Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Nov. 18th through Nov. 24th

November 17, 2018 JanF Community 108

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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48 Comments

  1. I have come up with a solution for the battery on my kindle — or rather, was given one. At the AIDS Walk, there’s lots of organizations giving stuff away: koozies, hand sanitizers, sunglasses — all to get you to take their literature, too. In one of the bags I got was a portable charger. I was shocked they’d hand out something that nice. It has a nice, long cord, exactly the right size to plug in to my kindle & lay on the table. So, when my battery is suddenly at 17% for no reason, or is at 50% despite being plugged in all morning, I have a great charger I can just plug it into, and keep reading.

    Man, I love having the boss’ parking spot. Sleeping late — when I wake up at my usual time, I just roll over for another 30 minutes, drive in all leisurely, and park right by the building. Very nice. No dreams that I remember last night. And now having said that, my brain is playing Head Full of Dreams to me. Oh — and another fun thing about being in the boss’ parking spot, I get a kick out of pulling away from the agency directors’ spaces blasting U2 from my car at top volume. Giggle.

    • Sounds like a good time, anotherdemocrat!

      Re Kindles: I have two, neither of which will take a charge, overnight or at any other time. It’s annoying because Kindles are idea to prop up on the ledge of the treadmill when I exercise. At the moment I have to use the Kindle app on my phone.

      • I have two Kindles: one takes a charge perfectly and uses very little battery in a normal day, the other one seems to run down quickly – in use or just sitting around – and is difficult to charge. We discovered that the connectors for the chargers make a difference, the one that does not charge well has a loose connection and needs to be tweaked into “charge”. I had already gotten that one replaced under warranty for not charging so maybe the default is “bad charge” and the one that works is the outlier.

        It would be very annoying to have to use it plugged in.

  2. Good Tiu’s Day morning, Meese! It’s still overcast here in Northern Virginia. The temp. right now is 46 F., going up to 50 F.

    Got a lot to get through today, including personal stuff. I’m up to 13,857 words in my book and am about to begin writing Chapter 9. My writing style has changed greatly: I can’t focus for very long because of acute Internet-itis. That’s why I write novellas with chapters of 1,500 words each rather than full-length novels with chapters of 5,000 words each. I have a stack of unpublished novels that reaches as high as my knees.

    Posted a bit about my husband’s childhood experiences as an evacuee. Thought it might be timely in view of the parent-child separations still taking place.

    Seamstress alert! Need advice about boned bodices and diaphanous fabrics, should you care to participate in an email exchange.

    Dee, have you ever heard of Urban Intellectuals? I will send you a kosmail about them. I have four sets of black history flashcards from UI, plus a black history coloring book from them.

    Off to do laundry and things. Wishing a good day to all at the Pond!

    • Email away…although I probably won’t get near anything until later tonight. I’m hoping to spend the bulk of my afternoon in my sewing room, completing something, anything!

  3. 29 windchill 23 and the sun is shining. Got 6.7 KWHs yesterday – if we can get 8 today we’ll be back on track for 180. Firewood’s been rescheduled for this weekend, we hope. That’s OK – sort of. I’ve got about 3/4 a rick left. I just need to be sparing over the holidays. Day-long fires use a lot more wood than just evening ones. LOL. Anyway, I’m at work so hit-and-miss as to when I read what or manage to respond to it. Most likely won’t be able to boost Denise’s twitter round up until I get home tonight. And not really sure I’ll stay online very long beyond doing that. A cozy book by a cozier fire has a lot more appeal right now. Buncha folks I know are hurting right now from one cause or another. Or a bunch combined. Channeling Healing Energy to everybody everywhere it is needed and accepted, shaped to the need. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

    • Thanks for checking in, bfitz! Do you have to work tomorrow and Friday as well?

      Here’s hoping you have a really good book to enjoy when you curl up by the fire with the kitties!

      • Hi Diana – I always check in at the Moose as long as I have internet connections and a working computer. LOL. I’m working tomorrow but not Friday. They’ve narrowed the applicants down from 22 to 5 and are trying to set up preliminary interviews next week. That means I’ll be working at least part of next week as well. Whether or not I’ll be working into December depends on how quickly they make a decision after the preliminary interviews.

        I’m mostly re-reading stuff – Mercedes Lackey, old Georgette Heyer, and the like. Very relaxing – both because I know what’s coming so won’t be upset/triggered by anything and I know what’s coming so if my eyes are bothering me and I’m having difficulty focusing I can still enjoy it. LOL. {{{HUGS}}}

  4. Good morning, Meesefolk; 25 now with a high of 30 today. We got another dusting of snow last night with a possibility of another tonight. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to finish the last of my raking until spring…unless I hire a Finn to do it.

    I should stay off Twitter late at night. I was reading a thread (which included Josh Marshall) which basically was Dem men (some with government experience) pontificating about 2020 chances, particularly in the Midwest. For whatever reason, it rubbed me the wrong way…probably because there was nary a mention of women and our ongoing anger. One of the dudes responded this morning in a way that I read as at least somewhat defensive. I don’t escalate on Twitter, so my response was fairly mild. But I’m way more peeved than I let on…too many white men, even Dem white men, still don’t get it. We’re not going away after one midterm, and Dem men need to start learning that posthaste.

    • I think that when many of us start paying attention to 2020 (I am not ready yet) our hackles will be up quite a bit! Right now I will give 2020 talk on Twitter a wide berth – my energy is going towards a successful start to the 116th Congress and Governor Tony Evers and Attorney General Josh Kaul showing us what they will do in Wisconsin. My own take is that Sanders 2020 will tear itself to shreds and not even make it into the primary season and that Biden 2020 will be promoted by the mainstream media ala Jeb! 2016 and Rubio 2016 and will never completely go away until early 2020 when Joementum meets Realworldia. The remaining candidates are quietly surveying the landscape and likely won’t make any public moves until next summer. I do know this: the Democratic Party nominee will not be over 55 years old and will probably not be white. Our demographic future is people of color, young people, college-educated people and women and we want a party that reflects us and our contemporary progressive values. Climate change, gun safety, affordable healthcare, affordable college, affordable housing, protecting the social safety net – decency and respect. It will be exciting to see who emerges.

  5. Good morning meese, late checkin here from the West Coast where it’s currently 38 degrees with a high of 68. I am looking forward to the rain that’s in the forecast!!

    Will be taking Belle to the vet for her antibiotic shot and then spending a bit of time with her at home to let the gabapentin wear off.

    • West Coast gets daylight a lot “later” than East Cost. Sounds like a very pleasant high for the day. Hope the winds are blowing the smoke out to sea or something helpful. Seriously holding the Good Thought for rain for you and all of western CA. Healing Energy to Belle and very good that you’re able to spend time with her until the gabapentin wears off. {{{HUGS}}}

  6. Good morning, 40 and sunny in Bellingham. My sister and bil are here now so my morning has been busy with visiting and making plans for the day. Looks like Lee and RonK are going to visit salmon streams and my sister will go for a long walk and then we’ll do some T Day shopping and cooking.

    Best wishes to all.

  7. Forgot to say hi earlier. It’s 64 degrees here and it’s night already in Costa Mesa. It’s been quiet and not much is happening. In an hour I’ll be off work and heading to the Canyon Democrats Club meeting where we are going to celebrate Katie Porter’s win in CA-45 (defeated Mimi Walters (R)).

    • I’m envious of all y’all with your new, actually representatives. We got within 5 points of beating Michael McCaul, but he will still hate-represent Austin for another 2 years. We hate him right back. (it’s a drastically gerrymandered district)

  8. Wednesday Meese.
    31 and cloudy going up to 41 here in the Catskills.

    Sigh – am watching a bunch of guys who are “offended” by the hashtag #FiveWhiteGuys – and got up to find yet another fragile rant over at Orange about how racist it is.

    • Well, the defining characteristic of the group is their glaring whiteness – not even the color as much as the butthurtness that is part and parcel of the faux economic anxiety crowd. Would they prefer #FiveButthurtAssholes?

  9. Good morning, meeses! Wednesday …

    It is 30 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 30 – sunny this morning then clouding up.

    People who are shocked that tRump wanted his DOJ to prosecute Hillary Clinton have not been paying attention. And people who believe that he was deterred by the possibility that he would be impeached are delusional. There is literally nothing that he could do that would cause the Republican Senate to turn against him and vote to remove him from office – his base is now their base and they would never win another election in their red states. He is the Republican Party – he owns everyone who still has an R after their name, and he knows it.

    We flipped another seat – UT-04 is officially “Democratic.” I put that in quotes because the Mayor of Salt Lake City ran as a #NeverNancy and will be part of the #ThirteenWhiteGuys caucus. Sad, really, as a friend who lives there said he has a passion for health care and making people’s lives better. He will be on the subcommittee to count paperclips while the people who embrace the right of the majority of their caucus to choose their leadership will get assignments on committees that will make a difference in people’s lives. I will never believe that any of the people who won seats won because they ran against Nancy Pelosi. And it is a failure of their imagination to have been unable to craft a position on Speaker that would have given then wiggle room to vote for the person their colleagues selected. “I will take a close look at the options available and will make the choice that allows me to best help my constituents.” Or better yet, tell them that you won’t “surrender to misogyny and bullying” by Republican dark money groups. Opportunity lost.

    I don’t understand why Marcia Fudge thinks that Nancy Pelosi does not respect the value and contribution of black members of the Democratic caucus but if the end result of the dustup is that an energized subcommittee on elections (that was disbanded by the Republicans in 2013) will become the place where the Voting Rights Act rises from the ashes of the Shelby County ruling, it is a good outcome.

    Today I will hunt and gather for tomorrow’s meal. No traveling this year, the Thanksgiving break will be a time of rest and reflection – and catching up on projects in the quiet time.

    See all y’all later!

    • Barack Obama on Nancy Pelosi:

      Speaking Tuesday in Chicago, Obama hailed Pelosi as “one of the most effective legislative leaders that this country’s ever seen.”

      “Nancy is not always the best on a cable show or with a quick sound bite or what have you,” Obama said. “But her skill, tenacity, toughness, vision, is remarkable. Her stamina, her ability to see around corners, her ability to stand her ground and do hard things and to suffer unpopularity to get the right thing done I think stands up against any person that I’ve observed or worked directly with in Washington during my lifetime.”

      From that same article, re the “left flank”:

      Reps.-elect Jahana Hayes (Conn.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) — who made calls for new leadership during their campaign – have kept their distance from Pelosi’s vocal opposition.

      Speaking on MSNBC on Monday night, Ocasio-Cortez said the rebel group was “not necessarily reflective of the diversity of the party” and questioned why they were determined to oust Pelosi.

      “I do think that we got sent to Congress on a mandate to change how government works, to change what government even looks like,” she said. “But if we are not on the same page about changing the systems and the values and how we’re going to adapt as a party for the future, then what is the point of just changing our party leadership just for the sake of it?”

      Five white guys are “not necessarily reflective of the diversity of the party”? Indeed.

  10. Wed/Friday, looking forward to a 4 day weekend. Our phones have been really quiet this week, the worst thing today will be people calling who don’t have any books. (calling today is too late to get books in the mail today) I hate those calls, because I know they’ll be lonely & bored but there’s literally nothing I can do. Things we enter today are compiled overnight, and labels printed the following business day.

    I found out this morning that I know someone from Paradise. The coach who organized (twice) a workout group for people with 100 lbs to lose — for us to be comfortable working out, and stuff arranged for us, he’s from there. There’s a paradisestrong.org — but I can’t get the page to load.

    Comfort music today: Love Is Bigger Than Anything In Its Way.

  11. Good Woden’s Day morning, Moosekind! It’s beautiful here, so clear, and the sun is rising over the woods. I can see a huge squirrels’ nest in the bare tree across from our screened porch. Currently in Ashburn it’s 32 F., going up to 48 F. Tomorrow is expected to set a record for cold.

    Was supposed to visit my friend in Greenspring today but alas, my poor Dearly Beloved has to go to the doctor. The pain in his shoulder kept him awake most of the night. We have only one vehicle, having sold the truck (which we really didn’t need any more), so his need takes priority. Hope I can visit my friend on Friday. Saturday it’s going to pour, or so they say, and anyway, her son visits her on Saturday.

    As I’m going to be home today I could take the dog out for his walk and do a little housework. I started work on Chapter 9 last night but ag, one of the characters mentioned the Kashmiri border business. If I allow that to stay in the chapter, I have to write a bonus story for the back of the book, because the Kashmiri border business has absolutely nothing to do with the plot. It’s in one of the character’s pasts.

    This is the kind of thing I occupy my mind with while waiting for Mueller. Weird, yes?

    Wishing everyone a good day of shopping and chopping, and peace at the Pond!

  12. It’s 35 windchill 28 and “partly sunny” in Fayetteville, AR. Got 7.2 KWHs yesterday and the 119.4 is just a hair under on-track – if we can get over 6 today…Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny but after that is iffy. We shall see what we shall see. Spending more time offline in the evenings these days. A nice book by a cozy fire is much better for the tummy than whatever is OMGHOF out in the wide world. I only get online at all to boost signals of folks I know will be posting stuff to boost and to check in with folks – some via Moose, some via email, some via twitter. I’m doing what I can. Beating on myself for not doing more is just going to make it harder for me to keep doing what I can. Healing Energy to everybody everywhere shaped to the need. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  13. Good morning, Meesefolk; a balmy 32 when I got up…and that’s the high for the day. By 7 tonight, it’s supposed to be well below 20. There will be much snuggling tonight (or probably more accurately, much fighting for the covers).

    I never made it into my sewing room yesterday, but I did resume and almost finish a project I started a year ago. I’m painstakingly super-gluing tiny toy dinosaurs to a lamp, which will eventually be spray painted a uniform color and given to The Kiddo. (The dinosaurs were part of the centerpieces at her wedding; some tables had vases filled with dinosaurs, while others had vases filled with Lego bricks.) It’s tedious, but I think when it’s done, it will be a Pinterest success rather than a Pinterest fail. Of course, I was talking to myself the whole time, and if anyone had been in the room, they would have heard things like, “Hmmm, I may have too many parasaurolophus in this section; I need an iguanodon here,” or “Do I want a pachycephalosaurus here or a ceratosaurus?” I hope to finish the last of the dino-gluing tonight so that this weekend, when temps are supposed to be warmer, I can take it outside and spray paint it. The final step will be to add a lamp shade, which is dependent upon The Kiddo informing me of the color scheme for her office where this lamp will go. Knowing her, I may just have to pick a neutral color or decide for myself; she doesn’t have a real interest in things like color schemes. After this is done, I had planned on making a Lego mirror (glued to the frame) for SIL, but I may have reached my tedium limits, at least for awhile.

    Good day to and for all!

    • Sounds like a fun if sometimes tedious project. LOL. I’d have love to have been there – except we’d probably have wasted a lot of your crafting time in earnest discussion of dinosaur placement. heh. Better you than me. I’m very clumsy and if I were trying such a thing the air would be full of cursing as I dropped the dinosaurs or accidentally glued them to my fingers. sigh. I’m sure your daughter will love it – and trusts your color sense. {{{HUGS}}}

      • I spent entirely too long yesterday wondering if it was wise to glue so many carnivores near the herbivores. And if The Kiddo was going to be upset that I included some elasmosaurs, when they technically aren’t dinosaurs. But then I realized it’s been sitting for almost a year, unfinished, and it was about time to GET. IT. DONE.

    • LOL, DoReMI, you have the strangest hobby of anyone I know!

      This:

      “Hmmm, I may have too many parasaurolophus in this section; I need an iguanodon here,” or “Do I want a pachycephalosaurus here or a ceratosaurus?”

      Thank you for my second big laugh of the day. (The first came from my poet friend Ben, who wrote a funny poem about a farmer, a fisherman, and a rake.)

      You must, must post a picture of that lamp when it’s done.

  14. Thanksgiving – and it is 15 degrees (brrrrrrrrr) here in the Catskills of NYS going up to 22.

    Will be cooking much of the day – company won’t be coming till tomorrow.

    Have a diary going up at Orange this morning at 9AM – a thank you to Chef José Andrés and all the World Central Kitchen chefs.

    Hope you all have a good day.

  15. Good morning, meeses! Thursday …

    It is 28 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 36. Some flurries in the morning then cloudy with a few sunny breaks later in the afternoon.

    I hunted and gathered yesterday and so the meal fixings are ready. I do not cook on Thanksgiving except for the vegetable dishes because it is a holiday! We will give thanks for the blessings of the harvest – and the gift of the day off – but without joining in the memorializing of the cruel treatment of indigenous people by white conquerors.

    At first when I saw that Chief Justice John Roberts had called out tRump’s disrespect for the judiciary, I hoped it signaled that he, for one, would not be a rubberstamp for Trump administration executive privilege – and also an attempt to repair the damage done to the court by his party elevating Republican operative Beerfart Keggernaugh to the court. But then someone pointed out the more likely reason for issuing the extraordinary statement: by claiming that there are no “Obama judges” and “Trump judges” he was laying the groundwork for saying that anything he and his fellow destroyers on the court were about to do was completely non-political. Bastid! I am not sure why I expected anything better – the hypocrisy of the man who single-handedly destroyed fair elections by his decision to pull Citizens United from the trash heap and use it to open the floodgates to dark money in our elections – and then stabbed democracy in the heart by declaring America post-racial and gutting the Voting Rights Act is stunning. Every election decision he has made – every single one – helps Republicans hold onto power in an America that increasingly rejects his party’s ideology and policies. They can’t win on ideas so they stack the courts to disenfranchise those who would take back the power. I am hoping young people, energized by the blue wave they were a part of that took back the House, will become supervoters, voting in every election from dogcatcher to president, and taking back state houses to fix the election system that the Supreme Court has damaged.

    Well, my plan today was to work on some projects before the sun came up and I got distracted by interesting articles in my news feed. I am going to put my nose back to the grindstone and try to make a dent in the stack.

    See all y’all later!

  16. Goid morning, Meesefolk; 18 now with a high of 27 today. The dogs were up early, and I decided trying to go back to bed was fruitless. I’m sure I’ll be able to catch a nap later, or maybe I’ll just be productive all day. (No, I won’t, but I thought I’d type that to see if I could say it without laughing at myself.)

    Since we don’t have our traditional meal until Saturday, I’m experimenting with a chili recipe attributed to Lady Bird Johnson. I’ve discovered that regional variations are so extreme as to make the word “chili” meaningless. I’m of the Midwestern sensibility that chili without kidney beans is not really chili, which is apparently anathema to Texans. But The Hubby detests kidney beans (and beans in general; “it’s a texture thing”), so we’re trying this beanless recipe. If it’s tasty and we like it, I shall dub it Lady Bird’s Soup; if we don’t like it, I will file it away as an oops and never speak of it again.

    Good day to and for all!

  18. Had to re-start my computer. I think that stupid band of polling data across the top of DK messes with my poor old laptop. Anyway, I slept in, now watching the news and Harry Potter. May take a walk this afternoon, it’s supposed to be nice — apologies to the northeasterners who are having record cold.

  19. 40 windchill 35 and sunny at the moment in Fayetteville, AR. We’re on track for the 180 goal and if we can get 6 KWHs today we’ll stay on track. I’m just dropping in for a few minutes to wish a happy day of giving thanks for our blessings combined with hopefully loving memories of those who are no longer here to share it with us. At last on this plane or time/space continuum. I give thanks for you all and the beautiful and safe Moose Pond. Now back to laundry and hopefully baking. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  20. Good morning meese, 52 with a high of 57. There was a lot of rain last night, to the point where small roads might have been flooded out. No rain in today’s forecast, at least that I can tell. Going to sleep in a bit more and then get started. I don’t cook, so will be taking a friend out for dinner.

    • The rain is good although floods are not – but if that rain helps prevent or put out fires, it’s a blessing. Sleep well and enjoy your celebration with your friend. {{{HUGS}}}

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