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 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 (right before “Leave A Reply”) and use the Pages Tool to view previous pages, shown here with 3 pages of comments available and Page 2 circled.
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Good morning, meeses! Wednesday that will feel like a Friday …
It is 48 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 66. Sunny skies are in the forecast. Tomorrow will be about the same and we plan to drive up to a nearby state park and do some hiking.
The Biden Administration extended the student loan debt payment pause to give the courts time to sort out the various lawsuits and stays on the debt relief plan. That is good news for people whose loan payments were going to start up in January. The payments will commence 60 days after the final disposition of the case or after June 30th, the last day of the Supreme Court session, whichever comes first. So far Mrs. Jesse Barrett has twice rejected appeals to the Supreme Court when the anti-debt cancellation group was rejected in appeals courts. Since then, the 8th Circuit accepted their arguments and issued a stay. So opposing rulings will require Supreme Court review. The plaintiffs have no standing – they are literally saying that because students won’t be paying interest on loans that are cancelled, they will lose out on tax revenue. If the Supreme Court accepts that argument, the Commerce Clause of the Constitution will be turned on its head. The Texas case is even crazier – that one says that it is illegal to pay for something that the plaintiffs disapprove of if Congress did not specifically authorize payment for it. Again, that is not how it works – an individual can’t choose where his tax money goes. That the Texas ruling and the 8th Circuit ruling were announced after the elections instead of before when their assholery might have inspired more youngs to go to the polls, is appalling. I have no idea how SCOTUS will rule – I guess it depends on whether the plaintiffs donate to the Supreme Court Historical Society and get to mingle with Alito and tell him their sad story of lost income. Deplorable.
I had two support requests appear in my Inbox yesterday and I need to get to them. Later, I will hunt and gather for tomorrow’s meal and I am not yet sure which grocery stores have what I want so that will be a challenge.
See all y’all later!
Wednesday Meese. 30 going up to 50 here in NY. Got up early to start my cooking for tomorrow. First step is boiling ham hocks for the collard greens. Collards taste better on the second day – so I always start them early. Next is the potato salad. Will cook the turkey with cornbread and smoked oyster stuffing/dressing tomorrow morning (old family recipe)
Only having three guests this year – so will be 6 people here.
Sis, your plans sound good. But if there are two of you and three guests, how does that add up to 6 people? Does one of the guests have a split personality?
Puerto Rico
Wanda, Mingo and Pepon. “Hard hand” for the worker and a towel for the racketeer
Powerful protest! I hope someone is paying attention.
Good morning. One last wfh day then a 4 day weekend. The weather guy said the last 10 days have been the 3rd coldest period here ever. That’s how weird the weather has been; we don’t get 30s and highs in the 40s in November. Anyway, getting ready for work. I hope someone answers their phone today, I only set up 3 people yesterday.
Good beautiful Wednesday morning, Moosekind! It’s 38 F. and sunny in Ashburnikins, going up to—wait for it—60 F. today! Should I wear shorts? Naw, that would give people heart attacks and we don’t want that before the feast tomorrow.
Little Ethan will arrive at 3 p.m. today to have a sleepover. I hope he’ll help Grandpa put up our paper Christmas tree with its 80 paper ornaments. At 11 I have to get my blood pressure taken and at then I have to pop off to the stores.
Moan of the day: I hate housework and yet I have to do it. At least the sun is shining and the coffee was excellent this morning. Also pleased that my obligation to the quarterly is about to be finished. The managing editors loved the last photo I submitted (bfitz knows the photographer, barbara es), and will use it to illustrate the article I wrote.
Wishing a good, not-too-exhausting day to all at the Pond.
It’s 39 heading for 60 and off-and-on sunny right now. But the clouds are already moving in. sigh. Yesterday we generated 6.69 KWHS – so cleaning the panels didn’t make much difference (we generated 6.8 last Saturday) and maybe now I can get the Ozark Solar guy to really look at why there’s so much difference in per-panel generation. Anyway the m-t-d is 128.3 so still slightly gaining on the 180 goal – 132 would be on track.
Well, we still have twitter. It’s like dealing with someone with a terminal disease. You know they’re going but nobody really knows when until it gets down to the wire. Sometimes it’s sudden when that happens, sometimes it’s not. We shall see. & continue Holding Good Thoughts for a “new treatment” and recovery. Since it is still here, I’m off to do my twitter chores. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 44 and cloudy outside my window today. Marcus will be here soon to finish the pruning we started last summer so I will save some of the greens before it all goes into the chipper. I know to stay out of his way and to not slow things down for his helper but I need to work fast.
Lisa tested positive for Covid yesterday and will start taking Pavalox today. She isn’t too sick so I’m not worried but we’re all annoyed that covid is just part of our lives now. I need to get the next booster shot as soon as I cam and will keep wearing a mask when I’m out and about.
Best wishes to all.
Prayers lifted for her speedy recovery
Healing Energy for all your family. {{{princesspat}}}
Also Happy Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving Day Meese. I’m up and finishing my cooking. 27 here in Kingston going up to 50.
This carton really hit me today
Puerto Rico
oops “cartoon”
Yeah. FDR said America was going to be the arsenal for democracy. Instead we’re an arsenal for domestic terrorism. Among other things. None of them democratic.
Good morning, meeses! Thursday, a day to give thanks …
It is 46 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 59. Sunny skies are in the forecast.
Mary Peltola wins a full term in the House! Lisa Murkowski re-elected in a poke to the eye of tRump! Maybe now we can get her to change her affiliation to Independent and caucus with the Democrats – after being trashed by the Republican Party twice, she should reconsider who her natural constituents are. It would be great if we could get her to vote with Democrats to break the filibuster on the Voting Rights Bill.
More drama in Arizona as the losing losers try to foment an armed rebellion. Loser Lake is encouraging her fans to show up at the Capitol tomorrow – with guns – to protest the election and demand a re-do. The losing candidate for the attorney general’s race is suing to block the certification citing “irregularities” and “miscounts” – even thought the recount has not even taken place yet. I wonder if he has Rudy Guiliani as an advisor? The Arizona courts have not been kind to election denialism by losing losers, I hope they continue that pattern.
The food for our feast of giving thanks has been gathered and we just have to decide when to eat. We are planning a visit to a state park, one of the Dark Sky Parks, to see how it is laid out in anticipation of setting up a star gazing visit in December. Today’s visit will include a hike but we will need to check out the trails to see if any of them are easy enough for me. I am not fit enough to scramble over the rocks like a mountain goat but I can do a 1 or 2 mile loop as long as it is mostly flat. In any event, we will probably want to go when it is the warmest which is late morning and then eat when we get back.
See all y’all later!
Good morning. It’s still raining — which I am not complaining about — but at least it’s not cold. I made risotto yesterday, will cook my not-chicken, and that will be a nice meal. I should take a walk this afternoon, if there’s a break in the rain. I’m watching Fantastic Beasts, the last one in the Harry Potter franchise left to me. It is sweet & funny, has a message of really accepting people who are different.
Happy Being-Grateful-Day, Meeses. It’s 49 heading for 55, dark enough I need the lights on/the PV system is still in night mode, and raining off and on. Which we need but I wish it would do it at night and give me sunshine in the daytime. Oh well. We managed to just make 6 KWHs yesterday before the clouds moved in. M-t-d is 134 – didn’t gain any but didn’t lose any ground either. Unlike today.
My eldest grandson and his folks will be here around 7 pm (they say 6 but I know them very well) to bring me a Thanksgiving plate dinner like they did last year. We’ll have a lovely, if short, visit and I’ll actually eat around 8. LOL. My own cooking today will be making up and cooking another 2-week batch of breakfast sausage. One of which I’ll have for lunch.
I wish I could say on this day of giving thanks that everyone’s safe, secure, and comfortable – including food, shelter, and medications if any. Well, we are, for which I very much give thanks. But a lot of folks aren’t and while my boosting a few folks pleas for help may not do any good, it might. So off to my twitter chores. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Diana can’t post – the dreaded 406 Error – and sent it to me. I copied and pasted and couldn’t get it to post either. She took out all the quotes. I messed with parentheses and dashes. Nope.
So. In summary. She wished us all a Happy Thanksgiving. Ethan’s watching the parades and some of the family are up in NY in the crowds. The foot doctor had a cancellation and it turns out she has warts on her toes. They’re being treated. They leave for Ethan’s house a little after 2. She’s glad they don’t have to bring anything. And hopes the children like the Advent calendars she got them. She’s looking forward to a quiet day of writing tomorrow.
Can you email it to me? I have been using quotes “in the open”, not even using the html quote codes and I have not had any issues recently. I would like to see what you were trying to post.
I haven’t had any issues either recently. I just emailed Diana’s email to you.
Apparently one of the sentences contains banned words. I posted the comment below. This will give me some great information for the Mods.
Good Thursday morning, Meese, and Happy Thanksgiving to all. We’ve had breakfast and are now dressing for the day. Little Ethan is amusing himself while we do this. Part of the family – Beloved Nephew, Darling Niece, and Great-Nephew – are up in New York, watching the Macy’s parade. I told Darling Niece we’d be looking for them in the camera pans of the crowds to which she replied, Look for two crabby looking grownups with a 12-year-old.
When I went to get my bp checked yesterday, it turned out the foot doctor had an unexpected opening as someone had cancelled. Turns out some horrid Witch has cast a spell on my feet and I have warts! No wonder they’ve been hurting. The dr put wart meds on my toes, with the result I will have put plastic bags on my feet and secure them with rubber bands in order to have a shower. It sucks to be a Pisces.
E t h a n is b e h a v i n g b e a u t i f u l l y.
Editor’s Note: Really, WordPress, this all run together is “dangerous”?
We will leave for his parents house a little after two. Thank Goddess I do not have to make anything. I hope the kids like the Advent calendars I bought. December 1 is not that far off!
Looking forward to a quiet day of writing tomorrow. Wishing a good day to all at the Pond.
Thanks, bfitz and Jan! What was the banned word? Honestly, WordPress is behaving like a conservative Christian Republican! What’d I say?
It was something in this phrase:
I bypassed the 406 by spreading it out with a space between each letter.
I have no idea what is offensive about that unless the Mods would prefer that people’s grandchildren commit hate crimes!
Corblimey! Well, perhaps they were all drunk.
Thanks for isolating the problem.
Good morning. Still happily watching the West Wing marathon that started yesterday. It is still raining, but edging slowly toward normal temperatures. I don’t think my heater has kicked on in a couple of days. Today: I really should try to get outside, if there’s a break in the rain.
Good morning, meeses! Friday that will feel like a Saturday …
It is 43 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 63. Sunny skies are in the forecast. I had to put on a winter coat to take the doggie out! Yesterday we decided to stay home instead of hiking when we found out that the park closed early. Also, it was very windy and would not have been a fun day to hike a mountain trail.
I have not clicked on the news yet – I am hoping that with yesterday being a holiday, there is no fresh hell to read about. I did notice that Musk is planning to reinstate every banned account starting next week – in the spirit of redemption, which is a very faux christianist thing. Whenever someone does something awful, they can say they have seen the light and should be forgiven even though their victims are never compensated or apologized to. If I can get my projects done today, I will put up a post here on How to Mastodon. I can avoid the bad people – by muting people who tweet the deplorables into my timeline but I am not sure how long Twitter engineers will work for free (it sounds like no bills are being paid); when they quit, the servers will shut down.
Back to work! I am hoping most of my clients are off today so that I can work quietly on accounting projects.
See all y’all later!
Good blissful Black Friday, Moosekind! We’ve awakened to the lovely sound of rain falling, which we hear all too seldom, and we’re still four inches under normal for the year. As we drove to Arlington to be with the family yesterday, I remarked to Dearly that I didn’t believe it was going to rain, because the sky was the most beautiful blue imaginable, not a cloud to be seen. The high today will be 50 F.
We had a wonderful time with the family, our own and the other set of Ethan’s grandparents. We’ve always got on very well with them. Elder Son and DIL must have worked very hard to decorate the tables and cook the food, so no wonder Ethan spent half the day with one set of grandparents and then 24 hours with us. I really dig this kid, not sure why—he’s so whimsical, just like his father.
The rain will allegedly stop at noon, but in the meantime I can enjoy it. I’ll work on “Three Vignettes,” which is for the Writers’ Group, and send out the few Christmas cards I send out. I need stamps. I will also work on my Christmas newsletter, which I email to save the cost of buying $100 worth of stamps. Our family is quite far-flung.
Poor Dearly was so tired after driving to Arlington and back that we went to bed at 9 o’clock. His job today is to rest on the sofa and put the paper Christmas ornaments on the paper Christmas tree. Wishing a good day to all at the Pond!
Today I will assemble our Holiday Card list so that we can get ahead of the incoming cards with our proper address. We have had 3 addresses in the past year and a lot of our incoming cards were not delivered or were delivered months later (one was finally delivered as a forward in March). I bought cards and stamps a few weeks ago and we will send cards to people who we think might want to know our new address regardless of whether we have received a card from them in recent Decembers or not.
It’s 48 heading for 59 and while the widget sez mostly sunny, it’s mostly not right now. At least it’s light enough the PV system is actually on. Yesterday we generated a little over one KWH – which is only the 2nd worst and not the worst production day – and the m-t-d at 135.68 is not on track and not likely to catch up.
I had a nice visit with DIL & 2 grandsons when they brought me Thanksgiving dinner. About 5 of my dinners worth of food beautifully plated out on a serving platter. I ate 2 dinners worth after they left. LOL. The rest will be lunch and dinner today and tomorrow. They also brought 3 large pieces of pie, which will also last through tomorrow, a jar of homemade cranberry sauce, a jar of homemade pickled green cherry tomatoes, and a dozen ready-to-bake GF tollhouse cookies. So I’ll bake the cookies, two at a time, starting Sunday evening and sometime next week I’ll bake cranberry muffin bread. DIL was designated by all 4 of my AR grandsons to ask if we could do the Yule celebration at my house this year because they’ve really missed that. They’re all vaxxed to the max and will even wear masks if I want them to. Which I do. I was very touched and rather surprised – I thought they’d pretty much outgrown that, they certainly didn’t show much interest in decorating a tree 3 years ago – and said, under those circumstances I’d love to have the family over for Yule. I’ll probably actually eat in another room though. Which I told her and she said everybody would be fine with that. So. Something to look forward to this year.
I’m collecting – paper list LOL – the addresses of where folks are going if/when twitter goes down but I myself am not creating any new accounts unless/until I have to. Technophobe to the core. Worse than dealing with snakes or trying to darn my handmade socks. Meanwhile, since twitter is still up, I’m off to do my twitter chores. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 48 and raining outside my window today. Thanks to the family text thread we all cooked together yesterday :) It was a nice quiet day here with good music, traditional food, and lots of memories to share. All the sick ones are recovering so we are all feeling relieved and grateful.
I’m feeling restless this morning but my legs need a quiet day so that’s what I will do. As always, my best wishes to all.