5 Thoughts for April 4, 2016

It's been a while since I blogged one of these. Reason: other stuff to do. :D

1. Serendipity: I was (spring) cleaning out stuff when I happened to find a 58mm UV filter. The timing couldn't be better as the 55-300mm lens I got last week uses a 58mm filter but I couldn't find any in my camera bag. Now that's serendipity.
2. Spring Cleaning: It's an annual thing, but moreso this year it's become an important ritual after helping out my bff to support this elderly woman to clear out her things so that she could move down to SF to live near her son-in-law, following the death of her husband last year. While helping pack and move things downstairs and into the U-Haul van, it was obvious that she and her late husband had collected a ton of stuff, and she didn't have the emotional fortitude to let go these old objects and their attached memories. Not me. Most of my memories are stored in pictures, not objects per say. Besides, I do not want to be living in the past.
3. Massive Scandal: An overseas law firm -- Mossack Fonseca -- had its client documents leaked, roughly 2.6TB worth of data. This firm specialized in setting up shell companies to funnel money around. The people who use shell companies, typically do so to avoid paying taxes and to hide their ill-gotten money. Are you a drug lord? Then you're using shell companies. Are you paying bribes and don't want that money traced? Then you're using shell companies. Trust me, this is going to be yuuge, and will likely take down many 1-percenters all around the world, including many current and retired politicians and famous folks.
4. Slightly smaller than large: This is a choice quote from Drumpf, highlighting his hand size insecurities: "You know, my hands are normal. Slightly large, actually. In fact, I buy a slightly smaller than large glove, okay?" Only Drumpf's hands could simultaneously be (a) normal; (b) slightly large; (c) slightly smaller than large. What makes it over the top, is that it illustrates Drumpf's penchant for contradicting himself multiple times in a single thought. For the record, I wear large gloves.
5. Google Wallet: Wallet is pretty much dead. Last week they announced that the GW debit card would stop working, June 30, 2016. Back before they created Android Pay, Google Wallet was amazing: You could pay at the store with your phone or GW debit card, deposit money on a regular basis into your Wallet, pay for things online with your Wallet account, track loyalty cards, and transfer money to other people who also had a Wallet. Now that they've peeled off just about every function of Wallet, it's days appear to be numbered. They say that they'll be adding some new features to it, but really, corporate has killed Wallet and the fluff marketing the program manager(s) is pushing out is the last gasp before Wallet is completely dead. No one had anything that came close to Wallet, not even Apple, but the problem was that they never bothered to advertise and tell everyone about its features. So now we're left with a lame Wallet and a not-entirely-sound Android Pay. Death by a thousand cuts, all self-inflicted.