Items of interest

Happy Thursday, friends.  Almost to the weekend!

I don’t have a theme for today’s post, as it’s really a collection of things I’ve seen, read, heard and experienced.  In no particular order….

I saw that Netflix is soon to raise prices for all of their various tiers of service.  Guess one could conclude that they have “won” the streaming wars, as they still stand head and shoulders above the competition.  We’ve had Netflix in the past, and after my wife and I concluded that we really didn’t have a lot of interest in what they offer on their service, we dropped it over a year ago.  We resumed our service for a few weeks to watch the Great British Baking Show (I know, but we both enjoy it) and then dropped it again after that show wrapped up.

For comparison, I’ve been enjoying another free trial of Apple TV+ since the holidays, as that trial came with a generous Apple gift card that was given to me by my son and his family.  First thing we did was watch the fun spy movie sendup Argylle, from the same creative team that brought us the Kingsman films (we like the King’s Man the best of them).  Then out of curiosity I began to watch the dystopian drama Silo, starring Rebecca Ferguson (she appeared in several of the more recent Mission: Impossible films) and a number of other recognizable faces.  Blew through the two seasons that were available and am interested in seeing more.  And then there’s Severance, which I watched the last time we had this service.  Just as intriguing as before.

We also have Amazon Prime Video but find that it has little that interests us that we haven’t already seen.  To be fair, we have a pretty large library of movies that we have curated over the years, with a number of other films on disk (which we seldom watch because it takes some extra steps, and who wants that?).  We get free Disney Plus (with commercials) via our television provider (yes, we still have a “cable” plan) and borrow access to Max from our daughter and her household.  The Pitt, which seems a modernized version of ER, is quite good.

I had the day off from work on Monday, since I had two medical appointments that day, but in addition to that I finalized our tax returns and submitted them.  We’re getting some money back this year, so decided to add a piece of furniture to our living room.  We bought a very nice sectional last year so this will complement that piece quite well.  Should be in the house in about eight weeks.

Some months ago I was issued a Jeep Wagoneer when renting a car.  This happened two or three times, and since that time my wife and I have a little game we play where if we see a GRAND Wagoneer (less common and way more expensive) we let the other know, including where it was spotted and the color.  So we pay attention to cars out in the world.

Have you seen the new Volkswagen bus, which is actually called the VW ID Buzz?  We’d seen the commercials, agreed it was very cute, but yesterday while away on business I saw one in person.  Much smaller than it looks on television, but still cute.  It’s an electric vehicle, so will appeal to a certain segment of the car buying market.

While in another state yesterday I passed a Tesla dealership and saw what appeared to be a line of new Cybertrucks either awaiting delivery or for sale.  Either way, isn’t it interesting that Tesla has experienced some backlash from its CEO’s overt political statements and visible support of our current president?

On this trip I had something happen that I haven’t seen in a while.  I put on the pair of socks I intended for yesterday’s outfit and noticed a small hole right above the heel in one of them.  They found their way into the trash last night.  And then yesterday morning, after my first meeting, I noted that I had apparently caught the forearm of my button-down shirt on something, as I spotted a rip about an inch long in that shirt.  That will also be discarded today.  A shame, but things wear out.

Finally, every state seems to have its share of personal injury lawyers that advertise constantly for cases.  Ever wonder how many of these attorneys never really intended to make personal injury cases their primary focus?  I do.

That’s enough for now.  Hope you have a good day and a good weekend!