Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Feb. 4th through Feb. 10th

February 3, 2018 JanF Community 107

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?

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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.

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– Page One of Comments are HERE!
 

  • Page Two of Comments are HERE!
     

 

36 Comments

  1. Good “morning”, Motley Meese! The week begins …

    Morning low of 12 degrees in Madison WI with an expected daytime high of 14. Flurries are in the forecast.

    Have a great day, all y’alls!!

  2. Good Sunday Meese
    28 degrees here in Saugerties NY and we have snow and sleet predicted
    Hubby is still knocked out from the flu – I’m sleeping in my office trying to stay away from him. He has the dogs for company.

    Speaking of dogs – two puppies from PR are in the spotlight

    Bad news

    Carmen Cruz

    Will be celebrating Black History Month today at DKos – with a post of the Puerto Rican ‘Father of Black History’

  4. Good morning, Meese. Are we up too early again? It’s just on 6 a.m. here. We’re expecting some very nasty wintry mix this morning, which will turn to rain later. Current temp. in NoVa is 33 F., going up to 38 F.

    Denise, sorry your husband is down with that awful ‘flu. Hope he will recover quickly.

    We’re going out to breakfast, then—it’s to be hoped—settling down at home while we wait for the wintry mix to turn to rain. Elder Son is hosting a Super Bore party tonight, so we’ll be going to that.

    Don’t want to think about the news today. Hope all is well at the Pond and Beyond.

    • I turn off my alarm clock for Sunday mornings and try to sleep in. Today it worked! I did not get up until 6am which is remarkable for me. I have been feeling a disturbance in the force for a couple of weeks now and have been waking up at 2am and 3am. I am hoping the extra sleep makes me less snoozy during the day.

      We got less than an inch of snow yesterday but had more overnight, probably about 3 or 4 inches. The windchill is -4 but the deep freeze does not come until tonight starting at 10pm.

      I have not clicked on any news tabs yet. I am still enjoying the Twitter rebuke of grannykiller Paul Ryan who was bragging about how his tax cut trickled down to a secretary at a school in Pennsylvania who said that the extra $1.50 a week she is getting will pay for her Costco membership. It answered the question: “what tweet would be so embarrassing that a man who literally wants to kill the poors because they “use up” money that should be left in the hands of the wealthy would delete it?” That one!

      tRump was trying to make the case that the Nunes Memo showed that Mueller should be fired. I am not sure who he is talking to anymore. The Fox News viewers is already on his side and the rest of the country believes overwhelmingly – at least right now – that the investigation should run its course. The memo was confusing to the lay person who had been expecting a smoking gun and found there was not much there there. I guess if the fact that a person in Trump’s campaign was being wiretapped (and had been under surveillance since 2013 which is probably the part that the FBI did not really want blathered) is evidence of FBI chicanery, then there is a case. Meh.

  5. I never did get warm yesterday, I didn’t visit my friend because I feared I was relapsing on the flu. I managed to stay awake till 9, slept till nearly 7 so there was definitely something going on. My friend has set up a visiting schedule, I signed up for Tuesday afternoon, to give me enough time to see if it is a relapse. Just taking it as it comes.

  7. Good morning, 50 and raining in Bellingham. The sky, horizon and water are all shades of gray, making the contrast of the green moss, blooming hellebore, and the red branches of the dogwood even more striking. In the summer my flower containers are the focus, but in winter my eyes rest on intermingling texture of leaf and branch colors. Winter pansies and primroses are in the garden shops now so it’s nearly time to add more color to the empty pots.

    I did finish sewing the dog bed cover, but I need to fix a few oopsies. I haven’t sewn a boxed cushion cover for quite some time so my technique is rusty. Oh well, at least I can still remember how to fix my sloppy corners!

    Best Sunday wishes to all.

  8. 36 feels like 30 and I’m waiting for the washing machine to finish – I’m debating with myself about hanging the sheets out – it was sunny when I started the laundry but it’s clouded up again. Sigh. I’m hanging everything but the sheets in front of the fire anyway, but the sheets take up so very much room that it’s nice to have them elsewhere if possible. Besides, I like the feel and smell of sheets that have been dried outside. (Except in pollen season.)

    Evil Ones being evil – whether it’s Lyin’ Ryan bragging about how little the tax scam gives to working folks (teachers for goddess’ sake should not come under the heading of “working poor” but unfortunately do depending on where they are teaching) or the criminal neglect of Puerto Rico or any of the rest of the “killing the goose/gov’t that laid the golden eggs attitude of the Rs in Congress – nothing new. They’ve been working on this since Nixon. We’ve managed to block them from pushing us over the cliff til now – we shall see if we manage to continue doing so until we get enough power to push us away from the edge.

    Need to deal with clothes. I’ll check back later. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  9. I can’t find anything on the status of the DACA vote other than something that suggested that there will be a vote Tuesday to extend the Continuing Resolution to March 31st, I think.

    What the hell happened to the DREAMer vote and the March 5th deadline and caring about these 690,000 people whose lives will be ruined when the thugs from ICE start rounding them up? I read this discouraging post from Erik Loomis putting it in perspective. The map says it all:

    When the Democrats took the deal on CHIP to end the shutdown almost immediately, I said it was a good deal and might be smart politics. Theoretically, I still agree with that. It could have been smart politics to take the short-term deal and ratchet up attention on immigration to prepare for the end of the upcoming government funding into a second shutdown where the Republicans couldn’t hold them hostage over children’s health insurance.

    But I was wrong in understanding the Democratic strategy. Senate Democrats have basically caved entirely. There is zero stomach for second shutdown. No matter what, that is not happening. Immigration advocates are furious and they have every right to be. Chuck Schumer’s comment that he can’t let this be the singular issue because he has to keep the focus on the middle class was insensitive at best and bad politics for sure.

    But I’m not entirely sure what choice he has.

    Other than Texas – a state that officially sanctions racism – the states that have the most on the line with DACA deportations are blue or purple states. And the states with endangered Democratic Senators (Machin and Heitkamp) have very little skin in the “game”. Jeff Flake and John McCain and Marco Rubio should care but they are party over country and won’t step up for their constituents.

    That was not the first time that Schumer made his tone deaf “what about the middle class?” comment. He was angry that Democrats passed the ACA and spent their political capital on that instead of somethingsomething middle class. Well, fk him. The ACA saved lives – lots of lives – and kept countless families from medical bankruptcy. I wish we had leaders with more heart. Nancy Pelosi has a fair amount of wealth but has never to my knowledge said that the concerns of the poor and the homeless and the hungry and the sick and the oppressed should come be secondary to political concerns. You don’t bargain away people’s lives chasing the white middle-class voter, you work to convince the white middle-class voter that caring about those less well off is important.

    I am sick about what the berners and their blasted purity did to our country and those kids.

  10. Monday Meese
    34 degrees here in Saugerties – going down to 32.
    Hubby still abed with flu. I fell asleep early – woke up to see twitter posts on stupid football rioting in Philly.

    Black History Month birthday today is for a classy guy – Hank Aaron – who faced and extraordinary amount of racism with a smile and dignity


    .

    • Trump takes every opportunity to wear the troops, any troops, as a shield against criticism of his terrible policies and beliefs. His Super Bowl proclamation made it sound like the only reason we have the Super Bowl is to honor the military! It is not surprising that he would try to tie Black History Month to his “brand”.

      I am still not sure if he truly believes that he can win over black voters or if he is using it to signal to the handful of Republicans who are still a little uncomfortable with white supremacy, that he is not racist.

      • I doubt he truly believes he can win over black voters – however I do think he wants to cast himself as anti-racist to some – while whipping up racism in others.
        Ugh.
        His Obama obsession isn’t about Obama specifically – he can’t stand the idea that a black man is better than he is, smarter than he is – etc.

  11. Good morning, meeses! Monday …

    It is -6 in Madison with an expected daytime high of 14. Flurries this morning and light snow this afternoon.

    I watched the Super Bowl because I had been enjoying the play of the Eagles in the postseason and because I wanted to watch the Evil Empire get its comeuppance. I was rewarded on both counts – it was a fun game and Tom “MAGA” Brady lost. I like to think that is a metaphor for 2018 – the universe will deal the Orange Orshole losses in every aspect of his life. I was a bit taken aback to hear the coach of the Eagles, Doug Pederson, give credit to “his Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ”. I wonder if he has Muslim players on his team who might prefer that “hard work and determination” get some of the credit instead of a religious figure.

    I hope that Dodge never again plays that ad that used a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr (“The Drum Major Instinct”) to sell trucks. From what I was reading on Twitter, his son, Dexter – after a bloody legal battle with Bernice King and the King Center – owns the rights to Dr. King’s words and they licensed them to Dodge (saying it honored Dr. King). But really, just because you can use someone’s words does not mean that you should use them. I wonder if the foreign owners of Dodge, Fiat, don’t get that.

    Busy day here. I pushed out some updates out to clients and now I have to hold my breath that everything goes well. There were reports of an update made by Intel to some of their processors to patch an exploit called Spectre may be causing operating systems to crash. Wonderful! Microsoft issued an out-of-band patch which I have ready to apply in the event that my clients’ computers are using that particular processor. Unfortunately, I can’t leave their computers unpatched for other risks until everything is sorted out. Fingers crossed!

    See all y’all later!

    • Ha! I know this is tongue in cheek by Ben Rhodes, one of President Obama’s advisors in the State Department, but it supports my theory!

  12. Cold enough for a jacket & gloves this morning. Got to leave early to pick up my bike from getting its tune up. People here are happy about the football game because the quarterback is from Austin. Eating oatmeal, drinking tea, trying to get brain in gear.

  13. Good morning, Meese! Sunny in NoVa this morning with a bitterly cold, nasty wind. Current temp. is 34 F. and apparently it’s going to stay that way all day. Yesterday we had snow flurries that turned into heavy rain from morning until night. Just as well, because we’re in drought mode in our area.

    Like the late Ava Gardner, who said, “Deep down, I’m really pretty shallow,” I favor Tom Brady for his looks. However, a Patriots loss had to happen some time, and I was very pleased the Eagles won. Couldn’t really pay much attention to the game because the children were making so much noise. They ran round and round Elder Son’s house: first, Miss Pink Cheeks, aged 9, followed by her brother Mr. Preschooler, aged 3 and a half, and then Mr. Toddler, aged 2 and a half. It was like the Pied Piper and the Three Bears, rolled into one!

    Another busy day in the offing. Will today finally be the day I do the taxes? Things keep interrupting. I smell coffee, so will go downstairs to cook breakfast. Wishing all a good day!

  14. 15 heading for 43 and at the moment bright and sunny. Hope it stays that way. It didn’t yesterday and we only got 5.7 KWHs (which would have been great in Dec but not Feb) and the m-t-d is right on 34 with this morning’s thus far driblet.

    Heaven only knows what the next bit of R-crap will be. I know everybody was saying the dud memo was to distract from the Russian investigation but I doubt it. That is going on and will go one no matter what. I think it did a quite successful job of getting everybody’s attention off the lack of budget, proposal for another CR, no progress on DACA, and the looming debt ceiling crisis that’s coming up sooner due to the tax scam – and why it’s coming up sooner. Of course the debt ceiling itself is a partisan scam anyway and it would be nice if we got rid of it – this is the Congress that might actually do that rather than clean up the budget mess they’ve made.

    I not only didn’t watch the football game I pretty much got offline and read by the fire. I did check in before going to bed and saw the Eagles won, there was a misuse of Dr. King’s words, a misuse of Prince (music and image), and mad king donald wasn’t hiding who he is from anybody. Hopefully all of that will have flushed through the twitterverse by now as I’m heading over there shortly.

    Hold the Good Thought for my friend across the street – she sent me an email yesterday and the “flu” that didn’t test out as flu was finally Dx’d as pneumonia Friday and she’s finally getting treatment but she’s now starting her 3rd week off work. Gonna check DK and look up a few things online. And coffee. :) Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  15. Morning, MeeseFolk! I spent the weekend in Ohio with The Kiddo and her husband. They’re hoping to put their house on the market in the spring, so Saturday was Demo Day! in the basement. We tore the paneling and furring strips off three walls, removed the janky carpet tiles from the floor, and tore down the ceiling tiles and the layer of drywall under that (who puts ceiling tiles on drywall?!). All the home improvement shows on HGTV assure us that Demo Day! is fun…and it is. At least it is up to the point when you have to collect all the debris and haul it upstairs and out of the house; that part is decidedly unfun. In the evening, we were all too tired to move, so we played several rounds of Timeline. (They received all of the different versions as wedding gifts, and I highly recommend it.)

    I drove home yesterday and made it home before the worst of our snowstorm hit, but then I had to deal with the shoveling. To say I’m tired today is an understatement. I fear tomorrow’s post is going to be bare-boned and pro-forma, but I have to admit it’s nice to be more physically tired than mentally exhausted. Staying away from all of the news over the weekend has its advantages.

    • Ha! “who puts ceiling tiles on drywall?!” Good lord, do you think it was a “look” they were trying for?

      Glad to hear you made it home before the storm. We had a lot of snow here and while the plows came through there were still a lot of treacherous roads. Now with temperatures plummeting into the deep freeze, salt (and beet juice which we use here) will be useless so the roads we have are the roads we will be stuck with. We will not get above freezing until after the 18th.

      • Glad you work from home – you also stay warm if possible but definitely safe. {{{HUGS}}}

      • We have no idea what look they were trying to achieve; they also had the carpet tiles running up one wall. My S-I-L described the whole look as “70s porn set”, and while I’m reasonably certain he’s seen as much 70s porn as I have (which is to say, none), his description did capture the vibe. Removing the dark paneling from three walls and exposing the (painted white) cinder block really made a huge difference, and we were pleasantly surprised to discover there was vinyl tile under the carpet squares. IF they can get someone in to remove the carpet glue residue from the floors without destroying the tile, they’ll have a nicely serviceable floor. (After reading up on what’s involved, I texted them and suggested they hire that job out. I know my limits, and spending a weekend on my hands and knees, scraping up the residue after applying a solvent is beyond me…and probably them too.)

        Our forecast doesn’t look nearly as cold as yours at least. We’re supposed to have highs in the low 20s most of the week, so…February.

    • {{{DoReMI}}} – glad you had fun and yes it’s a good thing to stay away from the news – especially over the weekend when you get 87 different versions of OMGHOF over the event of the moment. Stay warm if possible and definitely stay safe. Anything you post for tomorrow (basset hounds?) will be appreciated. moar {{{HUGS}}}

  16. 46, cloudy, and still morning in Bellingham. I woke up late, found my swim suit, and drove myself to the pool. yay! I was only in the water for 1/2 hr with the hope that my stamina will increase with easy workouts. I don’t want a setback of any kind.

    I have a deer dilemma this year……a doe with two fawns is munching the garden, but mama deer is injured and dragging one leg so it’s hard to chase them away. We’ve put netting over the emerging bubs and day lilies but the ivy and yew trees are looking very chewed. Oh well, nature will do what nature does and the garden will recover.

    Take care everyone.

  17. Tuesday Meese
    17 degrees here in the NY mountains – going up to 27 and snow tomorrow
    I have school, hubby is still home sick and I’m tired.
    Shaking my head at this news from PR

    On a brighter note we’ll be celebrating Bob Marley’s birthday today in Black Kos.
    Could use some musical uplifting.

  18. Good morning, meeses! Tuesday …

    It is 3 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 10. Sunny skies most of the day then a chance of flurries towards evening.

    The Supreme Court refused to stay the Pennsylvania gerrymander order paving the way for new maps that will likely give us two more seats in the House of Representatives and, I assume, better chances at state legislature seats. The deadenders in the Republican controlled legislature are making one last Hail Mary – trying to impeach their Supreme Court justices to get a more favorable bench. Yikes! When Republicans realize that their brand is so damaged and their policies so unattractive that the only way they can win is to cheat, they pull out all the stops. This shows how important it is to take back power in the states. We have the governor’s office in Pennsylvania and a majority on their Supreme Court – now if we can get fair elections with #fairmaps – maybe we can drain that swamp.

    It will be interesting to watch the stock market this morning. Two consecutive days of losses have wiped out all the 2018 gains and this is the day when panic can set in. I panicked in 1987 when the stock market crashed and I worried that I would lose all my retirement money. I was not very savvy about the market and did not understand the “sit tight it will be alright” rule. So I sold while the market was near the bottom and lost a lot of money. People who have not learned the hard way yet may be tempted to adjust their portfolios. The market is correcting for the giddiness of having a Unified Republican Government and returning to sanity. I am curious to see how Fox News explains that rises in the market are because of URG but drops are not! The White House is already trying to reset – will the basket of dupables buy what they are selling? My guess is that they will.

    I couldn’t check the news this morning as I was working on some client computers and I need to go see what the status of this week’s shutdown is. The last I saw, Republicans want to try to get a year of defense funding approved with this Continuing Resolution by tossing in a sweetener of two years of funding for community health clinics. The CR would run until March 23rd. It sounds like this plan (letting the defense appropriations off the hook for the sequester while holding domestic appropriations to the letter of the law) is not going to pass muster. I also want to see what happened with McCain-Coons, the DACA fix. So off to the news I go!!

    See all y’all later!

  19. Good morning, Meese. Very overcast, with the threat of freezing rain tonight. If that happens school will be delayed tomorrow. Current temp. in NoVa is 26 F., going up to 42 F.

    Lawks, if I’d known what renting our basement would do to the income tax prep, I wouldn’t have done it. We bought this house in 1976! TurboTax expects me to get out ALL the paperwork and copy down every single thing that happened during the settlement. I can see I’m not going to get this done before the shutdown.

    Tiresomely, I have to rush this morning because training at the gym is at 9 a.m. and I haven’t even had breakfast yet. Everyone stay warm!

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