Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Feb. 28th through Mar. 5th

Welcome to The Moose Pond! The Welcomings posts give the Moose, old and new, a place to visit and share words about the weather, life, the world at large and the small parts of Moosylvania that we each inhabit.

Welcomings will be posted at the start of each week (every Sunday morning). To find the posts, just bookmark this link and Voila! (which is Moose for “I found everyone!!”).

The format is simple: each day, the first moose to arrive on-line will post a comment welcoming the new day and complaining (or bragging!) about their weather. Or mentioning an interesting or thought provoking news item. Or simply checking in.

So … what’s going on in your part of Moosylvania?

NOTE: The comments page will now split off after 20 or so left margin comments with the most recent comments on the current page. To see the older comments, scroll to the bottom of the page and use the link.

41 Comments

  1. Do not miss the John Oliver takedown of Donald Trump. It is recapped here on Vox along with a clip of the show segment. The YouTube is 21 minutes but it was worth the time to get the talking points we will need in November.

    I wish everyone considering supporting Trump would watch it and understand just what they would be buying into.

  2. Good morning, Meese, and happy St. David’s Day! Grab your daffodil and wear it in your lapel as we wait for the election returns. It’s 31 F. on a cloudy morning here in NoVa, going up to 63 F. today. This will be excellent voting weather!

    Still lots of homework to do. Will be back later to say hello. Have a good day, everyone.

      • Thank YOU for letting me post here, Jan! Would it be better to remove “Community” as a category? Dratted post seems to be appearing in two places.

        • I was wondering if we should add a category “Short Stories” or “Fiction” for these sorts of posts. They are certainly well-loved by the Community but they are not check-ins or sad pet stories, for example.

          It is showing in two places because it was added to the Featured Posts category as well!

          • Thanks, Jan, I just removed the “Community” tag because it seemed to interfere with morning check-in.

            If you feel okay with having a fiction category, that would be great. However, if you’d rather not have short stories on a political site, I could just mention once a month during morning check-in that there’s a new short story on my website if people want to have a look. That will be after my new site goes live, which I hope will be this weekend! :)

          • This is our web site and it is political and spiritual and whateverwewantittobe. I hope to write more on a lot of different topics when my time frees up this summer (it will, I swear!).

            Do you prefer “Short Stories” or “Fiction” or “Short Stories – Fiction”? Or do you have a more clever name?

  3. Still way warm for this time of year — no sweater & I’m wearing sandals. But they weather guy said we’ll be turning our heaters back on tonight. Did my bills, got to get on the taxes, I need my refund. And on that happy note, I will turn up the volume on my earworm – Hozier’s Someone New, a bluesy, happy, bouncy song. I challenge you to listen to it & stay still. And the video I linked to is so adorable, it’s a fan-created one, from people all over the world, last year for his 25th birthday.

  4. Our “High” for the day was 61 just after midnight – at 52 now and doing a very slow downward glide to tomorrow’s 31 at dawn. Cloudy but should clear off. Got .75″ rain overnight. Finished off February production with the highest single day since last Sept of 16.4 KWHs and a grand total for the month of 321 – the highest since last April. :)

    Seems my wireless signal has died – AT&T tried to reboot remotely last night (3 times) but it didn’t take so I’ll be leaving work early to meet the AT&T techie and see if he can fix it. Then I can worry about what’s wrong with the computer itself. Hope he can – otherwise I’ll get the results of Super Tuesday tomorrow when I get to work. (If that’s the worst that happens this year, I will rejoice of course.) HUGS to all in Moosylvania.

  5. Good morning, 46 and raining in Bellingham. The first day of new month is always so promising…..lots of time to do what ever needs to be done. Then by about the fifth day reality sets in. Oh well, time for a fresh start, and a new list!

    Ron’s leaving today to spend a few more days with Ryan. His hip is improving, but he’s really behind in school and his mom needs to focus on her work. So a cook, another driver, and homework coach is needed.

  6. Morning all! Very beautiful weather here in north Florida this week – highs in the low 70’s and sunny, just about perfect for the kids on spring break here (probably earlier than in other parts of the country, I guess).

    Lots of great stuff in Lysis’ HNV diary this morning, man it is so nice to have a check in point at GOS. I was very reassured to read Kos’ diary yesterday, thought, summing up the post SC state of the primaries – it does sound like he intends to bring the hammer down once the nominee is decided. I can’t wait to see all the grocery store tabloid headline type anti-Hillary diaries disappear – and some long time Kossacks, like Bob Johnson, may decide to go with them, I guess, but their choice.

    I must try to get some work done today – recording makeup lectures, etc. And I guess I’m going to have to send in the form applying for a PIN from the IRS, as I’ve not heard anything from them in response to my filing the tax identity theft form a month ago. Sigh. Also more paperwork to send to SSA. Retirement is WORK! lol

    I have a raid tonight in WOW and one of my best friends and lead players on our raid team won’t be there, as he and his wife are caucusing in Colorado. I don’t know who they’re supporting – he just says he’ll support any Democrat in the general, and I don’t like to push, although he knows I support Hillary. I just want all this to be over soon so I can talk openly with my on line friends in WOW about how to elect Hillary and beat Trump without worrying about Bernie supporters swarming me.

    Have a great Super Tuesday everyone – I plan to enjoy hanging online in Twitter and elsewhere to check results.

    • I think that people say they will leave the GOS after every slight, some do, some don’t. Some make a big announcement on their way out, some just disappear.

      I am not sure what purpose keeping the bern going would be once the path to the nomination is closed off. kos has always been pretty clear that there will be no 3rd party jonesing on his web site so if they are going to try to drum up support for that, those people won’t be around long.

      There was a huge dropoff in site activity after the 2008 nominating contest ended but I think that was probably because there wasn’t a whole lot more to say: we had our nominee and the deadenders (PUMAs) were told to hit the road.

      Good luck with the IRS!

  7. Home from school – going to eat and then get settled in for a Black Kos stop – then to the live blogs, twitter and election result sites.
    May the best woman win ;)

    • I caught that this afternoon. Ugly.

      We expect that from Republicans, not Democrats.

  8. Good Wednesday Morning Meese.

    Tired from trying to stay awake waiting for primary results. Fell asleep a couple times but did make it through.

    Tweet of the night – imho

    • I stayed up until they called the last two states, way past my bedtime. I am uncomfortable that Sanders seems quite comfortable winning without much minority support. That does not reflect the Democratic Party, and certainly not the Obama coalition, and it makes me itchy because it is how the GOP frontrunner is amassing victories. I was glad to see that Texas’ youth enclave of Austin went for Hillary and also that she won the white vote in that state but don’t expect that to be reported. Headlines screamed “Clinton wins with non-youth, minority vote”. I want to dig into the exit polls in Massachusetts, a state that does not have a lot of minorities and see how she managed to win there.

  9. Good morning, meese! Wednesday …

    It is 8 degrees in Madison on its way up to 30. Partly cloudy skies are in the forecast. Yes, that is 8 as in single digits. We got about 5 inches of snow from the storm and it fell during the middle of the day which helped keep disruption to a minimum.

    The primaries aren’t over but the contest may be. I have a bunch of “Republicans in disarray” stories up in tabs, written now that the Great Establishment Hope Marco Rubio has crashed and burned. You can’t win only Minnesota and find a pathway to victory. Lindsey Graham is now saying he will support Cruz if he has to. See! There is no principle in the Republican Party except to win. They think they can control Ted Cruz because he once ran as a Republican. They are crazy to think that – he runs to the voices of god in his head and his destination is NOT where we want to go.

    Big day at SCOTUS today: the TRAP laws have finally made it to the Supreme Court and they provide a test of the “undue burden” compromise out of Casey; women’s reproductive rights in states run by Republicans hangs in the balance. I wish they would broadcast hearings but I will have to wait for the transcript.

    See all y’alls later!

  10. Good Woden’s Day, Moosekind! It’s sunny and 38 in NoVa this morning, but horribly windy. Hate cold wind, so hope I don’t have to leave the house much today. My TaskRabbit friend is coming at 11, so we’re going to transfer content from the old website to the new. (Guess I’ll go with “website” rather than “Web site,” even though “Web” in this context is short for World Wide Web. Can’t go on swimming against that particular tide.)

    Feeling pumped because Hillary won so many states, but nervous because Trump won a lot as well. Someone suggested “Love Trumps Hate” as a slogan for HRC’s campaign, which is a great sentiment, but which mentions the Trumpet’s name and just serves to keep him in the forefront of people’s minds.

    The local news showed people holding up signs and shouting on the steps of the Supreme Court early this morning. In my younger days I would have been one of those demonstrators but am now too old to cut the mustard. It’ll be interesting to see the opinion that’s handed in down in June—what does everyone here predict, with a 4-4 split? As soon as women get a “right,” it gets taken away. It’s already happened with abortion. I fully expect the right to contraception will be taken away next. We live in a theocracy.

    Time for porridge, so will wish everyone in Moosylvania a good day!

    • I don’t think any Hillary slogan should have Trump’s name in it for the reasons you mentioned. Plus, she is not running against someone as much as she is running against an ideology, the Republican Party’s platform and ideas, and also FOR the things she mentioned in her victory speech last night.

      Here is the speech if you want to listen to it again. The CSPAN one is not embeddable yet so you will have to put up with the ignorant CNN banners.

  11. As expected, Hillary won Texas. Not Travis County (again no surprise). Big surprises locally — no runoff in Sheriff (where there were 4 people running), District Attorney, and my Texas House race — the one with 7 candidates.

    The Texas abortion rights case is being heard at the Supreme Court today. Ugh.

    Earworm is Disappear. I hope women’s right’s don’t disappear thanks to SCOTUS.

    • Well Rats – early returns had her taking Travis County. I though the “Molly Ivins” wing of libruls had triumphed. Still, glad she won the state of my birth – and by a handy margin.

  12. Morning all – I was up very late looking at results, but I woke up early and couldn’t go back to sleep, so bowed to the inevitable. I’ll take a nap later.

    Great night for Hillary, although you wouldn’t really know it from all the attention paid to the Rethug clown show and the Bernie bros’ threats to primary Elizabeth Warren for not endorsing Bernie in Mass, thus, in their minds, losing him the state. I am not sure all the delegates have been awarded yet – the math in Colorado looks weird to me, as the Bloomberg delegate count site I’ve been using to keep track shows Hillary with more CO delegates than Bernie even though he won the vote, supposedly, by double digits. But it looks like she has 544 pledged (not super) delegates to Bernie’s 349, so nearly a 200 delegate lead without supers. March 15 is going to be big.

    The most amazing sight of the night, though, has to be that ‘deer in the headlights’ look on Christie’s face as he stood behind the Drumfpster on stage – the best quip I read about it on twitter said (spoiler alert if you haven’t read or seen The Lord of the Rings): “We’ve seen this Christie-Trump thing before and it ends with Wormtongue shivving Saruman in the back.” lol

    I really can’t wait for Hillary to nail the door shut on Bernie – last night in my raid, we were, as always, all in our voice chat and in a break one of the guys on the team talked about the ‘Harry Potter’ meme, recasting HP with politicians, and he was enthusiastically going on about Bernie as Dumbledore and Hillary as Dolores Umbrage, who of course is one of the most detestable characters in the books. I was really taken aback, as I think of Hillary as Hermione Granger myself. I then basically shut down the conversation based on our rule of no primary talk in guild because it’s divisive, but I really wanted to just lay him out for that. And this is a really good guy, very sweet and caring person – but clearly he and others on the team have bought into the curdled picture of Hillary the Bernie bros have adopted from years of Rovian propaganda against her. I was surprised at how personally hurtful I found it. Oh well, hopefully we can all come together by the end of March.

    Have a great day everyone!

    • Good lord, they are deranged!!

      Bernie bros’ threats to primary Elizabeth Warren for not endorsing Bernie in Mass, thus, in their minds, losing him the state.

      Last year a progressive hero, this year a goat. Another reason to ignore the unintelligent bleatings of the left-of-the-left.

      That Christie with Trump was classic. Let me see if I can find the Vine gif of one of the weirdest moments. I had the TV on (muted!) and he looked so uncomfortable. Someone wondered if he was being held hostage. Ha! Yes, to his own outsized ambitions.

  13. Geordie–

    I was surprised at how personally hurtful I found it.

    Yesterday I was trying to explain to daughter-in-Austin why I feel that criticism against Hillary feels as if it’s directed at me, and at every other woman my age who has been marginalized by society; discriminated against for being female; overlooked; and so on. I’m just four years older than she. To me she represents the lost dreams of my youth. It took me, and probably a lot of other girls, a long time to accept that no matter how bright we were, no matter how hard-working and full of promise, we were second-class citizens and always would be.

    • I often think of Hillary’s NASA letter, getting the reply that “we don’t take girls”. I know I loved space, watched all the launches & stuff….. but I think I absorbed that attitude more so than she did, because it never entered my mind to ask. Just seeing all those white-shirted white men in the control room….. Now, I’m angry for little me, and all the other little girls who got the message “girls can’t do math” “girls can’t be astronauts” “… can’t do sports” “can’t” “can’t” “can’t”

  14. Good morning, 46 and cloudy in Bellingham today. Between family worries and election angst I tossed and turned last night so my thoughts are still sleepy this morning. Fortunately I had laundry to focus on last night…..the image of Christie and Trump on stage together propelled me to even finish the ironing!

    Sue, my twice a month housekeeper, will be here today and her knees are still young so we’ll get a lot done. I really appreciate her assistance.

  15. 28 just after dawn, 47 now, and heading for 60 on another bright, sunny day in Fay., AR. AT&T guy got my wireless back so I was able to get to El Mito’s Hillary live blog last night – stayed up a little later than usual but once I knew she’d won the big ones, I didn’t stay around long enough to see by how much. Jan, thanks for posting Hillary’s speech – the live blog comments indicated she was doing well, but I couldn’t find it to listen to it myself, darn it.

    Got another pile of papers on my desk and the printer in the computer lab is down, so…. I’ll check back when I can. {{{HUGS}}}

  16. Good morning, meese! Thursday …

    It is 22 degrees in Madison on its way up to 36. Cloudy skies are in the forecast.

    Mitt Romney will be making a Big Speech today, adding his voice to the chorus of “please choose someone other than the vulgar talking yam!!” Too late! You have made your bed and you must lie in it. On July 21st, when you pack your bags at the RNC convention hotel and head to the airport, you will look a lot like this guy:

    The president’s team is vetting Supreme Court nominees and serious contender Jane L. Kelly could put some real pressure on Chuck Grassley: she is from Iowa and was confirmed to the 8th Circuit by a vote of 96 to 0 in 2013. At the time, Senator Grassley said this:

    The senator read from a handwritten recommendation letter he had received from a retired judge, David R. Hansen, a Republican appointee he counted as an old friend. Mr. Hansen called Judge Kelly a “forthright woman of high integrity and honest character” and a person of “exceptionally keen intellect.”

    “I congratulate Ms. Kelly on her accomplishments and wish her well in her duties,” Mr. Grassley said at the time. “I am pleased to support her confirmation and urge my colleagues to join me.

    Oops!!

    See all y’all later.

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