Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: July 16th through July 22nd

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.


Page 1 of Comments can be found at this link.

  • Page 2 of Comments can be found at this link.

8 Comments

  1. Good morning, Meese! Here in NoVa it’s supposed to be a stormy Saturn’s Day—lots of thundershowers in the afternoon. Right now, before 6 a.m., the sky looks gray. Current temp. is 78 F., going up to 90 F.

    Yesterday I did so many things in the morning that I simply took the afternoon and evening off. Before breakfast I weeded the bean patch, which was quite jungly, and harvested a whole bunch of potatoes. We didn’t plant potatoes this year—all three potato plants are volunteers! After watering the back garden, came in for breakfast, shower, driving Miss Pink Cheeks to art camp, and running to the grocery store. After that I had a badly needed haircut, came home and got dressed properly for an early afternoon social engagement, arriving home at 2:00 for a late lunch and nap. Too much in one day, I thought.

    Today there’s nothing but weight lifting at the gym, a bit more shopping, and catching up on paperwork. We might go to a movie, but since that hasn’t happened in years, I’m not sure it will today.

    Still feeling hammered by the rapid pace of the news and worries about what’s going to happen next with Thing. Too exhausting! Wishing all a good day.

  2. Happy Saturday
    Since I have company – have been away from the puter – just popping in to wave hi – and off to go start fixing breakfast

  3. Good morning, meese! Saturday …

    It is 66 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 81 – heat index of 100. The forecast calls for showers this morning, clouds this afternoon, then thunderstorms tonight. Last night we had waves of storms, heavy rain and strong winds. I don’t have the air conditioning on right now but the outside air is not very nice so it might go on soon.

    Yesterday the Senate Parliamentarian ruled that big chunks of the current BCRAp bill cannot be passed via reconciliation and will need 60 votes – 9 Democrats. Two of the provisions were inserted to take whacks at women’s reproductive rights and, with their removal it appears that the House will not approve if the Senate passes what’s left. Law won’t hurt the wimmins! That apparently is the bridge too far we wondered if we would find. Millions lose coverage, hospitals close, rural health at risk – fine – but they can’t deliver more restrictions on women’s bodies? Kill The Bill!! Sigh.

    The Minneapolis police chief comes under fire – and resigns – when an unarmed white woman is killed by police, sparking outrage. A half-dozen unarmed black men have been killed by police in the Twin Cities area over the past year and Minnesota, and the country, collectively yawns. I am not sure how you get people to care about this crisis. Paying out millions in victim compensation doesn’t make municipalities blink and now there is not even a national support system as the “Justice” Department is no longer interested in enforcing laws protecting the civil rights of citizens of color.

    I will go hunting for the Democratic Party’s Weekly Address and post it later but then I will put my head down and finish projects delayed during a too-busy week.

    See all y’all later!

  4. Slept in, watching Le Tour. Time trial today, then tomorrow in Paris. It’s been exciting — the closest Tour ever, only 29 seconds separate the top 2 guys. Waiting for Joy Reid’s show to start, and later I have a thing with people from the AIDS Ride. And I’m going to the gym this afternoon.

  5. Another request for prayers for my friend John & his wife Beth. She was getting better after the emergency surgery – walking a little & eating. Back in ICU. Please sent them all your good thoughts.

    • {{{another}}} – sending Healing Energy to you, your friend, and his family.

  6. Humid 69 at dawn – opened up and closed up at 8 when I got back from the Farmers Market. Heading for who knows but the heat index hit 108 yesterday and I’d bet on it doing the same today – which means the A/C will probably kick on before noon. sigh. 21.8 KWHs yesterday, m-t-d is 396 at the moment. Hoping to get at least the same today. Peaches, green beans, yellow squash, new potatoes, and an assortment of different colored cherry tomatoes from the Market – so along with my “staple” of organic carrots from the co-op, that’s my “vegetative matter” for the week. LOL

    The hits are still coming as fast as if we were at war, so I’m sticking with my “how to survive during war time” analogies – and strategies – for surviving it. As to the Bcrap or whatever name the Kill Americans First bill ends up being called – it’s a zombie. Don’t let up on the calls, letters, faxes, etc. The minute they think we’re not looking, they’ll ram it through. (They don’t actually have to pay attention to the Parliamentarian if Pence doesn’t want to.)

    SSA call yesterday – once you reach a real human being, SSA has very good customer service – I need to wait until October to file, make my application effective in December for my actual benefits to start in January, and (as Diana said) they don’t care about my final couple of pay checks (vacation pay out, etc) or my TIAA-Cref for the first 12 months. After that the Cref would only be an issue if I did something stupid like draw it all out at once. Since I’m going to use that as my “maintenance/replacement” fund for the house, that shouldn’t be a problem. They will withhold $134 for my Medicare Part B – that would make my “take home” about 60% of my current salary take home. If I have them withhold income taxes as well, it’ll be more like 50%. That’s going to shut down on just about all my charitable and political giving – although I’ll try to manage a few like ACLU and PP – and Heifer and UCS and Nature Conservancy… – you see I have a problem here :) – as well as a few bucks each month to the folks on my urgent community needs list. We shall see what we shall see.

    Need to check in with the Village at DK (been over there already loading in my Community Lynx stuff – which took over half an hour – good thing I’m OK with tepid coffee) but want to see the Fighting Back first. Also need to edit/update my Sharing Saturday diary. Please goddess that list starts getting shorter soon (says the person who just added two more people to it and know of two others who will probably go on it within the next week or so). Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  7. Good morning, 63 and cloudy in Bellingham. To day will be busy but right now everyone is still asleep so my house is blissfully quiet and I’m carefully reading the news. This article is prolly wistful thinking, but I hope someone with a conscience and the power to act reads it.

    James Fallows, at The Atlantic…….

    Everything Now Hinges on Three Republicans in the Senate

    ….With the 52-48 current party lineup in the U.S. Senate, a switch of three votes of conscience is all it would take to have this branch of government fulfill its checks-and-balances function.

    With three votes, a Senate majority could issue subpoenas and compel sworn testimony from Administration officials. It could empower its own thorough investigation, even re-hiring Robert Mueller to lead it. It could compel Donald Trump to release the tax returns about which he is so evidently nervous. It could act as if America in fact possessed a system of rule-of-law, rather than whim-of-one-man.

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