Tag: lessons learned

$200

That’s how much it cost me to lean about a scam.

Several of my friends learned the same lesson.

See, a friend has an old computer that often fails him on the net. He sent an email to me asking for a favor. Sounded like him so I did it. Bought an Apple Gift Card for him to send to a friend for their birthday.

Was his email address. ‘Sounded’ just like him.

Wasn’t.

His email address was likely spoofed. Maybe hacked. There was enough of him and his style available to analyze and mimic his writing style.

I’m just too damn gullible. Along with several of my friends.

It’s a jungle out there.

6

Mundaz Wandering Political Thoughts

My Inner Cynic cracked their eyes opened and cackled. “Huh.”

“What?” I asked.

“I just thought of something.”

That wasn’t news. The Inner Cynic thinks of something two, three hundred times a day. Yet, here they are, saying it like it was important news.

Honestly, I was annoyed. I’d gone back to an article pointed out by Nan the other day: The Anger Games: Who Voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 Election, and Why. After reading it lightly once, I was reading it again as The Neurons pondered the articles’ points, such as this one.

Our starting point is the hypothesis that prejudice is fueled more by aggressiveness than by submissiveness, and that it is accompanied by the wish for a domineering leader who will punish the “undeserving.” This wish is clearly authoritarian in the original sense, but we give the notion of authoritarianism a fresh spin. In contrast to most of the established theories, we posit that people with authoritarian tendencies follow domineering leaders less for the pleasure of submission than for the pleasure of forcing moral outsiders to submit. Vicarious participation in the domination and punishment of out-groups is a core part of the authoritarian wish to follow a domineering leader. Hence, to activate this wish, leaders must be punitive and intolerant. Authoritarianism is not the wish to follow any and every authority but, rather, the wish to support a strong and determined authority who will “crush evil and take us back to our true path.” Authorities who reject intolerance are anathema, and must be punished themselves.

Yes, I understood that. Trump obviously and clearly sharply embraced the idea. It’s one of his central policy pillars, sharing space with “Love and obey me,” “Don’t trust Democrats,” “Facts are fake news and don’t trust the media,” “Fuck you, I’m getting mine,” and “Violence is peace.”

The inner cynic said, “Well, what if Trump is blustering and threatening those other countries to provoke them back into attacking us?” As The Neurons stewed on this, the Inner Cynic continued, “You keep thinking that Trump hasn’t learned lessons from the history. But that’s on his own. The Heritage Foundation is propping him up and guiding him. They know history. They know how popular George W. Bush became after terrorists attacked the United States on 9/11. His approval ratings shot up overnight. Then almost everyone rolled over to give him (and Dick Cheney) whatever they wanted in the name of patriotism.”

“Yes, and that culminated in those disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

The Inner Cynic chortled. “Yes, and you remember that. You also remember that you were furious when revelations came out later about how the United States was conned into war. You were mad because you saw it coming and predicted it. Then people responded to the revelations with statements like, ‘they fooled us all.'”

“That’s right. They didn’t fool us all. I wasn’t alone in that. I was following Krugman, Olbermann, and other, even Colin Powell, who was against the war before he was for it. That Bush Administration was using information from the intel source known as curveball because he was always lying, for god’s sake. People were acting like brainless zombies.”

“That’s the point, though. How many Americans will remember that crap? You pointed out that the terrorist attacks were a result of failed American policy where we secretly killed people and manipulated others in secret.”

“Again, that wasn’t me, I just — “

“Tut, tut,” my Inner Cynic interrupted. “Let me finish. The point, to finish, is that you think Trump is doing the same thing without realizing what happened before.”

“Right. Because Trump is pretty damn dim.”

“Yes, but the Heritage Foundation folks aren’t. They’re the ones advising, guiding, and goading him. They’re the ones who put stupid, unprincipled people in charge of various departments, people like Noem, Hegseth, Kennedy, Bessent, Miller, Patel, who will do whatever the fuck Trump orders, regardless of law, logic, and precedence.

“There is a reason why there are no guard rails in 47’s Regime. And there’s a reason for the constant chaos and impulsiveness.

“And there’s a reason for his saber rattling.”

Closing their eyes, the Inner Cynic sat back. “And that’s why Trump doesn’t care about falling approval ratings. That’s why he doesn’t give a shit about the laws, the government shutdown, starvation, or inflation. Why he doesn’t care about accountability. He’s going to keep attacking other groups and nations with limited military force until one of them makes the mistake of attacking us back, giving him a firm reason to unleash the full force of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines. And Congress will approve it because the homeland was attacked, and the MAGAts will roar their approval, and all those other low-informed people who don’t pay attention will roar right along with them.”

“I hope you’re wrong,” I answered.

The Inner Cynic smiled. “We’ll see.”

4

Well, It’s Obvious

Daily writing prompt
Share a lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life.
View all responses

I’ve not read others’ posts about lessons they wished they’d learned earlier in life yet. I wouldn’t be surprised if others express the same lesson learned which I learned, a lesson I’ve learned several times. It’s simple: trust yourself. Though I’m not the smartest or wisest individual, I need to trust my intelligence. Though not the most talented, trust my talents. Pay attention to the little voice when it’s trying to encourage me and pay attention when it’s warning me.

Pause, here, to note, I feel naked staking this claim, naked, vulnerable, egotistical, and needy. But I’m swallowing those things to push myself to be honest and open here, to share this so that others can take a lesson from my lesson.

My self-confidence was frequently smothered when I was young. I kept getting bludgeoned by a stepfather who told me I was stupid. He told me that all the time: “You’re stupid. You don’t think.” That recurring process eroded my self-confidence. I started shutting my mouth, retiring to a place to be stupid by myself, becoming a loner. I was and am comfortable as a loner, so that wasn’t that great a change. But my doubt about my potential was really a killer. Since I stayed quiet and didn’t participate in things, I constantly surprised classmates with high test scores, good grades, and accomplishments. When honors came my way later, people were astonished. Then, later, people nicknamed me ‘The Professor’.

Yet, I continued to doubt my skills and abilities. I still do. Everything I attempt requires not one but several pep talks. That usually accompanies procrastination until I build up the courage to make an attempt to myself out, to brace myself to be exposed as an imposter. It also causes me to overtry, which can also end in bad results. In short, like bunches of other people, I’m a headcase.

I have come a long way. Some minor successes have fed that. My wife’s trust in me has fed it, too. So have comments and support from friends and bosses. And teachers; my teachers often saw and cultivated good things in me, and I owe them a doubt too large to ever be fully repaid. I’ve been fortunate in that I have had good friends, good teachers, and good bosses. Despite them, I keep forgetting that lesson about myself. My self-confidence gets smothered again and again. I still hear my stepfather telling me, “You’re stupid.” I do keep learning the lesson that I’m not, but I wish I could keep that lesson in the forefront of my being: trust yourself. You’re not stupid.

You’re better than you imagine yourself to be.

2

It’s Not DIY Without Some WTF

I took on an easy DIY project yesterday. This was a new foyer light.

The new foyer light.

This was my wife’s idea. I thought the old one was fine. We’d installed it shortly after moving in back in 2005. It worked, putting out light and everything. Click on, click off.

My wife said, “We need to update our lights. It’ll make the house look newer.”

Sure, I thought with a mental shrug. I had no reason to buy a new light but had no real reason to oppose buying a new light. They don’t cost much, and the old one will be donated to Habitats for Humanity and re-used.

We went on a light search together, an outing I found tedious and boring. I found this light and offered it as a possibility. “Let me think about it,” she answered, walking away. A little while later found her back at the light. We discussed its pros and cons.

“It’s black,” I said. “With seeded glass.” She’d specified those things. That’s what attracted me to it. I’m a hunter; she established those parameters and that’s what I sought.

“It’s flush mounted,” she said. “Can you install it?”

“Yes.” I was surprised she asked. I’m a budgeteer DIY. There’s little that I don’t think I can do, given time, tools, and video instructions. But the reality is, I’ve installed over a dozen ceiling lights in my life. The first was in Germany, where I shocked myself in an episode which will only die in memory when I pass away. I’ve been a lot more respectful of electricity after that.

So, she was out yesterday — Girl’s Night at the Movies, done at 1 PM because none of them want to drive at night. The feature was Earth Girls Are Easy. With her out, I pursued the new install. Half an hour, I figured.

I’m such a stupid optimist.

After turning off the power to the light (see, lesson learned), I pulled out the ladder and removed the old light with relative ease. So far, so good. But I needed to remove the installation plate as well; the new light and old plate did not match up. No big thing, right? Just two screws.

Here’s where WTF entered the project.

I could not get one screw to turn. At friggin’ all. Different screwdrivers were tried. WTF, over? I mean, I screwed it in. I should be able to screw it back out.

By now, my body was running with enough sweat to fill a bathtub. Repositioning the ladder a few times, I positioned myself to apply max torque. I realized that part of my issue was that the mounting plate was not perfectly aligned with the screw, and that extra pressure was hampering my efforts. So, I wedged that thing around just a little. With the slowness of a MAGAt realizing that Trump lied to them, the screw finally began turning. Of course, it’s a two-inch long screw, a bolt, really. I finally got it out, though.

The rest was as easy as eating pizza. I was just finishing as my wife arrived home.

“How’d it go?” she asked.

“No sweat,” I answered.

We agreed, it looks better than the old one. The photo doesn’t do it justice. It’s a lousy camera phone’s lousy photo. But the change was startling. The other light hung down about half a foot more, so it had more of a ‘presence’. The change to this light opened up the space.

I told her all that. She agreed.

“Now we just have to do the breakfast bar and dining room chandelier,” she said.

I’d installed them. Sure, that was twenty years ago, but I nodded.

“No sweat.”

5

Sunda’s Wandering Political Thoughts

Donald Trump declared “Liberation Day” on April 2, 2025. The phrase was used in conjunction with his ‘retaliatory tariffs’.

It reminds me of George Dubya Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech on the USS Abraham Lincoln. Given on May 1, 2003, six weeks after the U.S. led Iraq invasion, the Bush Administration backpedalled from the speech and the phrase. Dan Bartlett, Dubya’s communications director, said it was the ship’s banner. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld claimed that he edited the speech and removed references to “Mission Accomplished”. Bush later stated in several different interviews that “Mission Accomplished” was a mistake.

History tells that the mission wasn’t accomplished as far as that disastrous war goes.

At the time of the president’s speech, Americans had yet to pay the main costs of the Iraq War. The years immediately following “Mission Accomplished” were the deadliest in the conflict, which has left 4,500 U.S. troops killed and over 32,000 wounded. American taxpayers can expect to pay nearly $3 trillion for the Iraq War through 2050 when factoring the costs of veterans’ care, war-related defense spending increases, and additional interest on the national debt.

On a strategic level, President Bush was even more pollyannaish. He declared that, in deposing Saddam, the U.S. had “removed an ally of al-Qaeda” and prevented terrorist networks from “gain[ing] weapons of mass destruction from the Iraqi regime.” These claims reinforced since-disproven narratives that there was a connection between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden to begin with, or that the Iraqi government had weapons of mass destruction.

The key results of the invasion were two-fold: it empowered Iran to expand its influence in Iraq and across the Middle East by removing a check, and it aided our great power competitors, Russia and China, by distracting us in counterinsurgency operations for decades, delaying modernization programs, and wearing out our all-volunteer force and its strategic assets — such as the B-1 bomber fleet — from overuse.

In the days since that Bush speech, “Misson Accomplished” has often been employed in a mocking fashion. As in, “If you were trying to prove yourself ignorant, mission accomplished.”

As the Bush Admininistration did with the war in Iraq, Trump is using misinformation to convince us this is a great idea. Trump’s tariffs have introduced huge uncertainty. His thinking defies the lessons of history and economic theory. Trump will have you believe that the experts’ opinions that he’s wrong proves that he’s right.

I have doubts. Trump has always claimed to be the greatest. Evidence proves him otherwise. He says he’s a great negotiator. Evidence shows otherwise. He claims to be a brillant businessman. Multiple bankruptcies and failed businesses undermine that claim. Trump has instead proven that he’s an inveterate con man, master of spin, and consummate liar.

I believe that “Liberation Day” will join “Mission Accomplished” as a new mocking label in history. As it happened with “Mission Accomplished”, we’ll see in a few years what “Liberation Day” means to the United States and world.

1

Learnin’ to Walk

Daily writing prompt
How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success?
View all responses

I’m one of those people who believe and practice, you must be willing to take risks and face failure if you want to succeed. The classic example is learning to walk: we all must accept trying to take those first steps and risk falling in order to stay upright and put one foot in front of the other to cross a room and get where we want to go.

In my case, I’ve succeeded many times when I’ve tried. My failures have been as a sales person. I’m talking about goin’ door to door. Selling vacuum cleaners. Knife sets. Cookware. Hey, I was desperate to improve our situation and increase our income.

But I learned that I’m not a person who wants to pressure people into buying things like that. First, the products were overpriced. Second, they weren’t the greatest invention in the world, which was basically the line I was to spin. I didn’t believe it, and I didn’t accept it, and I couldn’t say it. I felt like a hypocrite and a fraud when I did.

I later learned, yes, I can sell things. I’m pretty successful at selling ideas. And I’ve sold tangible products, like coronary angioplasty products. But to succeed in that arena, I had to believe in what I was saying. And to believe, I couldn’t ignore my principles.

Understanding grew from those failures and setbacks. I learned: don’t ignore your principles. And I became known as a dependable person, trustworthy, responsible, reliable. I probably would have learned those lessons without my salesman failures but going through it helped me cement my understanding of who I am, who I’m willing to be, and what I will do to make a dollar.

In the end, I believe I’m a better person because of my failures.

0

Thursday’s Wandering Thoughts

I realized after a conversation last night that I was taught to hold the door for others — man, woman, child, animal; say please and thank you; always put the toilet seat down; and clean up after yourself.

I think about them as I do them, and why I do them. What I like best is that others usually thank me for holding the door, and others often hold the door for me. That’s the kind of place I’d like us to be. At least it’s a start. Then we can build off that.

4

A/C DIY Completed

I finished another DIY project — a repair — yesterday but I made several errors with this one. I’ll go into those. I want to also mention that I stayed overly zealous about throwing circuit breakers, ensuring everything was off, and cautiously touching wires. I won’t dwell on it, but I took constant steps to stay safe and unharmed. I was messing with 240 V a lot of times, and I stayed respectful of that.

Our air conditioning went out. Fortunately, the weather here hasn’t been too hot this year; we’ve yet to break 100 degrees F, and temperatures have been dropping into the upper 50s/low 60s at night. We also haven’t been inundated with wildfire smoke, so the air remains relatively clean, fresh, and healthy. It’s a mighty confluence of good fortune. We’re able to open doors and windows at night and in the morning to air the house out, dropping the inside temperatures to about 72 F. We just need to be aware of wildlife like skunks, raccoons, bears, deer, and cougars in the area, and make sure none of them wander in. Then we close almost all back up for the day, including the blinds, and keep the house cool. This works pretty well; it rarely pops over 82 F in the house, and that feels oddly comfortable. We do have a fan that we’ll kick on if we feel the need.

But one day, my wife said, “Turn on the air,” and I did, and it didn’t. The house blower went on but there was nothing from the condenser or fan. I immediately said, “Capacitor.” It’s gone out twice in the seventeen years we’ve owned the house, which was bought new. I ordered a new one, turned off the circuit breakers, pulled the A/C switch, removed the panel, and replaced the capacitor. All good, right?

No. I inspected the capacitor. Didn’t see any swelling or anything unusual. Wires were all connected. Hmmm.

Continuing on my mistake-strewn path, I powered the unit up and manually pressed the connector’s pull in. Power to the unit. Condenser and fan went on.

Well, damn. A bad connecter then? I ordered a new one and duly installed it. No change. Say what? I’d photographed the wires before swapping the part and poured over them now, ensuring I had them all right and secure. They were. Nuts.

Well, then, it must be the thermostat.

I’d replaced it last year. Maybe I’d done something wrong. I checked all of its wiring. Everything was correctly connected and tight. I replaced the batteries so they were new. No change.

I started searching the net for what the heck was wrong. This is something I should have done in the beginning. Pulling out the multimeter, I checked power at the unit — yep, 240 running into it, no surprise, as it fired before. No low voltage going into the connecter.

Whaaat?

The wires all looked good. Connections were solid, but nothing registered. Nothing. No damage visible. No nests, spiders, or insects. No traces of mice. Huh.

Back at the thermostat, I placed my probes against the red (power) and yellow (cooling) wires. 24 volts.

Then it must be on the furnace control board.

Nuts.

We have a side mounted furnace. It’s up in the attic above the garage. It’s a low, hot space. I dislike going up there and working on the furnace. It means pulling the car out, and using two ladders. One must be climbed to remove the access panel, but that ladder isn’t tall enough for me to safely climb and get up into the space. I must use a second, taller ladder, putting it into the access panel’s open space to climb up into the attic.

The furnace’s control board’s green light was lit but blinking. That’s how it usually is. I removed the access panel with the idea of checking all the wires. Yep, five into the thermostat connections, just as shown on the videos. Second was the fuse. Fuse was great. Next, I was going to check the low voltage power out of the stepdown transformer. As I was approaching that, I noticed a wire not connected to anything.

A yellow wire.

Now, you might think that’s obvious. In hindsight, it is. But there’s a large coil of installed but unused wires up there. That gave me uncertainty; maybe it wasn’t meant to be used.

I was thinking about all I learned but I still had just a nascent understanding of everything. Back down I went to videos. I really enjoy the Word of Advice series on Youtube. He’s patient and thorough.

I watched his video on the control board’s fuse because he was talking in general about the control board and all the wires and their purposes. And he said, “There should be five wires going in for the thermostat and two going out to the outside unit.”

Ding.

I had one going out. The blue one. No yellow one connected.

Power was cut and the connection was made. Success was achieved. The condenser and fan fired up and the house cooled.

Everything was reinstalled, closed up, and powered up. Success, but it was sloppy and haphazard. I should have been methodically testing and studying and not leaping to conclusions without testing. Lesson learned, I hope.

4

Shithead

Have you ever looked back on something that happened and think, “Man, was I a shithead”? Best thing about knowing you were a shithead is that you can fight against letting the inner shithead come out. You know, apply lessons learned, and not be a shithead.

2

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