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”, Motley Meese! The week begins …
Morning low of 46 degrees in the Desert Southwest with an expected daytime high of 77. Sunny skies are in the forecast.
Have a great day, all y’alls!!
Good Sunday Meese. 42 going up to 50 with rain later today. Now that embeds are working again I can post Puerto Rico news.
The Planning Board stopped the work on a recreational area next to the building on August 4, 2021. That same month, that agency filed a lawsuit the same month. On February 14, 2022, the Court of First Instance ordered the Sol y Playa Condominium Owners Council to demolish the structure, remove the debris, and restore the affected area to its natural state.
The construction of the facility, which was devastated by Hurricane María in 2017, triggered protests and confrontations with the police. Protests intensified after a photo revealed that a stranded Hawksbill turtle -which had come to nest- was inside the construction.
Remembering the protests:
Dee, this is amusing:
Gosh, imagine not wanting to join the racist, trigger-happy, socially backward USA!
It’s nice to hear that Vieques is getting something, even if not a full-fledged hospital.
P. R. might consider trying Singapore’s approach to education in public schools: Everyone, without exception, must study English (this is a hangover from Colonial times), but also must choose another language, whether Mandarin, Malay, or Tamil. Singapore is 70 percent overseas Chinese, with Malays and Tamils bringing up the slack, and a small proportion of “Europeans” bringing up the rear.
Seems to work well over there, and Singapore is of course an island, just as P.R. is.
Over the years there have been major political battles over what language would be used in the school system. Currently – school is taught in Spanish.
This is a BIG issue. Here’s an article that explains it
Good morning. So glad I went to the party last night. Got to hug the Best Representative Ever (that’s his official title and I will fight anyone who says different) Lloyd Doggett. And talk to my former state rep, who is also the best. He is Jewish, moved to Texas from Brooklyn in the ‘70s because of an AmeriCorps assignment and we are so lucky he did. Anyway, we talked about the rise in antisemitism and the war…. Not cheerful topics, but I adore Elliott, so any conversation is good. Now: tea steeping, watching the news.
M’Daughter has also been very enthusiastic about Lloyd Doggett! Of course she doesn’t live in Austin proper now. The Hills apparently is a little portion of bright red Lakeway.
Never mind, they’re showing their house in The Hills today. My poor angel is going to suffer culture shock, moving from Texas to Massachusetts. She’s not used to cold. However, like me, she’s so liberal she can hardly get to sleep at night, so she should fit right in as far as local politics is concerned.
Posted:
Good Sunday morning, Moosekind! We woke up to Brigadoon, Season 2, this morning. Fog pearls still decorate the screens on the porch: don’t know when the rain will begin. It’s 45 F. in Ashburn right now, going up to 54 F. or so.
Have been buried under an avalanche of chores. Today I have to fill six Christmas bags for the people in our hallway, send 16 emails of my newsletter to my dearest friends, and go shopping before the rain begins big time. I’m so exhausted I could just utter one scree-am. After all, the energy I used to have just isn’t there any more. And there’s still laundry! And gift-wrapping for Dear Friend’s and Youngest Grandchild’s presents.
Have discovered an excellent reason for lifting weights at the gym in addition to walking on the treadmill. Weights are boring (I can read my Kindle while I’m treading), but very useful in mitigating a certain aspect of physiology better left undescribed.
Whipped up an apple cake for dessert last night and it was delicious. We Zoomed with our sister-in-law in Melbourne, Oz, last night. For her it was morning. She seems very frail to me, although she does water aerobics five days a week and walks a lot. The four nieces are apparently quarreling over their father’s ashes. Seems a strange thing to fight about, but perhaps I didn’t get it right. My hearing is not the best, after all.
Well, it’s time to be off and doing, Moosekind! Hope everyone at the Pond will have a good day.
It was about 26 when I started housecleaning and 36 when I called it done. Going up to 56 today and blessedly sunny again. Yesterday we generated 1.2 KWHs and are at 81.6 for the m-t-d. sigh.
House is more or less clean, the spare chairs are out of the places they normally reside, most of the cat stuff is out of the living area, the new HVAC filters are in. I’ll move their food dishes and such just before folks get here. My son will be coming early to help me turn the mattress and clean the computer (which hasn’t been done since September 2022). I expect the rest of the family anytime between 4 and 6. That being the way my family rolls. When they get here I’ll turn the HVAC fan on constant and open the east window an inch (the fire should be going by then). We’ll all stay masked until the fan’s been running at least 15 minutes. Then, as long as we maintain a certain amount of “social distance” we should be safe to unmask and eat. I hope.
Meanwhile, I need to get my boosting done before the computer shuts down for cleaning. Holding the Good Thoughts for everybody. {{{Meeses}}}
Do you have a lot of Covid down there, bfitz?
Probably. We also have an R supermajority in the ledge as well as in our federal delegation and all state-wide elected officials who are anti-vaxx, anti-mask, and are keeping as much data as possible from getting out.
Scumbags.
Good morning, 36 and partly cloudy outside my window today. I should be sewing but I’m procrastinating, and that’s not good. Creativity, focus and energy are elusive this year. Oh well, I’ll muddle on regardless.
Sad news from Fairhaven this morning…..one of the oldest buildings burned last night so Tony’s Coffee shop and Harris St Cafe are gone. My oldest memories of being in Fairhaven are in that building with my little kids so feels like part of my history is gone as well. It was the heart of Fairhaven, just across the street from the bookstore. I’ll be in Fairhaven later today so will pay my quiet respect for what was there and hope that whatever comes next will be a proper replacement. Best wishes to all.
That’s sad, princesspat! It hurts to lose physical reminders of the memories.
Monday Meese. Raining here – 52 going up to 56.
Puerto Rico
I was glad to see that the embed issue on Twitter was just a technical glitch and not a plan to eliminate them entirely. A lot of news sites looked odd without the embeds – many people’s entire articles revolve around an embedded tweet that if it doesn’t show is an empty space with words that make no sense!
I still hope that someone buys Twitter, drives out the nazis, and returns it to its previous use. I suspect that Melon might consider it after the election – right now he wants the $44 billion megaphone to promote his world view and candidates who support it. I see a lot of the people I like to follow on BlueSky but it is not open so you can’t share skeets.
Good morning. Hurrah for a 4 day workweek! Did my walk/run, cold enough for my big fleece. I actually improved my time a little, yay! In the office today and Thursday, hoping people are too busy with holiday stuff to call. Woke up at 3:45, tossed & turned and gave up at 4:15. Sigh. But, hey my walk/run went well so there’s that.
Good morning, meeses! Monday …
It is 50 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 72. Partly cloudy skies are in the forecast. This morning the skies over the mountains were cloudy and I was not able to see any stars.
I was following a conversation on BlueSky about Democrats not liking Biden and it turns out that it is bulldung! Color me surprised that people are forming narratives based on the media pushing the horserace storyline. Democrats have an 83% favorability rating of Joe Biden, pretty much in line with Democratic presidents in the past. The 2024 polls right now are click bait and we have to remind people of that so that they don’t get discouraged amid the barrage of what looks like bad news. When the primaries are over and the stark choice is Joe Biden or Donald Trump, the polls will be more meaningful. I hold out hope that the American people won’t really choose a guy who quotes Hitler and says that “American blood” will be “poisoned” by allowing immigrants to come to our country and stay in our country. First, there is no “American blood” – we are a melting pot of nationalities and races. When they say “American blood” they mean white christian blood and anyone who uses the phrase is a white christian nationalist and should be shunned. Biden’s campaign is right to shed a spotlight on this – it is un-American and people who support tRump because of the tax cuts and deregulation should be splattereed with it. Shame on them!
I have a very busy day and week; I need to organize projects for the end of the year. A lot of people will be off next week and it will be a great time to catch up on projects. I do, however, need to make sure I have all the information I need from them before the world goes into the holiday break physically and mentally.
See all y’all later!
Yeah, I wanted to ask that guy if he ever talked to people who aren’t young white men. Then he started with the “look what happened to Bernie” crap, and I was done.
It’s 36 heading for 47 and sunny. What looks like the last sunny day for the year. sigh. Yesterday we generated 6.1 KWHs. The m-t-d at 87.6 at least didn’t lose any ground.
It was so nice to have the family over yesterday evening. They started showing up at 6 and left a little before 11. This year we got turkey and stuffing but nobody brought sides (except cranberry sauce. Lots of pre-dinner snacking stuff like cheese, crackers, nuts, pickles, & olives. Lots of dessert-ish stuff with candy, cookies, peanut butter fudge, and chocolate cupcakes. So I grabbed a bag of sweet corn out of the freezer and streamed that. Guys don’t eat much in the way of veggies anyway. A 1-lb package and 8 people at table and there’s still a serving left. LOL. The wreath is up and decorated. The windows and front door also. You could say I’ve done my holidays and now am waiting out the rest of 2023. (And good riddance.)
Didn’t get to bed until almost 1 and had a sinusitis flare so I’m running short on sleep. And running late on boosting. So I’d best get to it. Holding the Good Thoughts for everybody. {{{Meeses}}}
This is exactly why I dislike potlucks. One year a Witch promised to bring bread and at the last minute changed her mind and brought spinach-crab dip. What were we supposed to dip in it?
After that I forbade the bringing of anything that wasn’t drinks or dessert. Most can manage not to screw up those!
Tuesday Meese. 33 going up to 40 here in Kingston – and it will be sunny.
Puerto Rico
Good morning. I actually slept in, pretty nice. Getting ready for wfh, watching astronomy. Hope everyone has a good day.
Good morning, meeses! Tuesday …
It is 55 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 68. Mostly cloudy skies this morning with some sunshine this afternoon. Winter starts in a couple of days on the calendar and here in the Old Pueblo. Rain, with snow in the mountains, and highs in the upper 50s are the forecast for Friday and Saturday.
Bad news: the dismantling of the Confederate monument at Arlington Cemetery, an insult to everyone who fought for the United States and is buried there, has been halted – I guess so people can stop by with Confederate flags and demand that America be a white christian nation with white christian males in charge. I hope the judge’s order is overridden soon to get that abomination removed.
I have an online meeting in 10 minutes that I have to prep for.
See all y’all later!
It’s 27 heading for 52 and sunny at the moment but the widget says that’s going to change soon. Yesterday we generated 6.2 KWHs. The m-t-d is at 93.88 so if we can just do it again today (ahem) we’ll reach 100 by sundown.
There was much less dust and gunk in my computer than the last time my son cleaned it so I guess what I’m doing to protect it is working. Cranberry walnut muffin bread in the oven. Laundry this afternoon. And now starting my boosting day. Hoping my cold stiff fingers will cooperate. Holding the Good Thoughts for everybody. {{{Meeses}}}
Good morning, 45 and raining. Busy day yesterday, but the last package is in the mail and the problems with my sewing project are solved so I should finish today. I was at the lab too, and thankfully my coumadin levels are finally more stable. And thanks to our son the backdoor has new hinges so it is closing properly again. It was a fiddly job as the porch has settled making the frame slightly crooked, so the door has to adjust. Elsa stayed busy keeping her eye on our progress :)
Time to get busy…..as always my best wishes to all.
Good morning, meeses! Wednesday …
It is 53 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 64. It is cloudy now and we are expecting rain. I don’t know if they have attempted to predict how much – they are pretty bad at it so I would ignore them anyway. They did say that there might be as much as a foot of snow on Mount Lemmon. That would be nice – I enjoy seeing the snowcapped mountain in the distance.
Colorado Supreme Court bans insurrectionist from the ballot! It will be interesting to see how SCOTUS rules. They may be having quite a bit of tRump fatigue and be willing to move past him. They got what they wanted – lifetime seats on the highest court – and any generic terrible Republican president will be able to continue dismantling government regulation and banning help for the poors without all the nazi drama. It will be interesting to see what they do. Colorado is not a swing state and tRump was unlikely to win the general election there so either way it is not going to change the election outcome. Now if Michigan had let their challenge stand, that would be a whole ‘nother thing.
I have a project I need to get done before the sun comes up so I best get back to it.
See all y’all later!
It’s a nippy 25 here in Kingston, going up to 41.
Puerto Rico
On December 10, more than 4,000 people filled the main hall at the Puerto Rico Convention Center in San Juan for the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP)’s annual general assembly, with thousands more attending virtually. A latent sense of hope filled the air. Kicking off with two hours of pro-independence protest songs performed by musicians and artists from across the nation, the event’s main purpose was the ratification of the party’s 2024 electoral candidates.
“We have to lead with truth, with the message that we the government want to return to the people the dignity they deserve,” said Juan Dalmau, making a heartfelt case for ratifying his political program. “And that government is the Patria Nueva.” Dalmau, Puerto Rico’s most visible political figure, received support from the assembly to run for governor in the November 2024 election.
The 2023 assembly represented a change in the PIP’s strategy compared to previous electoral exercises: for the first time in Puerto Rican history, the PIP set aside its ideological differences with other sectors of the nation’s progressive left to form an electoral alliance with the Citizens Victory Movement (MVC), a relatively new left-wing/progressive coalition. La Alianza—as the alliance, ratified by the assembly, is known—seeks to overcome the ills of the colonial duopoly rule by which the pro-statehood New Progressive Party (PNP) and the pro-status quo Popular Democratic Party (PPD) have historically shared power. La Alianza’s eventual horizon, however, is much greater: both parties seek the nation’s eventual decolonization.
Good morning! “Seeking to become a senator for the PIP” and so it will be
More than a year after including the defunct Ochoa Fertilizer company on the National Priorities List of its Superfund program, the cleanup of contaminated land in Barriada Esperanza in Guanica, coordinated by the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), has yet to begin.
The federal agency had estimated that emergency cleanup work would begin in July of this year and has continued to postpone the start date, found an investigation by the Center for Investigative Journalism (CPI). The most recent date offered by the agency is January 2024 for the decontamination of the yards of 19 properties in the slum.
Part of this community, one of the most affected by the 2020 earthquakes, has been contaminated for more than three decades by polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other substances as a result of industrial activity in the area. According to data from Estudios Técnicos published in February 2023, 44% of the residences in the neighborhood were vacant or underutilized. In its streets there are still houses that collapsed four years ago, there is rubble over which a layer of vegetation grows and a sepulchral silence reigns most of the time. Guánica is the town with one of the highest poverty levels in Puerto Rico, and the one that has lost the most population over the past 10 years.
Good morning. The water went out in my complex last night, reminding me of the old days in Dubai (I lived there long before it became the luxurious hot spot it is now). They say it should come back on soon. For now, I’m enjoying astronomy and eating breakfast. One of the people I follow is a former lawyer, who clerked for a federal judge and at SCOTUS. She is worried about the Colorado decision giving SCOTUS a way to affirm the “independent state legislature” theory.
Good Wednesday morning, Moosekind! Haven’t checked in for a while, owing to the necessity of rushing off to various places in the MORNING. It’s a frosty blue morning in Ashburn right now, with the sun beginning to gild the woods. Currently it’s 30 F., going up to 44 F. At least those gnarly winds have died down, after blowing all the covers off my porch furniture.
DIL took Nora to Tokyo on Monday. They’re flying back on Saturday. What is this madness? They couldn’t have gone to New Orleans, Montreal, Seattle, Charleston, or Savannah?
Younger Son had a meeting yesterday which necessitated his absence from the house from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m., so we picked up Karl, took him to Virginia Kitchen for breakfast, then brought him back here. He’s been perfectly happy playing endless games on his iPad. I offered him a chance to make money by doing a household chore, but he appears to be more interested in playing games than doing work.
On Monday we went to a huge, lovely luncheon prepared by our British friend, and after we returned home were in a state of torpor. Now I know how pythons feel after swallowing goats. She’s going to be 90 on December 27, so we gave her a couple of presents to open and brought her a beautiful Christmas bouquet of red, green, and white.
Dearly has to take Karl home pretty soon because he has a play date with someone at some time today. Younger Son and his family are nothing if not vague. Yesterday was another useless day in terms of getting anything done. I must do things today.
Tonight I have a Girls’ Dinner at a restaurant near the gym where I work out (sometimes). Will have to stuff myself into some clothes and try to look agreeable. Dearly will stay home, which he’d rather do anyway, and nuke a Hungry Man dinner.
That’s all I have for now, except to mourn the looming absence of the columnists who make reading the Metro section of the WaPo worthwhile. John Kelly, my favorite, and Courtland Milloy, will be gone after Friday. They’ve taken the buyout. If any more leave, I’ll only be looking at the back page to see the rainfall deficit (currently 8 inches).
Wishing a good day and unbroken fingernails to all at the Pond.