StarFleet Carl: Blog

It's sad when you've been using a program for a while, and you don't realize you're making a mistake with it. In this case, I was using Libre Office and making my scene breaks using the wrong formatting tool. What's worse is that I've been doing that since Day One, so eventually, I'll go back through and change the other books and repost them. As is, I just sent the first nine chapters in for reposting, and chapters from here on out will have this fixed.

I sincerely and deeply apologize for not ending this chapter in anything that someone normal (which obviously leaves out the Grinning Dick) could consider a cliffhanger. I just checked and even the next chapter ends in a spot that's simply a set-up for the following chapter and not even a cliffhanger. Sorry, I'm not sure what's wrong with me in not doing that.

Of course, depending upon where things end, I'll probably get lots of emails, wailing, and gnashing of teeth at the end of this book. I've actually already figured out that cliffhanger sentence, it's just whether or not that's where Book Four ends isn't currently set in stone at this point.

Enjoy your reading!

Things are progressing nicely in Hutchinson. Real life - well, they're progressing, anyway. I'm now down to a 14 week buffer - Chapter 22 is getting sent out today if I feel like it.

The weather here turned vicious cold. 67 one day, 12 the next. Can you say sinus infection? Absolutely NO temperature at all, just lots of junk, sneezing, and coughing. So I've only been to the office one day this week, barely feel sub-human now. Before you send me all your home remedies (unless they involve alcohol!), I'm married to a nurse and we're better stocked up than some small town pharmacies, it seems like.

Of course, you can't have one without something else, so my wife tripped and fell down, breaking her foot. So she's in a walking cast, with three broken bones and torn ligaments. At least she didn't mess up the knee that she'd just had surgery on earlier this year, so silver linings and all that.

House is progressing nicely, if weather cooperates, tile work and painting will be done this week. Now if we could have more than a 3 week supply of houses for sale, such that my clients that are looking could get an offer accepted (it's getting bad when you offer 10K over and it's NOT the winning offer) so I could start the real estate year off right, that'd be good.

The same inventory crunch is out there on cars, too. My wife's car was on a lease that expired in November, we had to extend it because the new one I ordered in October wasn't going to be in until Christmas. It finally showed up, and we leased the new one. Apparently I'm the first guy that's ever pulled equity out of a car lease. Due to assorted discounts when I got the first leased car, the 'price' was $32K. Lease payoff was $20K, trade value was $29K, so I pulled $4K cash OUT, and still had trade value of $25K. My new lease payment went up $10 a month. Big whoop.

The whole point of that long comment is that if you have a vehicle that you don't necessarily need, right now they're worth a hell of a lot more than you'd think, at least if they're less than 10 years old and under 100K miles. Until the computer chip fiasco gets resolved, it's going to stay that way for a while.

For those of you (us) who drink adult beverages, Chapter 7 is in the queue for Saturday morning. Some light reading for you while you recover from your late night celebrations. Of course, while 50 is the new 40, 9:30 is the new midnight, too.

Remodeling work is progressing well. It'll be totally done well before we can actually write the contract on it. (90-day FHA flip rule.) Now if the new company that bought the place my wife works gets a clue that paying the staff $14 per hour doesn't work when they can make $15 per hour flipping burgers, or $18 at the Amazon warehouse, that'd be great. Note that my wife isn't an hourly worker - she's Director of Nursing, and the number two person in the facility, so she's salary.

I've still got two clients I'm trying to find houses for, but supply and demand still exists. If all you folks would quit fleeing the People's Democratic Republic portions for actual real America for a while, that'd be great. (Except for military veterans - we'll take ALL of you! And your guns - lots of guns.)

Folks, it's a blog and includes my own personal opinions. I can do that, and just because my opinions don't match yours doesn't make me a bad guy. Get over yourselves and quit taking your own political views so seriously!

Chapter 6 is in the queue for Saturday morning. I hope Laz has time to run things for posting, but if not, hey - he's a hard working man and deserves a holiday, too. My wishes for him are a Merry Christmas and a Happy Boxing Day as well. Those also go for my readers, too.

I'm certain there are going to be comments made and I'll get emails because people think I've included what is obviously an insane conspiracy theory. You know what the funny thing is? I've done just as much research to make sure that some of the dialogue and scenes in this chapter and book in general are as completely accurate as possible, while still placing things in an alternate universe. I did the same research as well on Bilderberg, Rothschild, Rockefeller, and Soros. All I can say is this.

Everyone 'knows' UFOs are fake, and just something for Giorgio Tsoukalos to talk about on 'Ancient Aliens.' Laugh at him, love his hair. Except now... Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon. UAP - change the name, and admit they're real. Welcome to official government policy now, because 'The Truth Is Out There,' according to Mulder.

If you do more than about thirty seconds worth of research into the four named groups, families, and individual, including their own press releases, suddenly Alex Jones doesn't sound quite so crazy with his 'wild' conspiracy theories. Is it easy to make them the bad guys? Yeah, because every time someone goes to disprove the theories... they prove them, instead.

By the way, this blog is a bit long, due to various things discussed in Chapter 6. I like to explain the reasoning behind things in Cal's world... and ours.