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 (usually Saturday night with a Sunday date). 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 is HERE!
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Good Wednesday morning, Moosekind. Will be brief, as this computer wants to update itself, which means I have to close down Safari and everything else.
At the moment it’s 63 F. this morning, going up to 68 F. Overcast skies and showers are predicted for three days straight. Rats!
Stanley Steemer is coming at 9:30 so we are hustling through breakfast and vacuuming. We have to take the dog out and keep him out for the time they’re here.
One of the characters in my soon-to-be-written novella keeps insisting that his name is DeOnte Williams, not Jamal something-or-other. Okay. I know when a character does that he or she is coming to life, so I embrace it. Must summon the other characters into life.
Wishing all at the Pond a good day!
Good morning, meeses! Wednesday …
It is 57 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 84. Sunny skies are in the forecast.
The headlines are horrifying – the tRump maladministration is pushing re-openings and saying the coronavirus is no big deal just as cases are spiking in many states. The mayor of Tulsa was pretty upset saying that they sacrificed to get the curve flattened and are about to be visited by a swarm of virus bearing MAGAts (he did not say the last part, I did!). I wish red state white Republicans were the most at-risk group instead of people of color – then we could cheer for its spread. Sorry! I am sick of people who care so little for human life that they will risk permanent lung damage and death to fluff their failed president.
Here is a fun headline and lead in:
Another busy day here as I try to get some projects out the door.
See all y’all later!!
Wednesday Meese
Just put up this piece – in lieu of my daily PR roundup
It’s still in the upper 60s – made baking the little ham this morning quite comfortable – heading for upper 80s and sunny. At least at the moment. It’s not forecast to be as cloudy this afternoon as yesterday afternoon but still is forecast to have afternoon clouds. Yesterday’s generation was 16.8 KWHs – obviously afternoon clouds prevents a good 6 KWHs or so of generation – but the 325 m-t-d is still on track. It won’t be much longer if we keep getting these afternoon (or longer) clouds, but it is right now. Funny. After the clouds moved off and the sun was shining again we got thunder and even a little damp-the-dust rain.
No dogs, no rain, diddly sales, and mounting expenses more regular than clockwork – that’s Aji’s life right now. With the unfortunately not occasional enough attack of some sort online or locally just to make things harder. She apparently got one of those online last night. White person and “knowingly put me at risk” is what she said about it. More prayers/invocations/Channeling is all I got. Amelia’s going through a spell of fatigue that’s interfering even with self care, much less anything else that needs to be done/she needs to do. Those two, they’re in the most extreme of situations. They aren’t just on the edge, they’re over it and hanging on by fingernails. So Channeling Healing/Helping Energy to everybody, to their shapes – and just about with every breath for those two.
I need to get on the treadmill while it’s still cool enough. I’ll check and boost Dee’s diary when I’m done. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning’s walk/run. 5 segments of 1 minute running and 3 at 30 seconds. A bit more recovery time between segments than the plan calls for, but still a good morning. Anyway, it’s time I should be working. Have a good day, y’all!
{{{anotherdemocrat}}} 👍👍👍 moar {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 57 and mostly sunny in Bellingham. I’m trying to to expand my narrow covid world, so I tied on my mask and went to the flower shop and the fabric store yesterday. Most everyone I saw wore a mask and we all kept our distance so so I hope it was safe.
I’ve got a busy (for me) day ahead with laundry, basic housekeeping, flower and party prep, etc. Feels good to have a more normal day planned. And tomorrow I have a haircut scheduled, yay!
Best wishes to all.
Good morning, meeses! Thursday …
It is 57 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 86. Sunny skies are in the forecast.
The Bolton revelations – a truly terrible person spilling the beans on another truly terrible person – is interesting but unlikely to change anything for the MAGAts who have already signaled that tRump could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it. It is infuriating that Bolton is allowed to say “House Democrats should have impeached on more counts” without being met with laughter – the White House stonewalled producing any documents and refused subpoenas for witnesses. They are still trying to gain access to tRump’s personal taxes to find out how much money he has gotten from foreign countries! How were they to do an investigation? Republicans pull things out of their asses to charge presidents with, Democrats follow the rules – there were no further charges because the evidence was hidden from the investigators and we refused to charge without evidence. Period.
Someone wrote “White Lives Matter” on Arthur Ashe’s statue in Richmond. Yes, Arthur Ashe “beat” many white tennis players. Sigh.
I was glad to see that the officer who shot and killed Rayshard Brooks was charged with murder. It is not enough – it needs to end in the wholesale firing of anyone who thinks that a person fleeing a misdemeanor charge should be shot and killed. They had his car, he could have been found later!! The apple barrel needs to be dumped out and the rotten ones and rotten-adjacent ones removed and a new, more transparent, barrel built.
We are still in the middle of a global pandemic. No Mike Pence op-eds will change that. Those who open their states and counties with a careless disregard for human life should be run out of office.
See all y’all later!
Didn’t walk this morning, will continue the stretching & standing abs workout. Mornings are getting warmer — 73 already at dawn. Plan for the day: work, listen to U2 in between phone calls. Not a bad day.
Good Thursday morning, Moosekind! We received some heavy rain yesterday. Today we may have more, and tomorrow, and the day after that and the day after that. Right now it’s overcast and 68 F., on its way up to 81 F.
The WaPo reported this morning that owing to the unusually cool, wet weather we’ve had so far and the drastic reduction in vehicular traffic, we’re having the cleanest air since 1980. Imagine that! It would be so wonderful if cities and towns would designate car-free zones, and if companies would allow every one who can, and wants to, work remotely. I know my daughter-in-law, who has been with the FCC for eight years this very month, loves it. She finishes her workday soon after 4 p.m., then exercises on the equipment in the garage.
Once more we are washed, brushed, fed, and waiting. (This time we had to achieve this state of affairs by 8 a.m.) Turned out yesterday that the company Hubby thought was Stanley Steemer was actually a different company. They showed up half an hour late, realized their equipment would not work, and agreed to cancel the whole thing. Today the real Stanley is coming with portable equipment between 8 and 1. Thank Goddess! I hate this early morning stuff. We usually don’t get our act together until 10 a.m. or later.
Yesterday on my walk I passed our garden, so plucked a zucchini that was big enough to eat. We had it for our green vegetable last night. Nothing tastes as good as vegetables and fruit you’ve grown yourself!
We had some good news at the televised 4 p.m. briefing yesterday. Next Monday the campus shuttle will start running as usual—good, because although I prefer to walk between buildings I do enjoy seeing my favorite drivers around the campus—and on Monday the 29th we’ll get our regular mail back instead of having it delivered right to our apartments. The mail has been taking FOREVER to get here, and the outgoing takes forever to arrive at its destination. So that’s two events toward a more normal life.
While waiting for SS, I’ll be working on a story for the rising kindergartener about foxes having a tea party in the woods across the way from our flat, and a bear fishing at Fisherman’s Pond here. As a rule, there’s a Father’s Day Fishing Contest at Fisherman’s Pond, where people can try to catch catfish and the delighted spectators can enjoy hot dogs and potato chips. The virus has put paid to that.
Anyway, Mr. Soon-to-be-Five-Years-Old sent us a heart-shaped card. On one side it said “Monty Grandma,” and on the other side he’d drawn two heads with long hair. The ice cream cone stickers he’d pasted under the heads were upside down, but that’s okay. I have days like that too. He and his family are coming to tea on Saturday. Family are now allowed to visit as long as they wear masks, come straight to our apartment, and don’t wander around outside.
About the current situation I’ll say nothing, although it will be interesting to see who shows up at the stupid rally in Tulsa on Saturday, but I do believe—I dare to believe—that this time things are going to be different, and that George Floyd and the long list of others will not have died in vain. They shouldn’t have had to die at all, of course. They were murdered by white supremacists.
Time to get on with things. Wishing all at the Pond a good day!
This:
I bet they showed up with the truck that has a long hose that runs into the house! Not appropriate for an apartment for sure. I have used the truck with the long hose people and I actually don’t like it. I would prefer they bring something in and run it around. They claimed that it was the greatest way to clean but frankly I did not notice anything special. It did take forever to dry and the furniture all had to piled onto the non-carpeted area for several days. I won’t have that done again until after I move – I hate being inconvenienced!!
It was 65 at dawn, 75 now, and heading for 90. Sunny today – looks like the last sunny day for the month. Yesterday wasn’t as cloudy in the afternoon as Tuesday. We generated 23 KWHs and the m-t-d’s at 348 – today reaching 370 is possible which would at least get us above 2017 when a combination of hardware, software, & “firmware” problems was causing the system to shut down every time we had even a flicker of a power outage.
Fayetteville City Council & Mayor have passed a “masked in places where public goes” ordinance for the duration of the “emergency”. Our governor “deplored” it but didn’t override it so Fayetteville at least has a mask order in place. Our town doesn’t like our county’s 1-in-20-has-it odds and wants to keep our folks safe. (& the governor can get rid of it any time he wants to by lifting the “state of emergency” – which he’s paying little attention to anyway as he orders the reopening of the state.) We’ll of course see how well it’s followed and enforced.
Nothing seems to change for “my” online family/folks I’m worried about – except when it gets worse. I not only haven’t a clue how Aji carries on, I am not sure why she wants to. But she does and that’s all I need to know. Same for the rest. Why they want to be here is their business. They want to and my only business is to help them to the best of my ability. As little and limited as that is.
My opinion and all that but I think/am sure WP should not be using “Karen” or “Becky” or any of the other terms BIPOC are using to describe dangerous white privilege racist behaviors of white women (or men for that matter but there’s not consensus on a name to call men). That distances us, allows us to say “not me” without saying it, gives the comforting illusion that we do not belong to the demographic in question. That we don’t carry any of the blame or shame of it. We do. Even if/when/though we don’t know how the hell to stop it much less make reparations for it. We have got to accept the fact that “bitch is my sister/cousin/aunt” – not “kinfolks”, they aren’t welcome to the “decorate the tree at grandma’s” party – but family. I cannot say “not me” about this evil behavior any more than I can about the white colonizer culture I live in and benefit from because I’m white. So I also cannot say “Becky” or “Karen” to distance myself from that behavior. And watching WP do it on twitter (& hearing about it being done on various blogs) is effing depressing because that distancing is the first step to not fixing it.
I need to get on the treadmill while it’s still cool enough. Channeling Healing/Helping Energy to everybody, to your shaping. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
At least – so far – your governor is allowing cities to make their own rules. The governor of Nebraska, Ricketts, who was in the Oval Office yesterday kissing up to tRump, has told counties and municipalities that if they enforce any rules that are inconvenient for people – but especially mask rules which are now a cultural thing – they will not get any of the $100 million that the federal government gave to his state from the CARES Act. So the health officer in one of the counties hit hard by a meat packing plant outbreak, and who had been requiring masks and doing temperature checks before allowing people into city-county buildings, has to stop. I hope that Nancy Pelosi is paying attention and that the next round of relief includes protections from Republican governors who put party over the health of their citizens.
We weren’t sure he was gonna. Fayetteville had shut down and is being forced to reopen. Of course the state’s “re”-open thing is crap. The state never fully shut down in the first place, just closed all the schools (including the universities). But A$a has been pretending we’d shut down and are now reopening – totally against the reopening plan he approved/announced a couple of months back, too. The “official” plan says we’re shut down until the numbers of cases start dropping. They never did and in fact have been climbing steadily. But his corporate sponsors said “jump” and he’s asking “how high” on the way up.
May that misbegotten son of the evil djinn suffer the nightmares of the damned every night.
Good morning, 56 and sunny in Bellingham. I opened some upstairs windows yesterday so I can smell the morning breeze today. The furnace has been turning on early in the morning and I can’t remember how to reprogram the thermostat so I’ve waited to open the windows. So glad I put the screens away clean last fall!
My long awaited hair cut finally happens this morning, yay! And this afternoon I’ll do some party prep with Emma and her mom, and then focus on making the flower arrangements. I’m only doing eight so I don’t feel to pressed for time, especially if I can stick to the “keep it simple” plan :)
Best wishes to all on this sunny morning in June.
I had my hair cut on Monday. The salons here are open but not the specific one I have been using and it sounded like it was not going to happen until July. So I went to a different salon with a hair stylist I had gone to in the past and got my first haircut in 5 months. It feels glorious! The salon seemed to have all the proper sanitizing and safety things in place and when I got home I washed my hair – they say the hair can hold onto the virus for longer than other “surfaces.”
Good to know! Thanks, Jan!
Good morning, meeses! Friday, Juneteenth 2020 …
It is 68 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 86. Partly cloudy with showers this evening and overnight.
I would like to think that the wheels are coming off the Trump “re”-election campaign but we have been here before. People were convinced that tRump would not survive the airing of the Access Hollywood tape and then the deplorable media grabbed the Russian bait and sucked all the air out of the room over their obsession with the contents of private emails from the Clinton campaign – Podesta’s recipes!! I really doubt that Joe Biden has any skeletons in his closet after his long career – or that his campaign communications are not being better managed now that everyone knows the risks – but we have over 4 months to go and anything can happen. Don’t believe polls, make plans to go to the polls or request and return absentee ballots. This past week, both Wisconsin and Michigan have won the legal battles to send ballot requests to all registered voters. That is a start, at least.
Juneteenth – a holiday celebrating something real and tangible and one that celebrates freedom as kind of an addendum to the Fourth of July which celebrates a document signed by slaveholders declaring independence for themselves but not their human property. They should make it a national holiday – we can trade Columbus Day for that and it would be perfect.
I am still way too busy but a deadline has been moved to Monday so I have a weekend to finish a project that is running long. I am a little nervous because it involves hardware, software and complicated logistics and we just started a Mercury retrograde yesterday.
See all y’all later!
Good Juneteenth morning Meese.
69 going up to 87 here in the Catskills
Will be busy posting today – just posted and have another on the way
Puerto Rico
I’m ashamed to be white.
Second story posted
Lazy morning, I decided to put off my walk/run till tomorrow. Watching Hidden Figures. Plan for today: get in the last 6 hours of work needed for the week. There’s also a Dr Who marathon on BBC America. But: Hidden Figures is followed by Selma.
So much good stuff is available to watch – wish I had time!
I wish that among the DW episodes they are showing today was the Selma episode. It is so good. It’s from the 1st season with Jodie Whitaker.
It’s 77 already, heading for low 90s and a heat index that may or may not hit 100. Sunny still but clouds are supposed to move in this afternoon. And stay. sigh. Yesterday we generated 22 KWHs and we’re almost to 371 for the m-t-d. On track with some wiggle room. I just don’t know if it’s enough wiggle room considering the forecast. We shall see what we shall see.
Lethargy/fatigue dragging me down. I don’t know why. Weight of the world except I’m not bearing it. Just watching, “praying” for, trying to do my little bit to help those who are. Juneteenth is a marker along the road. But it’s a long geedee road and there are those in power right now trying to push things back to that marker. Supposedly genocide of Natives is “history” – except the highest number of cases/deaths of COVID is Navajo Nation – there are 3 counties in what Aji calls NDN country in NM, not all of which are part of the Navajo Nation, that have death tolls over 150 – Natives are over 50% of the COVID cases in NM and only 11% of the population. By comparison, my county, which is very upset at our climbing number of cases and deaths, has 15 as of yesterday. Best I can tell the greatest part of the progress we’ve made is official genocide & Jim Crow are no longer legal and we’re not supposed to say the quiet parts out loud. In general and in individual cases, we’ve got a long, long way to go.
No good news from any direction other than “still hanging on” can be considered good news. Best I can say is no bad news either. I’m not sure I’ve got the energy to do the treadmill today. We’ll see. Meanwhile I need to close up the house to keep the coolth in and visit Dee’s diaries. Channeling Healing/Helping Energy to everybody, to your shaping. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 60 and partly sunny in Bellingham. I did get a haircut/color yesterday, yay! It’s shorter than usual, but “fixing” my home trim mess required a real haircut. The salon has a safety regime in place with masks, gloves, chair separations, touch less payment procedures, temp taken at the door, etc. After my haircut we met for lunch at the bookstore cafe and it was so nice to see out friends on staff again. We set outside, used our masks, and tried to keep a proper distance from others. It was a nice moment of feeling “normal” again.
However, covid isn’t gone, and my DIL and Emma have had an exposure from their work so they drove to a lab in Skagit County to be tested and the party for Emma tomorrow is cancelled. I’ll regroup with the flowers and make three large arrangements…..one for her, one for her Nana, and one for us and deliver them today. We’ll do a porch hand off as we will all have to keep our distance for the next two weeks.
Best wishes to all on this quiet sunny morning.
{{{princesspat}}} wonderful on feeling “normal” again – but rats! about Emma’s party. You still make it special though, even if not as special as you’d like. Healing Energy to your household/family & moar {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, meeses! Saturday, Summer Solstice …
It is 70 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 75. Showers and thunderstorms are in the forecast – no Sunny Solstice here!
I suppose that the tRump rally tonight will break all TV records, kind of like the movie “Titanic” where you look at the people in the crowd wondering which ones will die. Statistics say that 20% in the crowd will get COVID-19 and that 2% will die from it. Goddess, keep safe those who are not there willingly – I hope the MAGAts will allow the arena workers to wear masks and that someone provides them with N95s. Or better yet that they stay home and campaign staff has to work as ushers and security.
The Florida governor is “surprised” that the new infections are to people who are younger than the promised “old people who should just die because they have had a full life” that the Republican Death Cult is suggesting are the only victims. Although he went true to his hateful party in declaring it to be the Hispanic workers. Okay then, Governor Doodiehead, you want commerce to return – which includes picking produce – but you want to do it without migrant workers? Good luck with that. A Fox polls shows that 80% of Americans, including 68% of Republicans, think we should mask up.
And for those who think it will be sports as usual this fall, 23 members of the Clemson football team tested positive. When some get so sick their lungs are ruined – or they die – will the Football Death Cult say “oops, our bad”? I am not looking forward to our so-far-pretty-low-infection Dane County having students descend here in the Fall bringing their uncontrolled red state infections with them. Our university system will be opening with hybrid classes – large classes online, smaller classes in person – but the dorms will be wide open with no adjustment in density. Yikes! I can avoid the university area but there are a lot of commuting students who will be bringing the COVIDS back out to the residential areas of the city. I wonder if I should order another box of masks?
The Weekly Democratic Party Address is by Dick Durbin of Illinois who is an old white guy and a member of Chuck Schumer’s inept leadership in the Senate. I may try to find someone more uplifting to put on the front page of the Fighting Back post and will tuck away his speech under the fold. I will ponder it.
I have to take advantage of the quiet of a Saturday morning after a too-hectic week with long days. A number of issues were resolved on some projects I was working on and I need to document their status and lay out the plans for the next phase. Thank goodness for weekends!
See all y’all later!
Saturday Meese. 69 going up to 87 with rain here in the Catskills.
When you think things can’t get worse – they do. Now parts of Puerto Rico have drought
What is not mentioned about the areas water will be rationed – is that Loiza is one of the areas with the highest number of black Puerto Ricans – who seem to always be the last served by the PR gov.
Geocidal Old Party and their sycophants. I’d blame water rationing more on the drought and less on racism if they were shutting down the golf and swimming resorts – and rationing the white gated communities. I guess some folks still aren’t dying fast enough for the Rs & R-butt-lickers. Cut services instead of expanding them with drought in the north, earthquakes in the south, and hurricane damage everywhere…Evil.