Random Monday Morning Thoughts

• Decatur ISD's school superintendent resigned on Friday. One thing I've learned in life: I would never want to be a school superintendent or a member of a school board. 
• I thought about this way too long. 
  
• Based upon the other shots, they weren't trying to re-create Anchorman -- just trying to be "wacky news people" who love working on the 4th of July outdoors.
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• You've got to love the Arizona governor getting all high and mighty and withdrawing incentives for Nike's move into a city because of the Betsy Ross Flag controversy only to be out in public at a function a few days later wearing Nikes. 
  
• Last Friday: Seinfeld debuted 30 years ago.  Last Saturday: It was 25th anniversary of  the release of Forrest Gump. And, by the way, the 2010s are over in six months. 
• Keller PD did a bit about Blue Bell, Fox 4 posts this, and people became outraged because the didn't know it was a bit.  (Yet another reason why I'm against cops doing bits on the taxpayer dime.)
  
• The New York U.S. attorney's office indicting Jeffrey Epstein on child sex trafficking between 2002-2008 sure got everyone's attention starting on Saturday night. (You either know about the case or will never care about the case.) Man, the stuff he knows and the people who he could inculpate. Side note: I didn't know Ken Starr was on his defense team when he ran into problems in Miami. 
• Trump about Epstein in 2002:
  
  
• Something I was surprised to see in James Michner's Texas that I'm reading: Texas was given approval by Congress to break into five different states whenever it wants. I knew about it and wrote about it last year, but I acted like I had discovered a golden nugget. Yet, it's thrown out in the book, written in 1985, with an "everyone knows that" feel.  
• The Rangers' Angels' catcher was run over at the plate yesterday. From this angle, it looks like the runner clearly went out of the baseline to go get him (watch his left foot.) This other angle makes me not so sure. 
  
• I tried to diagnosis a water sprinkler system problem where a zone was stuck in the "on" position (and I have no experience in water sprinklers.)  Having some indication (read "youtube told me") that it might be a valve, I looked for the protective box in the ground. The first picture is what the Internet told me it was supposed to look like.  The second is what I finally found and unearthed. Yep, no box. Just completely buried. Spliced wires everywhere. Two different manufacturers of the first two valves I found. And that was the way it was "professionally" installed. 

  

  Not mine.

   

  

  Mine.
• That's kind of like the fast food pics of what it's supposed to look like in the ad vs. what you get. 
• I was able to clean it up a bit more and identify the valve controlling the offending zone, disassemble it, and take a look at the diaphragm which, I'm told, can be the problem.  At this point in the pic below, I was like, "Well, so that's a diaphragm, huh?" I pulled it out, and it looked fine while realizing that I wouldn't know if it didn't look fine.   Did you know you can get a replacement for one of those valves -- the complete thing -- for about $20.00? That's the easiest way to get replacement parts, too -- buy the whole thing. I'll also re-splice those wires to clean up the connections. Oh, and buy a valve box. But Vegas money is rolling in on me calling in someone. 
  
• Stuff I read that sounds incredibly dull yet incredibly bad: For the last full quarter, long term bonds are paying less interest than short term bonds. So what? For the last 50 years, every time that has happened for a quarter - every single time - a recession happened.
• "Britain's ambassador to the U.S. described President Trump as an 'insecure' and 'incompetent' leader of an administration marred by 'vicious infighting' and 'false claims' in a series of leaked diplomatic memos published by the Daily Mail."
• Messenger: Above The Fold.