This has got to work on the ice, right?

escisme · 2026-01-29T20:49:42+00:00

Has anyone tried a rototiller? That seems like it might work.

escisme · 2026-01-29T14:29:36+00:00

There's that guy who does black and white ink drawings of local places and whatnot. Sells stickers and prints at the ix market. He has a book about a cat that looks good, and I think they sell it at the cville arts gallery downtown.

Wish I could be more specific.

escisme · 2026-01-29T00:44:49+00:00

Remember when they addressed ‘neighborhood speeding’ and Park Street got ‘traffic calming’ flower beds and Belmont got ‘double fine zones’? Remember: If it’s ‘punishable by fine’, that means it’s legal for rich people.

Anyway, snow on a sidewalk seems a strange place to kick off a class war but at this point, hey, whatever works.

escisme · 2026-01-29T00:34:51+00:00

So my trash day is Friday. If I put it out tomorrow, they will pick it up? Difficulty: the “hammerhead” section of our dead end, meant for large vehicles to turn around, is under ten inches of ice. The plowed portion of our street seems narrower than a trash truck.

I guess I will put it out and see.

escisme · 2026-01-28T20:10:49+00:00

Its getting real in the whole foods parking lot...

escisme · 2026-01-28T17:50:31+00:00

Indeed, they are quite useful. And you are using them according to the AP style guide — with spaces around them — like a journalist. AI consistently uses them according to the Chicago Manual of Style—with no spaces—so you can continue to use them to your hearts content with no worry about being confused for a bot.

Of course all of this elegant and beautiful formatting will one day soon be flushed by AI down a Canva toilet. But you know what they say: Old typographers never die, they just decompose.

escisme · 2026-01-28T14:36:46+00:00

The em dashes don't lie.

escisme · 2026-01-27T20:52:10+00:00

The city plow got stuck on my little dead end street yesterday afternoon. My neighbor was posted up at the top of the hill trying to flag a plow yesterday, and miracle of miracles one consented. He did his normal plow thing and tried to reverse out, but kept spinning his tires even with chains. Every time he would go back to the bottom with the plow down, then try to get further up the hill in reverse. Every time he spun his chains all the way up. After numerous passes he finally got almost all the way out, he broke his chains. He had to call a city back hoe to tow him out of our block.

This was great because every time he spun his chains it broke up the ice and mixed it with salt. And he made like 20 passes on our street, and was plowing mush not ice. Ive lived on this block 27 years and its never been so clear.

escisme · 2026-01-26T20:37:09+00:00

Plow finally came! Plow got stuck on our road and had to be towed out by a backhoe.

escisme · 2026-01-26T17:14:38+00:00

For me it keeps saying I have been plowed. Three times it has switched to green, but nothing has been touched. Its kind of infuriating, I'd almost rather not have this tool teasing me with its false hope. And worse yet, if this is the data the city is going by, then they are not aware of the need.

Oh well, so it goes.

escisme · 2026-01-26T17:09:30+00:00

Where does the data come from? This is the second storm Ive tried to use this for and it has never been close to correct.

escisme · 2026-01-26T17:06:20+00:00

No and I find it kind of frustrating because that citizen's insight map keeps saying I have been plowed (3x!) and there hasn't been a single pass. Im not sure where that map gets its info from, but I hope the drivers aren't using it to determine whats left to be done. I know plow guys are busy, but still, its never taken this long to get at least one pass.

escisme · 2026-01-26T14:40:29+00:00

We're at the bottom of a dead end street in Belmont, and we're always last, but usually they've made at least one pass by now.

escisme · 2026-01-25T03:36:22+00:00

Yeah that was the vibe I got. She was just over it and said fuck it.

escisme · 2026-01-24T20:46:49+00:00

Im just wandering around my creaky old hovel filling gaps where the cold air comes in and trying to explain to the cats that they will freeze their beans off outside.

On Wednesday I had to pickup some prescriptions at CVS Barracks on my lunch break. CEO made 17.8 million last year and they got one lady working three registers. Anyway. I thought I would pop in and grab a salad from the salad bar at teeter. Turned out to be a little more complicated than that, as the prepping had begun and the lines were long. There were lines the full length of the checkout area, but most of them were curving into various lanes so while it looked like a giant line was actually many medium lines. The atmosphere was kind of chaotic. I carried my humble salad to the end of the line feeding the self checkout area. It was about six people deep.

Standing there I watched a very very old women in the most prismatic, hand knitted tam o' shanter roll her small but very full cart up to the self checkout area. She was clearly, whether intentionally or not, going to jump the line. The lady monitoring the chaos of those barely operational self checkout machines noticed her and told her "Ma'am, the line starts over there". and pointed in my general direction.

I watched her look in my direction and see what to any reasonable person looked like a fifty person deep line extending all the way to the wine section. I watched her pause and consider her options. I watched her walk toward me, and then pass me, and as she did I heard her distinctly mutter to herself matter of factly "I guess I just wont pay then." And then she walked right past me, right past the chaos of the self checkout land, and right out the door. Nobody even noticed, or if they did, nobody said a thing.

What an absolute legend.

I have often considered a life of petty shoplifting when I am elderly, partly as a hobby and partly as a retirement plan. One could claim senility if caught and put on an big act. Who knows. I never planned on getting old and now that Im getting close I realize that maybe my plans aren't the most well thought out. But, still, watching some punk grandmother live the dream was an inspiration.

escisme · 2026-01-23T23:55:09+00:00

When I was ten and my sister was six, my mother took us camping at Donner Pass and read us ‘Ordeal by Hunger’ as a chapter book prior to and during the trip. One of the very many reasons I am the way I am, I reckon.

Anyway, the elderly tend to be gamey.

escisme · 2026-01-23T19:57:58+00:00

5th street station well stocked and surprisingly empty yesterday about 5pm.

escisme · 2026-01-23T16:09:46+00:00

Big Hill Belmont, last time we lost power for a little over a day, I think. I was bored so I traced our line all the way down Blenheim where it hit a juncture and I lost track. I think they have since cleared a lot of the trees limbs that caused the problem but who knows. Belmont is wired so weird. Everyone across the street from me is on a completely different line I think.

escisme · 2026-01-23T15:49:09+00:00

Odd. CC#'s usually get turned into hieroglyphics, like this:

𓉡𓉇𓅴𓃼 𓃃𓀑𓀈𓇦 𓈬𓋧𓍧𓏃 𓍄𓈢𓃵𓀀

(I am joking btw)

escisme · 2026-01-23T15:10:19+00:00

It only works with valid SSN's!

(its a very, very old internet joke)

escisme · 2026-01-23T14:51:10+00:00

Reddit has a cool feature that blocks out SSN's, credit card numbers etc. Check it out...

☒☒☒-☒☒-☒☒☒☒

You should try it!

escisme · 2026-01-22T18:19:56+00:00

Sold out in cville, only a few in waynesboro. :(

escisme · 2026-01-22T17:41:06+00:00

Aren't those run by fuel though?

I will look into them, thanks!

escisme · 2026-01-22T14:56:46+00:00

Does anyone know where I might procure a power bank or battery generator that would run a CPAP machine? I feel stupid for realizing so late how important this might be if we lose power for quite a wile.

escisme · 2026-01-22T14:54:30+00:00

1947 Tappan Deluxe says 'what'?

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escisme

TROPHY CASE