Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: May 7th

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?

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.

37 Comments

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

    Morning low of 57 degrees in the Desert Southwest with an expected daytime high of 82. Sunny skies are in the forecast.

    Have a great day, all y’alls!!

  2. ADMIN NOTICE:

    I did not complete the upgrade, I forget a previous afternoon commitment on Saturday. The upgrade will be done Sunday after 12 noon Eastern Time.

  3. Sunday Meese. 45 going up to 62 here in Kingston – and the weather forecast was switched to rain for this afternoon so need to try to get the lawn mowed this morning. Tall grass isn’t good for the dogs – deer ticks abound up here.

    Puerto Rico


    Environmental Justice and Coal Ash in Puerto Rico

    The Guayama region, where many residents are Afro-Puerto Rican, has a high rate of poverty. According to the Toxic Release Inventory, this region suffers the greatest contamination of any region in Puerto Rico. The region also has among the highest unemployment and school dropout rates on the archipelago. The region experienced a sharp decrease in medical services with only one hospital currently in operation. AES-PR’s waste pile, offsite disposal of coal ash in the region, and continued reckless operation of the plant impose disproportionate public health risks to this environmental justice community.


    At 78 years old, he’s been fighting against the Navy longer than any other living Viequense, but he still doesn’t feel victorious

  4. Good morning. For a day that I had no plans, I did a lot yesterday. Today: church, breakfast for next week, and…..maybe actually nothing. Sad about the latest shooting, and the ones in — was it Ohio? — overnight. Going to enjoy the smell of my steeping tea and think about something else.

    • I see that you found and followed the Motley Moose on Mastodon! w00t w00t Toot!

      • I did. It took a couple of tries, but I did it. I just don’t like Mastadon. It is too complicated. But we need something for when Twitter dies.

        • It’s like what people in wildfire country do – have a bag packed in case you need to evacuate!

  5. It’s 73 heading for 84 and sunny at the moment. The widget says clouds are coming and possibly rain. I hope not. It’s depressing looking at the 10-day forecast. At least partly cloudy and maybe rain all the way. Yesterday we did manage to get 19 KWHs and the m-t-d is 95.8 – as long as it doesn’t get too cloudy today we’ll definitely reach 100 by day’s end.

    As of last night there was either nothing new with anybody or I wasn’t in contact with them to find out. I do need to call my sister. I just hate to bother her. My nephew should be “home” again and recovering from his 2nd round of chemo.

    My hands still have tremors but otherwise are fine. They totally love the heat. So do my feet. We’re supposed to have 80s all this week then drop back into the 70s next week. Anyway, off to do my boosting chores and enjoy the music in Dee’s diary. Holding the Good Thoughts for everybody. {{{Meeses}}}

  6. Good Sunday afternoon, Moosekind. Had a horrible night, so it was back to bed soon after breakfast to sleep until noon. Still don’t feel that great. Not being able to sleep is the pits.

    So of course I’ve done nothing today except read what I could stomach of the WaPo. Gods, how I despise the media!

    Have much to do: essays to read from the Writers’ Group, which meets next Thursday. And I have to write the vegetarian article, which I’ll do tomorrow.

    Something interesting (well, at least interesting to me) happened on Friday. A turning point was reached. I was driving through my old neighborhood, which I loved, and looked at our old house, which I also loved. I asked myself again, “If you won the lottery and could somehow buy the house back and start living here again, would you?”

    And for the first time in five years, I thought “No.” I’m used to the old folks’ home by now. I feel I’ve made a place for myself here: as High Priestess for the fantastically open-minded UUs, a devoted, dependable workhorse for the Progressives, a reporter for the Resident Pubs. quarterly, and as leader of the Blue Ridge Writers’ Group. In addition, I am now the dunce of the Karate for Seniors class!

    But anyway, I thought it was interesting, because always before I would answer “Yes, yes, lemme at that winning lottery ticket, I wanna go back and live in my much-loved house!”

    But you can’t go back, really, can you?

    Wishing a good day to all at the Pond.

    • Wonderful news about being content with your new circumstances! I already had the “I would never want to go back” the day after I closed on my house. It was a nice place to live and will always have a special place as the place where my daughter spent her formative years (she still misses it, especially the yard) but I am where I want to be.

    • Diana and Jan, those moments when we we know something to be true are important. Soglad you are both living where you know you want to be. I know I am happier here in my old house that I would be elsewhere, but I am having a time of worrying about how long we can keep up with the daily reality of living here. I guess time will help us sort that out, and if we can recognize that true moment when change is necessary we will be ok.

  7. Good afternoon, 55 and cloudy outside my window today. I woke up with plans for my day but I’ve been sidetracked with family phone calls and texts and my general lack of energy. So my lists are just sitting there and I’m trying to care! I do need to tend to some laundry and I would like a dessert for tonight’s taco dinner so I’d best get busy. Best wishes to all.

  8. The site upgrade has been done and we are now on WordPress 6.2 and an updated theme. The theme update lost my footer with newsfeeds – if there was anyone who used them, let me know and I will try to find a screen shot and add them back. The new Jetpack does not have the Twitter feed as WordPress had indicated it would not. However it now has sharing buttons including Mastodon. The Mastodon feed is now showing a cleaner list.

    • Actually, it did NOT remove the footer, it just moved the BBC feeds to the sidebar from the footer and I did not see it while my FireFox was being rebuilt (the site update blew up my FireFox and required me to reinstall it from a backup).

      I suspect that the theme upgrade limited the number of columns I can use in the footer and the BBC (as the last column) got turned into a sidebar. I will rearrange the feeds when I get back on my computer tomorrow. I am exhausted!!

    • Thank you for doing that, Jan! We love having a friendly, tension-free place to gather each morning with our coffee. So thank you bigly!

    • Thank you, Jan. Your work keeping the Moose Pond going is greatly appreciated.

    • I’m always last to arrive, but I do so with appreciation. Thank you Jan.

  9. Monday Meese. 52 going up to 74 here in Kingston. Nice weather to head out to doctor’s visit this morning and to do some farm stand shopping for plants for my garden.

    Puerto Rico

    When Hurricane Fiona hit Puerto Rico on September 18, 2022, the U.S. colony had still not fully recovered from Hurricanes Irma and Maria, in 2017. Collapsed bridges had not been rebuilt, houses still lacked roofs, and most recovery funds had not been distributed.
    Fiona’s rains only added to the woes, causing house collapses on the interior part of the island, devastating mudslides, and a widespread power outage that lasted for weeks. There was no drinking water: The Puerto Rico Aqueducts and Sewers Authority failed to acquire power generators before the storm hit, and drinking water or sewage systems run mainly on electricity. Simple tasks such as getting gas for the generator (for those who had one) or obtaining drinking water could take a whole day—and become life-and-death situations for people with chronic illnesses who needed ventilators or refrigerated insulin.
    The three hurricanes severely impacted the island’s wellbeing. But their effects aren’t simply the result of intense storms. These “natural disasters” are political, stemming from a long colonial history culminating in years of austerity imposed by the U.S. With federal and local government support at a standstill, people in the colony are pulling together to make things better. Mutual aid groups and rural water systems have driven recovery pathways across the island, creating a new model for effective disaster recovery.

  10. Good morning, meeses! Monday …

    It is 59 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 88. Sunny skies are in the forecast. We will have a couple days with above average, a couple of days right around average and then we hit the 90s again for a few days. Eventually May will mainly be upper 80s low 90s for highs.

    Republican politicians seem to suggest that white supremacy and neo-nazism is “mental illness” – the cause of mass gun violence – instead of violent extremism that they embrace and promote. There is some mental illness but there is a boatload of ginned up anger and resentment that the MAGAts and Fox feed red meat to daily.

    I can’t read much news yet as I have to reconstruct my browser settings after FireFox got trashed by some kind of incompatibility introduced while I was working on my upgrade. The worst part is losing stored passwords – it is a PITA to dig them all up and enter them again. I never had a web site blow up my browser so that was a learning experience – I will do the next upgrade on one of my other computers.

    See all y’all later!

  11. Good morning. Two mass murder events in my state in under 24 hours. And yet we carry on. So — I got my walk done in the steam bath that is the outdoors right now. Going to have to start wearing shorts for the walk. Anyway, in the office. Must stay awake all day.

  12. Good Monday morning, Moosekind! Poor old Croaky has never been able to see the Flower Moon, even in its waning stage, because it appears at an hour when she’s supposed to be asleep. Bummer, but first-world problem.

    I can’t read anything but the headlines in the front section of the WaPo. I’m so bloody sick of the WaPo. “Most” people are against trans people? Not in my world. Biden’s polls are at “an all-time low?” That’s only because WaPo stenographers resolutely refuse to interview anyone but Trumpanzees. Idiots!

    Meanwhile, a busy day looms ahead: finish the vegetarian article, do some laundry, and read through my writers’ offerings tonight.

    Wishing a good day to all at the Pond and let us pray that no attention-seeking, suicidal incel will kill people today.

    • Yes, the WaPo and NYTimes reporters are spending all their time in rural diners interviewing “Real Americans”, ones who don’t like Those People. Not to say that Biden is not popular in the popularity polls, but those polls don’t vote and when push comes to shove Biden v tRump, the rematch, will likely have the same outcome – this time without the bloody riot on January 6th.

      (Note: The Preview button and box do not work under the new WordPress version. I will be looking for a replacement).

  13. It’s 70 heading for 88 and sunny at the moment. Clouds are supposed to move in around noon, stay through what would otherwise be prime production time, then move off again for a couple of hours in the late afternoon. That was the pattern yesterday and we did at least get 16 KWHs and brought the m-t-d to 111.

    I talked to my sister yesterday. Grant had teeth issues last week – abscess & a necessary root canal – that had to be dealt with before he could start his 2nd round of chemo. Today will be the last day of this 2nd round. Apparently all his pain had been caused by the teeth. After 3 solid hours of dental stuff he went from “opioids don’t touch it” to “not even an aspirin needed” – even when he started the chemo again. When it comes to “the Big C” nobody is going to act like there’s no problem, but nobody is handing out the gloom/doom with Grant either. Apparently hormones tell the tale when it comes to testicular cancer & a number that should be 10 and started at 24000 before he started any treatment at all was at 1000 before he started this 2nd round of chemo.

    I’ve got laundry going. It’s now too hot for fires so I need to do it in the morning and get it hung outside. The grass is more than ankle deep. The lawn guy isn’t due until Thursday at the earliest. But if I want clean underwear next week, I’ve got to do laundry this week. LOL. But while it’s in the machine, I’ll get started on my online boosting chores. Holding the Good Thoughts for everybody. {{{Meeses}}}

  14. Good morning, 53 and partly sunny. I hope to follow Dee’s lead and visit a garden shop today. I had plans to start flower seeds earlier this spring but that was derailed by my dental woes, so now I’m going to have to buy plants. I don’t want to spend very much money for what I know will be a deer buffet so I’m trying to be creative with limited choices. Best wishes to all.

  15. Tuesday Meese.45 going up to 67 here in Kingston.
    Watching people try to dismiss, deny, avoid the idea of Latino white supremacists –

    Decided I would write about this for Thursday’s Caribbean Matters

    • It is telling that the MAGAts first screamed “Mexican gang member!” before it turned out to be one of their own. That is why the “monolithic Latino vote” is such bs – Florida 2020 and 2022 proved that many Latinos will vote to enable the authoritarian regime because they hate Blacks and women and people who need help to live.

  16. Puerto Rico

  17. Good morning. Watching astronomy, eating breakfast, so glad I have these 2 wfh days. Going to get my walk in later this morning. A bill to raise the age to buy assault rifles to 21 actually made it out of committee here yesterday, but the House Speaker says he won’t bring it to the floor. Because guns are more important to him than people.

  18. Good morning, meeses! Tuesday …

    It is 59 degrees in Tucson with an expected daytime high of 90 (feels like 84). Sunny skies are in the forecast.

    The senseless slaughter in Texas is heart rending. I read the stories about some of the victims because we can’t forget the lives snuffed out by Republican worship of guns even though we can’t do anything. Pro-gun politicians have a lock hold on our democratic institutions and there is no shooting event that they would ever find “too much.” Even their own getting shot at a Congressional baseball game did not bring a single Republican call for tougher gun laws! We need an assault weapon ban. And about that “mental illness” claim? Campos:

    One problem I have with the whole “mental illness” frame for talking about mass shooters, is that the “mental illness” often appears to be garden variety authoritarian ethno-nationalist misogyny, with the misogyny being the really critical ideological lynchpin.

    By the way, Republicans don’t like paying for health care – how do they think mental health is to be addressed?

    Still trying to unbury from my unscheduled repair of FireFox, my blogging browser. My own impatience made it worse – after taking a break from it and writing down all the options, it turned out to be a fairly simple process. Thank goodness for backups, though. I have two projects that I think I can get done in a leisurely way – last week I had some appointments, this week I only have one place I have to be and it is not until Friday.

    See all y’all later!

    • I wanted to attach this here so I can find it later. It is related to a story I was reading about press complicity in the Donald J. Trump presidency and how they seem ready to do it again. A suggestion:

      Every general press account of Trump should begin with a descriptor something like “Donald Trump, the former president who staged an unsuccessful coup after being defeated in the 2020 election …”

  19. Good Tuesday morning, Meese. After coyly flirting with the forecast, the rain has finally begun. Thank you, Yemaya! We’re still at 4 and 1/2 inches under for the normal rainfall to date.

    Had another rotten night. We’re supposed to go to a meet-and-greet morning coffee for our building’s residents at 10. Don’t think we’ll make it on time, as we are just finishing breakfast. We both had such rotten nights that we tried to catch up on our sleep, not very successfully in my case.

    Today is THE DAY! I do hope Dr. Lee can help me. I have no referral, she’s out of my network, but the ENT that is IN my network was useless.

    We’ll set off at 12:30. Dearly is driving as the directions are complicated.

    Wish me luck, Meese, and I’m wishing all of you at the Pond a good day.

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