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I'm off for another week of lake visiting tomorrow afternoon Central. Camping with female companionship this time. I expect there to be more sex but less fishing than the last trip. So, mixed bag.

Start picking your interim targets of blame now to avoid the rush. If all else fails, try the ~blame command on IRC.

Mrs Turgid and I went for a holiday in the USA this year. I've never been before, but she has, since she has an aunt who lives in Portland, Oregon.

Since we were going to the USA, I decided that we really must visit the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on the way, so we flew from London to Orlando via Dublin. The most stressful part of the trip was Dublin airport. You have to collect your boarding pass for the second leg of the flight in the airport and they're pretty laid back at the desk in spite of schedules and deadlines. Then you have to go through US immigration. That wouldn't be so bad if you hadn't waited an age to get your boarding pass.

I was lucky and got selected for extra security. Oh boy, did I get security. Luckily the fellow doing it was very jolly and Mrs Turgid remarked that he was now on more intimate terms with me than she was.

The immigration officer was very efficient and being an idiot and tired and flustered I forgot what day I was leaving the USA which did not impress him very much. When going to the USA the immigration officers are mostly interested in how and when you will be leaving the USA. Remember that to make your immigration experience as painless and quick as possible.

On the flight, as we landed I got an interesting earworm, "Living With a Hernia" by Weird Al. The first song on the radio in the taxi on the way from the airport to the hotel in Orlando was "Living In America!" Spooky?

The Kennedy Space Center was the coolest thing I have ever seen and I saw two alligators. We had lunch with an astronaut! That was a very pleasant surprise that Mrs Turgid had arranged. We saw space shuttle Atlantis and we did weep. We also had a long bus tour of the site, including many launch pads. We saw the VAB and pads 39A and 39B. I also noticed a building which said on the side "Home of the X37-B." The tour guide didn't mention that.

After the tours we wandered round until we saw the Saturn V. Now I can die a happy man.

After three nights in Orlando (which was very hot and humid, but with plentiful and cheap food) we went via Atlanta to Portland, Oregon to stay with auntie and her husband. Oregon, and the Pacific Northwest, is beautiful. On the plane we saw Mount Hood, Mt Ranier and Mt St Helens.

Portland is a lovely place, and Oregon is full of Pentiums such as Willamette, Yamhill, Deschutes, you name it. They also make lots of very excellent wine and beer. There are lagers, wheat beers, amber ales, stouts, porters... and they all taste of something good. The food's great too. I made the mistake of ordering side orders in the pub. There was enough to feed a family of four.

We went to the beach at Lincoln City for a few nights. I put my feet in the Pacific Ocean and it was cold (Scotland cold).

On the way back from Lincoln City we stopped at the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum where I saw the Spruce Goose, an SR-71B, X-15, Mercury, Gemini, Apollo 16, V1, V2, Goddard's rocket, all kinds of weird helicopters...

We drove along the Columbia river, went to Timberline Lodge on Mt Hood, went to Multnomah Falls, went into Washington State etc.

Mrs Turgid and I also went to Seattle by train for a couple of nights. I know people like to berate American trains, but by modern British standards they are sheer luxury.

Seattle is pretty cool. We stayed in a hotel near the Space Needle and very close by was a pub called the Teku Tavern which had hundreds of kinds of excellent beers and ciders. We went on a tour about the old town called Beneath the Streets. We also found a really cool shop called Utilikilts which is a gentlemen's outfitters specialising in kilts for the physically active and strident working man. Unfortunately I did not have enough money left to buy a Utilikilt, having just bought a laptop. They don't seem to have invented the Buiness Kilt yet. I think I might send them an email.

We didn't go up the Space Needle, but we went up the Smith Tower, which made me seasick and I had to take a pint of ale to steady my nerves.

There was also a long-haired dude wearing a bandana driving a Pontiac Firebird with the roof off, with tiger skin seat covers and loud music.

Conclusion: American beer is good, American food is not too bad if you choose wisely, the weather's hot, sometimes hot and humid, and no one tried to shoot me. And they went to the Moon, in peace, for all mankind.

As they say in Portland, Oregon, "In our America love wins."

The brilliant motherfuckers over at Ruhr-Universität Bochum in Germany have gotten their science on and done up a paper stating in part that crazy bitches are better in the sack. Thanks a bunch there, folks. Think you could do up a study on whether guys like to look at boobs next?

Another HORRIFIC terror attack in London. Many people dieing. And naturally @SadiqKhan did a "remain calm" statement. Remember "no reason to be alarmed"? What pathetic excuse will he tell Fake News MSM this time?

These animals are CRAZY -- incredibly Wacky -- and must be dealt with through toughness and strength!

This is the same guy that let their alt-left fly that HORRIBLE Blimp. To make me feel VERY UNWELCOME -- and unsafe. Trust me, that one's going to go up like the Hindenburg -- possibly worse. If they keep flying it, it's going to be a disaster. So I said, no reason for me to go to London.

foxnews.com/world/2018/08/14/pedestrians-injured-in-crash-outside-parliament-in-london.html
foxnews.com/world/2018/08/14/latest-police-treat-london-crash-as-terrorist-incident.html
foxnews.com/world/2018/08/14/london-car-ramming-treated-as-terror-incident-police-say-suspect-in-custody.html

This has been...a busy week. I've been transferred to the Madison branch of that bakery I started working for, and have spent the last couple of days preparing; I'm now staying in the absolute cheapest hotel I could find whose reviews contained zero instances of the word "bedbug."

A good friend I've mentioned before, Matt, lives in Madison and has been helping me find a place on short notice here. I haven't seen much of the city but I really, really like it compared to Milwaukee. The public transit is even better if you can believe that, people seem much more laid back, and there's lots of early 20th-century buildings near the Capitol that just exude history. It feels almost nostalgic, like a much smaller, nicer NYC in some ways. It's kind of appropriate we'd end up in the same city again considering we went to college together and, i found out then, grew up within a mile of one another.

Not for the first time I find myself thinking "if I were straight, or even the least little bit bisexual, we'd be married." Alas.

Anyway...what got me here? Bagels.

Now, as a born New Yorker, it makes sense I'd have a sort of innate affinity for bagel dough. The stuff just seems to like me, insofar as something that (I truly hope...) isn't sentient or alive in any way save for a bit of yeast can. First attempt at the dough came out feeling just perfect, and my particular method of putting holes in them--take dowel, punch hole in center of 5 oz. dough round, and more or less goatse it apart to around 2 inches, sorry for the mental image--works better than the "roll out a dough snake and pinch the ends" method.

In particular, the Capitol Square holds a farmer's market every Saturday, and people come from miles around and wait hours for specific products. I am told that my bagels have the potential to be one of them, along with a few of the other products the bakery makes. Despite there being at least 3 or 4 hipster-infested coffee shops within 2 blocks of the Capitol building, one of which has the word "bagels" in the name, apparently no one's thought of selling them at the Farmer's Market, which deserves both those capital letters.

Madison seems waaaaay more health-conscious than Milwaukee, so I'm going to try to get permission to make a whole-wheat version (with a pinch of vital gluten) and maybe some vegan bran muffins. Ground flaxseed and water in 1:3 ratio can replace eggs, 4 Tbsp. mix per egg, if you put a tiny bit more baking powder in. Autumn is coming too, which if this place is as hipsterish as I suspect it is, means we can do pumpkin-spice everything and make a killing.

As much fun as all this is, I'd really rather be doing pharmacology, and will see if I can get floated a loan to go through the UW Madison training program (I, along with 4 of every 5 other contenders, did not get in last time through the employment application process). But for a little while this may be fun, in a hardworking, busy, up at 5:30 AM every day kind of way.

To the people of the Great State of Wisconsin -- today is the big day! Election day.

Scott Walker is a marvelous Governor who has done incredible things for your Great State. He has my complete & total Endorsement! He brought the amazing Foxconn to Wisconsin with its 15,000 Jobs -- and so much more. Vote for Scott in the Republican Primary. Trust me, I don't give these endorsements easily!!!!

People are telling me, Paul Nehlen is running too. But I don't know who he is. They tell me he's a Republican. Running for Paul Ryan's seat in our House. To replace Paul Ryan who, as everyone knows, is retiring. I don't know Paul Nehlen, never met the guy. And I have NO OPINION about him. ZERO opinion. But, you can vote for him if you want to. Or, you can vote for somebody else. Hopefully you'll vote for somebody, whether it's Paul or one of the others. Lot of choices today. A lot of decisions.

This email was submitted into evidence in the Manafort trial yesterday.

Paul Manafort emailed Trump adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner on November 30, 2016 recommending Stephen Calk for the Secretary of the Army. At the same time, Manafort had received the first part of what would be $16 million in loans from Calk's bank, the Federal Savings Bank.

Read the email from Manafort to Trump adviser Jared Kushner submitted into evidence

When you hold a widely publicized ahead of time rally for your cause in DC and less than fifty people show up, your movement not only doesn't exist but is repugnant to the American people. You could get more than fifty people to show up to just do the Thriller dance and go home. Must really butthurt the poor progtards who've been trying like hell to gin up fear of white supremacists.

Very smart move by David Bowdich, Deputy Director of my FBI. He fired Agent Peter Strzok, the Chief Witch Hunter -- finally. The Office of Professional Responsibility said, "oh, demote, oh, suspend." David didn't demote, he didn't suspend. He FIRED! And hopefully he'll fire the Office of Professional Responsibility too. Need to get those Obama people OUT!! And many more -- FBI & DOJ full of bad players. No Accountability!

Former Agent Strzok was in charge of the Crooked Hillary Clinton sham investigation. Which almost cost me the election. It was a total fraud on the American public and should be properly redone.

And Strzok was in charge of the Phoney Russia Witch Hunt. With nobody running it, will it be dropped? It is a total Hoax. Millions of dollars spent -- big waste of Taxpayers Money. 💸 No Obstruction and no collusion, as in never any collusion, ZERO collusion, just my honest opinion, folks!!! 😇

Several days ago, while I was out at my local Sonic picking up a gigantic Oreo Cheesecake Master Shake, my home was invaded by SJW stealth units who sabotaged my computer such that the drive hosting my encrypted /home partition started spitting errors into the syslog that look for all the world like the controller is going out on the drive.

After much panicked backing up of important shat interspersed with downtime to let the drive cool when I started getting errors, I checked my records and found out it was only eight months old. Still under warranty then, even with today's cocktastic two-year manufacturer warranties. Then I thought, you know, the first sata cable I tried when I installed this drive was bad... I should swap cables. And since I'm swapping cables, I might as well switch to an unused sata port on the motherboard. Much less of a pain in the ass than jumping through RMA hoops. That let me finish up all my backing up and twelve hours in still no errors. If it stays copacetic until tomorrow, I'm going to call it good and go back to my regularly scheduled hurting of butts.

Anyway, that's where I've been and why that climate data I promised hasn't been gathered up and posted here yet. Tomorrow will be somewhat busy around Casa de Buzzard with all the standard shat plus some real estate doings but I should be able to get to it by Wednesday at the latest.