually lead to the government confiscating their guns. Of course, they feel that any attempt to regulate firearms is an attempt to confiscate their guns.
  I think the main reason why the gun zealots are so opposed to keeping guns out of the hands of criminals is that it would ruin their chances of fulfilling their Dirty Harry fantasies. These are the fantasies they have while they're sitting in their bunkers, surrounded by weapons, desperately rubbing  the grips of their pistols against their cocks while reading Guns & Ammo. They want to be the hero in a big old fashioned Western style shootout.

The Encryption Debate

  As most of you know by now, an outside party has shown the FBI how to crack Syed Farook's iPhone 5c without Apple's help. The FBI claims that this crack will only work on the iPhone 5c but one has to wonder whether this is true or not. Now just because the FBI has dropped its case against Apple in this instance doesn't mean that the battle over encryption will be ending anytime soon.
  Senators Richard Burr and Dianne Feinstein have proposed legislation that would give federal judges clearer authority to order technology companies to help law enforcement crack encrypted data. So far, the White House isn't backing this legislation. There are many reasons why backdoor mandates are a bad idea. A list of some of those reasons can be found here.
  The federal government has tried to create an encryption device with a built in backdoor when it created the Clipper chip. As the Wikipedia article details, the Clipper chip was a massive failure. The Clipper used a key escrow system in which a copy of the cryptographic key would be held by the government. Information about key disclosure law can be found here.
  Given all the information stored on peoples' smartphones, encrypting them should be a no brainer. In fact, all iPhones, iPads and iPods running iOS 8 or greater are encrypted by default. Sadly the same can't be said about Android devices. It's estimated that roughly 10% of the world's 1.4 billion Android phones are encrypted. Compare that to the 95% encryption rate of iPhones. This is a sad state of affairs. The problem stems from the fact that many smartphone manufacturers use Android's source code and tweak it to suit their needs. It's this lack of uniformity that's the biggest of Google's problems when it comes to security. There's way too many companies involved in the process. This article details the problems Google has implementing security updates.
  Both my Android phone and the SD card installed in it are encrypted. The same goes for my Mom's phone. If you own an Android phone, you should seriously consider encrypting it and any memory cards that are in it. I'm ending this blog post with a clip from Last Week Tonight with John Oliver regarding both the FBI vs. Apple showdown and encryption. Enjoy.

The Only Guarantee in Life

  Life doesn't guarantee you health. It doesn't guarantee you wealth. It doesn't guarantee you happiness or sadness. Life guarantees one thing and one thing only, death. That's it. Deal with it.

Apple vs. the FBI

  There has been an ongoing court battle between Apple and the FBI regarding San Bernadino shooter, Syed Rizwan Farook's iPhone. The FBI wants access to the iPhone's contents but can't get it due to the encryption software embedded in the iOS. Ten wrong password entries and the contents of the phone will be erased. Thus the FBI has been pressuring Apple to create a workaround or backdoor in order to bypass the iPhone's security features. Apple refuses to do this because they say it would compromise the security of their customers' iPhones and iPads. The FBI has also threatened to compel Apple to hand over its iOS source code and signature so they can create their own security compromised iOS software.
  I agree with Apple on this issue. The government has demonstrated an almost obsessive desire to collect information and they hate any form of encryption they can't crack like PGP (Pretty Good Privacy). A recent Journal Times article cites examples of how the government, when granted extended powers, can quickly use those powers to trample upon our basic rights. The government wants the inch so they can eventually take the mile.

News Bits

  The right radical orchiectomy went well. The incisions are healing and there has been little in the way of pain. I have to set up an appointment with Dr. Matkov so he can tell me what was wrong with my right testicle. Update: My oncologist, Dr. Jefferies, gave me the orchiectomy results this past Tuesday. It's official, I had stage 1 seminoma (testicular cancer). Since it was confined to my right testicle, it's pretty much gone. My tumor markers are going to have to monitored every three months to make sure there's no recurrence. This fucking sucks. I undergo a colectomy and chemotherapy in order to rid myself of colon cancer only to end up with seminoma. Then I undergo an orchiectomy to get rid of the seminoma. The enlarged lymph node has yet to be analyzed. For all I know, a third form of cancer is fucking up some other part of my body.

  My erectile dysfunction appears to have worsened. I no longer get anything even approaching a decent erection anymore. I'm less of a man now than I've ever been. Not that I've ever been much of a man even when my penis worked and I had two functioning testicles. Women ignored me then. They have even more reason to ignore me now.

  My life has been little more than a shining example of mediocrity. I've made little, if any, impact on anything. Nothing I've done has amounted to anything significant. I used to think that I was smart and that said intellect would land me a decent job and lead to a decent life. I couldn't have been more wrong. Despite having health insurance and living with my parents, I'm barely making ends meet. One major financial crisis and I'm screwed. I have virtually no social life. The only time I usually see my friends is when we get together for gaming. And dating is out of the question. No woman wants what I have to offer. While any one particular flaw might not be enough to scare them away, all of them together will easily do the trick. The total, in this case, is far greater than the sum of the parts.

  That being the case, it means that the later years of my life are going to be lonely ones. After Mom and Dad die, I'll probably have to sell the house. Since I'm their executor, I'll be the one settling their estate. Jeff and I are the primary beneficiaries for now. With them gone, it will just be me. 

More Health News

  The Jan.19th biopsy attempt was a failure. There were too many organs and blood vessels in the way for them to use a needle to obtain a sample via my throat. I have a consultation with Dr. Needle, who performed my colectomy, on Feb. 9th to determine the next course of action.
  I had a consultation today with Dr. Matkov, a urologist, regarding the ultrasound of my scrotum. The end result is I'm having a right radical orchiectomy on Feb. 12th. In layman's terms, my right testicle is being removed because it's enlarged, unusually firm and covered with nodules. Once it's gone, I'll hopefully find out how it wound up that way. I don't believe I have testicular cancer but it's in the realm of possibility.
  All this, of course, could lead to more medical bills. I already have another $1,300.00 added from the PET and CT scans. Despite this setback, I still believe that I can put enough money aside for Gen Con.

The PET Scan Results Show

  The results of the PET scan were inconclusive. The only anomaly detected was a solitary lymph node in my chest near the heart. From what my oncologist says, it doesn't look like the return of colon cancer. Colon cancer would have affected more than one lymph node and those nodes would be located in the abdomen not the chest cavity. A biopsy has been scheduled for Jan. 19th. The biopsy results should provide the answer as to what's inflaming the node.

  One other oddity was revealed by the scan. It seems that my right testicle is larger and firmer than my left testicle. I was aware of this particular issue for quite some time but didn't address it because, other than the size difference, nothing unusual was occurring there. An ultrasound has been scheduled  on Jan. 26th in order to determine what's going on down there. I'm not entirely sure what to expect when I get the results.