KGB Report

Donate via PayPal

Sorry about this...
(permalink)

Published Saturday, December 07, 2024 @ 4:00 PM EST

Dec 07 2024

Our now-unsupported blogging software is acting up again, making it extremely difficult to automatically post stuff to the site.

As much as it pains me to say this, if you want to keep up to date with my posts, check out my page on Facebook.

I hope to do a serious revamp of the site in the New Year. In the meantime, hope you all have a safe and happy whatever holiday(s) you observe.

Categories: Facebook, KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Work in progress
(permalink)

Published Monday, July 22, 2024 @ 6:00 AM EDT

Jul 22 2024

I wasn't planning on it, but policy changes at some backend support firms kind of forced me into making some major alterations here as well. Thing is, you probably won't notice most of them.

For the first time in a while, all the links on the main page work. One of our vendors implemented some URL modifications that I missed, somehow, which required me to dive into the html code, some of which was almost years old. I think I have everything here on the main and archive pages working. The KGB Database Quotations page is aesthetically a train wreck, but the search function works well and we also added more entries there this weekl.

While I was digging around in the code, I decided to expand the Commentwear side of the enterprise. Right now, it's all t-shirts, but at the time of this writing there are 26 funny, thoughtful, gonzo and other assorted types of tees out there. I'll be adding more every day, and will also feature a "Tee of the Day" for those of you who'd rather stay here on the main page.

More to come; stay tuned.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

A slight delay...
(permalink)

Published Saturday, June 25, 2022 @ 10:58 AM EDT

Jun 25 2022

Some important and can't be delayed maintenance items have arisen, so we're extending our "vacation." We'll be back on Tuesday, July 5.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

A new approach
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, May 03, 2022 @ 5:07 PM EDT

May 03 2022

Some readers have been objecting to looking for my stuff on Facebook or Twitter. I understand... it takes a while to uncontort one's mind after spending any appreciable time there.

So what I'm going to do is publish KGB Report at the end of the day instead of the beginning. It will contain my social media posts and any other observations that I can't post there without violating some unknown "community standards".

The email version will now just contain a notification that the day's page is available and a link to the page. It takes too much effort to reformat the web code into something that's MailChimp compatible.

Let's try this for a while and see how it goes...

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

What's going on?
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, March 29, 2022 @ 3:25 PM EDT

Mar 29 2022

Egads. It's been seven months since I've updated the blog.

I've learned that setting specific dates for the relaunch of the website is an exercise in futility. Something (or, more commonly, a number of things) always comes up to derail my detailed and well-intentioned schedule.

I won't bore you with the details. You can follow my daily postings on Facebook (although that's becoming a more fascistic platform on a daily basis) and Twitter.

As I've mentioned before, the blogging software I use here has been orphaned, and moving to a new platform requires a not insignificant learning curve. Not to mention the problem of somehow porting thousands of posts dating back to April 1, 1999. Having a multi-century blog may be something of an accomplishment, but only if you can maintain it.

See yinz on Twitter and Facebook, and I'll be back here... sometime.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Off the air
(permalink)

Published Wednesday, July 14, 2021 @ 6:29 AM EDT

Jul 14 2021

The latest software update broke some stuff. Should be back in a day or two.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Oops...
(permalink)

Published Monday, June 28, 2021 @ 3:15 PM EDT

Jun 28 2021

Vacation ran over a bit. See you tomorrow.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Touchy, aren't we?
(permalink)

Published Wednesday, May 19, 2021 @ 9:00 AM EDT

May 19 2021

This cartoon, which I posted several years ago, just got me a new 30 day ban on Facebook.

Seems like they're sensitive to satirical comments about social media.

Categories: Facebook, KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Oops
(permalink)

Published Monday, May 10, 2021 @ 8:28 AM EDT

May 10 2021

Thought I was ready to go back to regular daily blog production, but several technical and professional issues have arisen.

The regular schedule should resume in two weeks.

Sorry for the inconvenience. Assuming I manage to stay out of Facebook jail, you can check here for updates.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Florida sheriff tells people moving to state not to "Vote the stupid way you did up north."

Adios Facebook
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, April 20, 2021 @ 12:13 PM EDT

Apr 20 2021

I think I'm done with Facebook. Just got suspended for a week for a post that violates "community standards." Problem is, the item their moronic AI finds offensive was posted six years ago.

I'm still a bit away from updating the software here on the website, but I'm going to post something here daily to stay in practice.

-----

Granddaughter Leanna turns 18 on Friday. She's graduating from Taylor Allderdice High School next month and heading off to Edinboro University in the fall, probably majoring in math and computer science. Here she's taking a break from homeschooling with her beagle/basset rescue, Pepper.

-----

My mother is upset because her home appliances are failing. She bought them when she bought the house, back in the mid-1960s before consumer goods became mostly disposable. She's not upset that she has to purchase replacements; it's just that she'll be 95 this year, and she says she hates buying stuff that will last longer than she will. I'm not so sure... the day after Christmas she went shopping for the half-off Christmas cards she plans on sending next year.

-----

Speaking of the sixties, I went through all this social upheaval back then. I really don't need to experience it again. At least in the sixties we had good music.

-----

I tried to get into this, but I just end up fast-forwarding to see the special effects. I don't find the concept of Superman being unable to deal with his moody teenage twins particularly engaging.

-----

-----

Republicans blame Biden for making millions of Americans' arms hurt.

Categories: Andy Borowitz, Florida, Joe Biden, KGB Blog News, KGB Family, Peter, Paul and Mary, Sixties, Superman

Donate via PayPal

Ping (Update)
(permalink)

Published Sunday, January 31, 2021 @ 5:23 PM EST

Jan 31 2021

I didn't realize how long it had been since posting here. The problem is the blogging software I use is no longer supported and a post takes over an hour to process and upload. Even in a pandemic, who has that kind of time?

Some good news... after WordPress and its ilk took over the blogging software universe, someone realized that static site generators had some major advantages... the reason I adopted static site software in the first place.

Anyway, I'm tasking myself to adopting new software by the end of this quarter. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to integrate the 30+ years of stuff on this site with a new one, so I'll probably just have a "view legacy site" button that will allow access to this body of work.

In the meantime, you can follow KGB Report on Facebook unless I get put in Facebook Jail again- their AI software isn't very good at recognizing satire.

My wife and I managed to get Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine thanks to my son, who can reload web pages must faster than I can and who has infinitely more patience. Of course, there are all the other aspects of advanced age with which to contend, so I keep my physician and pharmacist on speed dial.

A belated happy new year to yinz all... keep in touch.

-----

Well, I didn't make the first quarter deadline, so we'll shoot for quarter two.

Categories: KGB, KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Maybe soon
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, May 05, 2020 @ 8:33 AM EDT

May 05 2020

This social isolation business may mean I'll have the time to migrate to new blogging software. I've found a few static website generators (I'm not a fan of WordPress or other server-side content management systems) and have actually looked at some of them.

Facebook's artificial intelligence-based post scanner doesn't understand concepts like irony or satire. I got banned for three days for posting this photo, which apparently set off alarms when a Nazi flag was detected:

While the number of people the KGB Report Facebook page reaches is not trivial (>10,000), I'm getting really tired of being warned about posting items which "violate Facebook's community standards," the standards being what a piece of brain-dead AI software can comprehend.

Stay tuned.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Day of Reckoning
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, September 25, 2018 @ 4:48 PM EDT

Sep 25 2018

The day I feared has finally happened... our orphaned blogging software has quit functioning reliably.

Moving to another platform isn't trivial... we have over 3,000 posts dating back to 1999. I've researched various software packages, but each one has at least one major deficiency that blocks a successful migration.

In the meantime, I suggest checking KGB Report and my personal account on Facebook for frequent daily updates.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Vacation of sorts
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, July 10, 2018 @ 7:48 AM EDT

Jul 10 2018

Taking a few weeks off to rest and recharge. The ol' energy level's been a bit low lately; perhaps age is catching up with me, but I need an extra hour or two of sleep these days to function.

Perhaps getting the air conditioning replaced and being able to sleep in my own bed in my bedroom again will recharge the batteries.

See you after Labor Day... and keep resisting.

Categories: KGB, KGB Blog News, The Daily KGB Report

Donate via PayPal

Riding the wave
(permalink)

Published Saturday, December 16, 2017 @ 10:37 AM EST

Dec 16 2017

Some ongoing and upcoming developments should permit the return of the web KGB Report in early 2018. Several things have to come together, but so far, it looks promising.

Just because we're not posting here regularly doesn't mean we don't have a daily web presence. Indeed, daily postings on KGB Report's Facebook page generally exceed what our daily output was here, and my personal Facebook page also contains a great deal of eclectic content. (Why two accounts, you ask? I try to keep all the political stuff on KGB Report and off the personal page. I need all the friends I have there...)

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc., etc. See you when this craptastic year 2017 is over.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Countdown continues
(permalink)

Published Tuesday, October 24, 2017 @ 5:25 AM EDT

Oct 24 2017

Four weeks to go until training is complete and KGB Report's web version returns. We may be able to fire things up a bit earlier, but right now time remains tight.

In the meantime, visit KGB Report's Facebook page which will continue to be regularly updated, as well as my personal Facebook page which is also fairly active.

Thanks for your continued support.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Onward and upward
(permalink)

Published Sunday, August 14, 2016 @ 11:24 AM EDT

Aug 14 2016

Unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, I resolved to write a book.
-Edward Gibbon

While waiting for the Social Security to kick in and hoping the intermittent consulting contracts continue, I've decided to take advantage of the self-publishing outfits like Createspace and Kindle Publishing and try to make a buck or two by publishing various unpublished works I've written over the years.

I have no J.K. Rowling-like delusions of grandeur here, but I do think one or two of my projects might be slightly successful.

A few years back I self-published Eff the Ineffable, Scrute the Inscrutable, a collection of quotations I'd gathered over the years. On-demand published through CafePress, I sold a couple each month until, for some reason, CafePress somehow damaged the .pdf file and could not generate new copies of the book.

My new untitled quotations collection will be in e-book form, link-accessible by subject and author, thus eminently more usable than the print-based "Eff". Categorizing each quote is not precisely a trivial effort, and I have to write the software to generate the book in a Kindle-usable format. I also want to add another 2,500 or so quotations to get the total up to a nice, round, marketable 40,000.

So please indulge me should I miss a day or so here on the blog. I'm fairly active here and here on Facebook, where I generally hang out ro maintain the few feeble remaining social contacts I have.

Will keep you all posted. And thanks for your continued support.

Categories: KGB, KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Christmas vacation
(permalink)

Published Wednesday, December 23, 2015 @ 10:21 PM EST

Dec 23 2015

KGB Report will be off the air until January 4. I'm taking an actual vacation break.

Merry CHristmas and Happy New Year!

2016 promises to be interesting...

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

The devil you know
(permalink)

Published Friday, July 17, 2015 @ 8:24 PM EDT

Jul 17 2015

I originally scheduled my FIOS installation for July 13. Then I got an email asking me to reschedule; the customer service person to whom I spoke said my original installation order "dropped out of the system."

I rescheduled for today. I received an email this morning saying the technician would be here between 11:30 am and 2:30 pm. At 2 pm I went online and saw the new scheduled time was between 6:30 and 7:30 pm. Another check at 7 pm... underneath the photo of a smiling lady greeting a Verizon technician with the words "Congratulations-Your FiOS Installation Day Is Here!" was the notice:

We are sorry that we were unable to install your Verizon services. To reschedule your installation appointment for a later date, please select a new date that is convenient for you.

How about never? Is never good for you?

In the five years since I've been back here, Comcast has never been late on a service call. They've screwed things up from time to time, but immediately apologized and gave me credit on my bill to compensate for the inconvenience.

Bah. I don't need another hole drilled into the house, anyway.

Categories: Comcast, KGB Blog News, Verizon

Donate via PayPal

Temporary inconvenience, permanent impermanence
(permalink)

Published Thursday, July 16, 2015 @ 1:57 PM EDT

Jul 16 2015

Fascinating how we can receive high resolution photographs from a 12-watt radio transmitter on a spacecraft 3 billion miles away, receding from us at 75,000 miles per hour, but cable companies can't equalize the volume levels between channels.

Anyway, I'm switching internet service providers tomorrow, a process that should take four hours and begin sometime between 11 am and 2 pm.

This process should involve simply unplugging from one router and plugging into another, but things are never as simple as they should be, and I can't shake this sense of impending doom.

Anyway, we'll be back on the air as soon as possible tomorrow. We're signing off early because the cellar needs to be cleaned so the installation technication doesn't flee in terror or call the board of health.

Stay tuned...

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Oops
(permalink)

Published Thursday, February 12, 2015 @ 10:11 PM EST

Feb 12 2015

A configuration problem rendered the quotations system inoperable for the past day or so. It's been corrected. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal

Here we go again...
(permalink)

Published Wednesday, December 31, 2014 @ 8:11 AM EST

Dec 31 2014

It is not true that life is one damn thing after another- it is one damn thing over and over.
-Edna St. Vincent Millay

KGB Report welcomes you to the Eve of 2015: May this arbitrary, transient point in your solipsistic sense of the space-time continuum delineate the initiation of a series of random events which trend in a manner which you perceive to be favorable.

After two years without missing a single daily post, I'm taking tomorrow off, immediately eliminating the pressure of attempting to attain illusory perfection in 2015. If there's something you can skip tomorrow, I heartily recommend it.

As long as it doesn't involve personal hygiene.

-----

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed, is more important than any other one thing.
-Abraham Lincoln

An optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves.
-Bill Vaughan

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.
-Benjamin Franklin

Before celebrating too much, you should be certain the statute of limitations expires on January 1 and not the date of the original offense.
-Unattributed

Celebrate what you want to see more of.
-Tom Peters

Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past. Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God that it can go.
-Brooks Atkinson

Every New Year is the direct descendant, isn't it, of a long line of proven criminals?
-Ogden Nash

For last year's words belong to last year's language and next year's words await another voice.
-T.S. Eliot

Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account.
-Oscar Wilde

He who breaks a resolution is a weakling; He who makes one is a fool.
-F.M. Knowles

I am resolved to grow fat, and look young till forty.
-John Dryden

I have never heard anything about the resolutions of the apostles, but a good deal about their acts.
-Horace Mann

I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is too much of a daily event for me.
-Anaïs Nin

I think in terms of the day's resolutions, not the year's.
-Henry Moore

Many years ago I resolved never to bother with New Year's resolutions, and I've stuck with it ever since.
-Dave Beard

May all your troubles last as long as your New Year's resolutions.
-Joey Adams

.New Year's Day... now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.
-Mark Twain

New Year's Eve is like every other night; there is no pause in the march of the universe, no breathless moment of silence among created things that the passage of another twelve months may be noted; and yet no man has quite the same thoughts this evening that come with the coming of darkness on other nights.
-Hamilton Wright Mabie

New Year's Eve is like the death of a pet- you know it's going to happen, but somehow you're never really prepared for how truly awful it is.
-John Oliver

New Year's Eve we got five dollars for the evening- but that was from eight to unconscious.
-Sid Caesar

New Year's Eve, where auld acquaintance be forgot. Unless, of course, those tests come back positive.
-Jay Leno

New Year's Resolution: To tolerate fools more gladly, provided this does not encourage them to take up more of my time.
-James Agate

New Years Eve: when the beautiful promise of tomorrow is transformed into the ugly reality of today, and the disgusting miasma of now becomes the rosy nostalgic netherworlds of yesterday.
-J.C. Duffy

Resolutions, like the good, die young.
-Fulton J. Sheen

Resolve to be honest at all events; and if in your own judgment you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer.
-Abraham Lincoln

Resolve to be thyself: and know that he who finds himself, loses his misery.
-Matthew Arnold

Resolve to edge in a little reading every day, if it is but a single sentence. If you gain fifteen minutes a day, it will make itself felt at the end of the year.
-Horace Mann

Resolve, then, that on this very ground, with small flags waving and tinny blasts on tiny trumpets, we shall meet the enemy, and not only may he be ours, he may be us.(From the comic strip Pogo)
-Walt Kelly

The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad.
-Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

The proper behavior all through the holiday season is to be drunk. This drunkenness culminates on New Year's Eve, when you get so drunk you kiss the person you're married to.
-P.J. O'Rourke

Time has no divisions to mark its passage; there is never a thunderstorm to announce the beginning of a new year. It is only we mortals who ring bells and fire off pistols.
-Thomas Mann

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.
-Hal Borland

Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever.
-Mark Twain

Your success and happiness lies in you. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.
-Helen Keller

Youth is when you're allowed to stay up late on New Year's Eve. Middle age is when you're forced to.
-Bill Vaughan

Categories: Holidays, KGB, KGB Blog News, KGB Opinion, Quotes on a topic

Donate via PayPal

Scheduled downtime
(permalink)

Published Sunday, October 12, 2014 @ 6:03 AM EDT

Oct 12 2014

Dreamhost is upgrading our shared web server's operating system tonight at 11 pm EDT and says KGB Report may be unavailable for approximately 30-40 minutes.

Life is full of disappointment.

Categories: KGB Blog News

Donate via PayPal