Good morning, USA! I’ve got a feeling that today will be a wonderful day.

My internet doesn’t seem to be working. I am typing this post in gedit for the moment, rather than directly into WordPress like I normally do.

I feel rather rested, for once!

Yeah, network completely down, it seems. I wonder if it’s just a computer glitch. When I turned my laptop on, it was really really slow to start firefox. It seems to be really slow about 1 in 20 bootups. I think there is some hard drive maintenance task that could be running. I have run the CLI program, glances a few times when it gets slow, and there are some ubuntu processes that seem to be hogging resources.

I didn’t notice any processes hogging resources this time, but there are a lot of processes to sift through. I might not have seen the process responsible in the sea of processes.

Ok my network just came online. That is some weird shit. I think it was a computer glitch, because my laptop showed that wifi was connected the whole time.

Maybe I have some sort of malware. One of these process cold be the culprit!

I installed Telegram yesterday. Telegram is shipped as a binary executable. When I ran it for the first time, it took about a minute of inactivity before I finally saw the splash screen. When shit takes it’s time, I get suspicious.

My computer is a 12 core beast. It should eat a program like Telegram for breakfast. Telegram engineers probably introduced some sort of startup routine that is as efficient as a Hummer.

Or I’ve got malware.

The thing about running linux is that malware kind of has a free pass. There are antimalware programs for linux, but the ones I’ve seen only scan for windows malware which might be stored on the hard drive.

What I want is a malware scanner that detects based on program behavior. Since Linux viruses are less common than windows variants, identifying specific malware by file signature may be impossible.

I think I should just reinstall my OS if I’m suspicious about malware. That really is the best course of action.

The thing about reinstalling my OS is that there is a significant time toll with that method. Two days is what it usually takes me to get my system backed up, reformatted, reinstalled, and reconfigured.

The process would be a lot easier if I had a surplus of external HDD space. Right now, I’m pretty much maxed out.

So it’s crunch time for Christmas! I have just two days to get Jepurdee ready for my family to play on Christmas Eve. I’ll make it. I just gotta finish up Final Jepurdee.

I’m going to see Star Wars: The rise of Skywalker today. When I heard that title, I was a little confused about how the movie would fit in the series timeline. Didn’t we already see the rise of Skywalker back in Return of the Jedi?

Then I looked at the cover and realized it’s probably not about Luke Skywalker, but a different Skywalker. I don’t know. I figure the less I know about a movie going into it, the better the experience. I always like to set the bar low, so I’m rarely disappointed.

Speaking about good movie experiences… I lost my train of thought. There was another movie I wanted to touch on, but I lost it.

I’ve got an overdue bill. Auto insurance. I don’t think I should be buying Christmas presents at the moment. If I do decide to buy, I have to limit myself to $3 per person. I just picked this number because I have a $50 bill that I was thinking of using for gifts. Really I shouldn’t even use that, because I owe lots of money on credit cards. I should use $1 per person, but that would cut out the gift I’m thinking of getting everyone.

I’m thinking of getting everyone OCHO bars. They’re one of my favorite candy bars. Dark chocolate exterior, with a gooey shredded coconut interior. Kind of like an almond joy, just no almond. And no milk, so it’s a delectable vegan treat!

Oh yeah, I also need to get ingredients for the asian vegan curry I was planning on making on Christmas eve. I’m excited to try that recipe and share it.

I had a dream that Burnerapp support e-mailed me back. Their support staff seems lazy. It’s probably just one dude, the app developer. I need to get my phone number switched on burnerapp so I can log into the app on my new phone. I can’t get rid of my old phone until I can text on my new one.

I’m starting to think I should just do what everyone else does, and use the phone number provided to me by my carrier. That would require updating everyone of my new number again. Also I could just port my number if I wanted to change again.

Now that I own my own phone plan, porting will be a breeze. Before, I would have to jump through hoops, use several middlemen, and fill out forms to accomplish the task.

I hope burnerapp staff reply soon. Until they do, I’m effectively without a means of texting people.

The reason I can’t text people is because I haven’t given anyone my new phone number. I don’t know if I’m going to use the plan I signed up with, so I didn’t want to give a number out which I may end up changing in a month or two.

Instead, I gave people a phone number I reserved for myself via burnerapp. Burnerapp is an app which gives people a second phone number. They have a subscription which auto-renews said phone number.

The problem is that burnerapp is tightly bound to the user’s first phone number. So right now, I can’t even log in because I no longer have my old cell phone number. I’m able to use burnerapp solely because I’m already logged in on my old phone. If I were to log out, I would be locked out of the app.

And the app remains on the wrong phone. Burnerapp support staff have been talking their sweet time getting back to me. I’m talking days. Their tardiness really gives me perspective on other companies who take support to the extreme.

Twilio for example. They take about a day to respond, but when they do, they are on top of it. They will reply once with a proposed solution, and keep replying every day, urging me to respond to let me know if my problem was solved.

That’s how support should be. E-mail support is so low bandwidth. Meaning and intent may be lost in the message. By following up until a definitive conclusion is received, support can be sure that they are doing their job well.

Burnerapp on the other hand, falls into a different spectrum. Where Twilio reaches stellar levels of support, Burnerapp reaches deplorable.

Oh shit, they replied the same day, I just missed it.

Well I take that back then! Burnerapp support is rather decent! Now I feel embarrassed. I have been unnecessarily waiting for days! I wonder how I missed that e-mail!

Overzealous message archiving, probably. “Inbox Zero” sickness.

Apparently burnerapp support staff needs to see an e-mail screenshot from my new provider. This is an issue because Net10’s e-mail was all jacked up. It doesn’t have any information which burnerapp needs.

See how the blue boxes don’t have data in them? The first one is just blan, the second one looks like a variable, ##DATA##, and the third one doesn’t tell anything useful.

Burnerapp needs to see the items ordered and the price. And be able to determine that the e-mail was sent to my e-mail address. That part is satisfied, but not the other parts.

I’m on chat with Net10 now, seeing if I can get a receipt e-mailed to me, since the above welcome e-mail is literally all I got from them.

The start chat button doesn’t show up on Firefox. It does however show up in Vivaldi. I was getting a little nervous that I would have to actually call Net10. I might abandon the burnerapp problem if it means I have to call someone.

Nah, I wouldn’t give up that easily. I do hate calling strangers, but I would do it in order to get my texting app on my new phone.

Wow, Net10 won’t send me an e-mail with a receipt. They won’t even send me an error free welcome e-mail. It’s a good thing I used chat, because I can screenshot and share it!

After that, I just said, “Ok thanks anyway” and just closed out of chat. Maybe I should have taken the survey and rated 0 stars LOL. Nah, after that I just wanted out of there. They should pay me to take a survey.

I take that stance on just about every kind of survey. Compensate me for my time, or forget it.

Same thing with rewards cards. Rewards cards often benefit the providing company more than the customer. I have a rewards card at Maverik. I’m literally just wasting my time with one extra step in the payment process every time I put gas in my tank. All so Maverik can track me and my spending habits.

Fuck that. I’m not even getting a discount. What am I swiping that card for? It’s unclear. I simply quit using it because I don’t see any benefit to me.

Dude, that grinds my gears. Net10 can’t even send a courtesy e-mail. I’m feeling even better about not giving people my phone number. I feel like dumping Net10 now. I’m thinking of dumping burnerapp as well. Phones are so stupid. They’re these walled gardens and totally antiquated, given the internet. I’ve wasted so much time on this new phone.

Yeah, I should have just given people my Net10 number. Then I get texts via signal, I can easily invite people to signal, the phone number is in my ballpark so I can port it out to a different provider if I wish…

Well, at least if I switch phone providers, I won’t have to do another transfer with burnerapp. I can just port the number out of Net10.

I shoulda just bit the bullet and ported my original number. Actually, I don’t like that idea. I like it when I don’t get calls. By telling only the people I want to call me about my new phone number, it cuts off comms from everyone I don’t want to hear from. In this way, it’s a good thing to have a new number!

Ugh, Signal should not be bound to a phone number. I think Signal should be bound to an e-mail address. Ugh. Antiquated systems!

That’s frustrating. Very frustrating.

I’ve been getting a ton of privacy policy update e-mails. A new business quarter must have just started.

You know what business is really exciting? Tesla. SpaceX. I don’t want to get into it. They’re just exciting and that’s all I have to say about that.

I’m feeling meh right now. FRUSTRATED! I wish everyone would use Signal and contact me via Signal. Then I could get the data plan I actually want… A sweet, sweet, grandfathered in Unlimited, unthrottled AT&T plan. YUMNER!

I just about hopped on amazon and bought another AT&T sim card so I could set that up.

I mustn’t! I have no income!

Which reminds me. I can’t buy Christmas presents!

No wait, that’s fucked up. People are going to buy me presents.

Well I should withdraw my consent to participate in gift swapping then.

It’s a little late for that!

I’ll give everyone a Jepurdee lifetime subscription. It’s the thought that counts!

No really, the past several years, I haven’t wanted to participate in the consumer bullshit holiday that is Christmas. But I get dragged into it because, well, tradition.

I gotta buy presents for everyone because I’d feel guilty if I didn’t. That’s such bullshit! I don’t have a single dollar of spending money to put towards this stupid holiday!

BULLSHIT HOLIDAY!

Nah, y’know what? Everyone gets a Jepurdee voucher. That’s what I can afford. I’m not going to go into further debt so someone can have more shit they don’t use in their life.

I’m just in a shitty mood because I’m hungry.

I should go exercise but I don’t know if that’s the best plan. I’m not really sure of anything right now.

I gotta do laundry but I’m afraid that I’ll run into someone. I think D. is home and sometimes he brings guests with him. If there is a guest with him, I might startle them and I don’t want that.

I’m grateful for cyborg badasses and cyber divas with impossibly tight butts. Their inhuman figures are a spectacle to behold and a worldwide treasure.

I’m grateful for free vegan recipies from Liv B on YouTube. I made her potato wedges last night and they delicious beyond belief.

I’m grateful for dried cranberries, which I hardly ever buy, but always give my tastebuds a good time and are the perfect amount of chewy.

Fuck the banks. Long live Bitcoin!