No Internet Connection

Possible error messages include “can’t connect to the internet.”

Are other devices able to connect? If not, check network health and status, perhaps power-cycle the modem. If other devices are able to connect and only a computer cannot, there are many troubleshooting steps, as follow.

Ways to get to System Settings: Press the Start button or Windows key and find Settings. Or use the shortcut Windows + I. Or Get to the Action Center by clicking Windows + A and click on the gear icon.

Possible remedies

Check if Airplane Mode is on. This can be done right away in the Action Center (Windows + A).

Toggle Airplane Mode. This can be done right away in the Action Center (Windows + A).

Make sure Wi-Fi is on or available. Go to System Settings > Network & internet. Is Wi-Fi turned on? Does your network show as “connected, secured?” If still an issue, navigate to Settings > Network & internet > Wi-Fi > Manage Known Networks. Forget all known networks. Navigate back to Wi-Fi > Show available networks. Connect to the correct network and enter security key as requested. If still an issue, restart the PC and repeat.

Ways to get to CMD as admin: Search for CMD and click run as admin. Can also be accessed from the Run menu (Windows + R) with cmd typed in, then press CTRL +SHIFT +Enter to run as admin. In each case, PC will request admin privileges.

Run system file checker in the CMD prompt with admin privileges. (SFC /scannow)

Run the following lines from CMD as admin:

netsh winsock reset

netsh int ip reset

netsh advfirewall reset
ipconfig /flushdns

Restart the computer at the end of all commands.

Cactus Is Our Friend

The ’70s hit song one music reviewer described as such: “…so sensual and evocative that it was probably one of the most replayed records of the era and may be responsible for the most pregnancies from a record during the mid-’70s.”

No, it’s not a Prince song. It’s

Maria Muldaur – Midnight At The Oasis

(Reviewer was Matthew Greenwald of AllMusic.)

Facebook Album Challenge

I was challenged by Cliff Bailey to choose 20 albums that greatly influenced my taste in music. One album per day, for 20 consecutive days. No explanations, no reviews, just a cover. Every day I will ask someone else to do the same and share their gems.

Here they are, or the ones that published. Thanks.

The Anti-Abortion Position Is Impossible

The anti-abortion argument is impossible, and we’re seeing this played out in the shambles of its proponents right now. We’ve been calling the post-Roe Republicans the “dog that caught the car” for a reason. Dogs allegedly chase cars, though in my experience, they tend to bark at cyclists, but they allegedly chase cars, and if one dog was to actually catch the car, said dog would not have a plan for the next thing.

That is certainly where the anti-abortion people are now. You see it in the headlines today in a temporarily leaked Supreme Court decision where the court may graciously allow women in Idaho who are dying of sepsis because of a rotting corpse in their womb to have an emergency abortion. This is a contortion of forensics, and there’s a reason for that: The anti-abortion argument is impossible

I have a simpler, and therefore more defendable position on abortion, which was basically tattooed on the forehead of the now-dead Dr. George Tiller, shot to death in his own church in Wichita, Kan., in 2009 because he was an abortion provider who was constantly referred to by a certain bloat-headed Fox “News” host at the time as “the baby killer.” Get it? IT RHYMES. HA HA HA HA and now the world is without another valuable health provider who likely also provided pap smears and mammograms and who knows what other care hundreds of women lost access to when Dr. Tiller was assassinated.

And that’s the point. That’s why the anti-abortinist argument is impossible. It’s why we are seeing these people do abah dabah dabah like Jim Jordan being asked if the talked to Former President Carnage on Jan. 6:

Abortion is healthcare.

That’s what makes the #trustwomen argument so well-defended and why pro-choice, nay, pro-abortion people like me, do not have to do contortions to argue our position, why we don’t have to talk in terms of “exceptions” and limits in terms of weeks or trimesters, and why we don’t have people like Amanda Zurawski filing lawsuits against our position. My position has no exceptions. My position does not factor in trimesters or weeks. My position is that abortion is healthcare, and that like any decision about how to deal with cancer, or measles, or diabetes, how to handle care should be decided among the potentially pregnant person, their family, their doctor, their faith, and their cat. That’s all.

I have a Twitter friend @abortionchat who tells her story to the world, so I don’t think she’ll mind me telling it here. Years ago, she got pregnant and didn’t want to be. Abortion to her didn’t seem to be an option, so she make plans to take her own life, and when I say she made plans, she had a date, a time and a method. Fortunately, friends intervened and convinced her to have the procedure. She did. And she’s still here.

There are no exceptions.

It’s always about the health and life of the mother.

Always. Every time.

This is why publicly the antis are struggling so much with this. Their position is impossible. It flies in the face of the truth: Abortion is healthcare. That’s the truth. But these schmucks will continue to make like Cirque de Soleil to defend a deranged position that is not based in anything but superstition and lies.

Abortion is healthcare. It’s that simple.

David Sanborn

I was up and reeling a bit after work last night and happened to put on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and I was watching and laughing a little, and then it came time for the Late Show Band to play the music into the commercials.

And this happened.

Well, something happened, but I’m not sure I can share it because YouTube may not allow me to. Suffice it to say, the Late Show Band did a classy thing.

There was no announcement, no acknowledgment, Colbert probably didn’t even know they did it after. They just did it, they played a David Sanborn song.

This one.

Bob James & David Sanborn – Maputo

Sanborn died May 12 at age 78. His album Voyeur was one of the first records I ever owned as a teenager. It is a magical amalgam of nice pretty jazz and funky shit, largely due to Sanborn’s ability to make an alto saxophone scream and also due to his partnership with bassist Marcus Miler. There’s also a lovely analog aesthetic to this album that makes me think Memory Man was responsible for much of its sonic energy. This is one of those albums that happened just before studios started discovering digital, much like Diver Down, or like these days when Louis Cole is drumming in some person’s bathroom.

The thing about Sanborn though is that you know him even if you don’t. He played with Albert King and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band when he was a youngster. As the latter arrangement, he played Woodstock. He played on Talking Book. He is the sax on Bowie’s “Young Americans” and on James Taylor’s “How Sweet It Is.” He played with James Brown. He played with Michael Stanley. Jaco Pastorius. Kenny Loggins. Bruce Springsteen. Little Feat. Donny Hathaway. Elton John. Linda Ronstadt. Billy Joel. Steely Dan. Ween. Again, I said WEEN. The Rolling Stones. Toto. That’s like half of it.

He played in the Saturday Night Live band and later sat in with Paul Schaffer and the World’s Most Dangerous Band on Letterman.

Sanborn was so prolific that I think the only person he hasn’t performed music with is me.

I love his music. But I’ve only dipped my toes in. He’s a whole universe of music and now he’s gone, so you go, David Sanborn. You no longer have to wet your reeds. People, go on Spotify and listen to him and good on the Late Show band for a subtle but effective remembrance.

My Day Off

At the start of my new job, I thought it was important for me to have a PC as my daily driver rather than a Mac as most tech calls that come in are on a PC, so I went out and bought one. My dear Mom even helped me out with the cost, thanks Mom. And it has been helpful. Also kind of necessary as my Mac has been beyond support for a few OS versions now. Safe surfing, kids! Keep your OS up-to-date.

But tonight, I decided to be a good little tech support tech supporter and run Windows Updates. This was just a casual click. But it kept running and running and running and wouldn’t find any updates. So I restarted.

This f87king computer, a brand new HP laptop, started running a repair. I think it reverted to a previous restore point, FFS. Then I got on and several apps could not run, especially Google Chrome. Bear in mind, I do tech support on the phone 40 hours a week, and this is my day off. MY DAY OFF.

I uninstalled the current version of Chrome. Then I tried to install it again. It would not install. I flushed every cache I could. I restarted. I ran scannow. I turned off the firewall. I do not run a VPN. I checked every gravity-bound thing I could check and it would not install my favorite browser.

Then I saw something on the download site about running an “offline” installation. When I downloaded it, I noticed it was different from the other iterations. It was a 64-bit version, which, duh, was the version I needed. It installed like a charm.

But golly, Windows. WTF?