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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Good morning, Meese! It’s 41 F. here in NoVa on a sunny Thor’s Day, going up to 63 F. eventually. Jan, sounds as if our weather is a lot better than yours. At least we don’t have wind! Lots of daffodils, forsythia, and flowering trees, though. That groundhog was right, we’re having an early spring.
Not being a fan of St. Patrick, I’ll be wearing my snake earrings today. Paddy is reputed to have driven all the snakes out of Ireland and we all know what that means. The same forces are at work today trying to denigrate Hillary, who has won more primaries than any other woman ever has in American history. Lysis over at Orange has a nice diary about that today.
In other news, darling niece is coming for coffee this morning; I need to do some shopping for the Ladies’ Afternoon Tea I’m hostessing on Saturday; and I wrote the first scene of the March Fiction Cafe story last night. I hope the FBI never looks at my hard drive, I’m researching some pretty weird stuff! :)
Wishing all a nice green day!
Left work early yesterday because I was so sleepy I was worried about keeping my eyes open. Went to bed at 9. Woke up every 2 hours….. ugh. Eating my oatmeal & drinking tea that cannot be strong enough. Oh – and it is too warm to wear shoes with socks, so I ditched my shamrock socks for green sandals. Green t-shirt, yellow (gold) capris, Celtic earrings.
Beannachtai na Feile Padraig Dhuit — which means St Patrick’s Day blessings to you. (This Irish sentiment should be pronounced as BAN-ukh-tee nuh FAY-leh PAH-drig gwitch. — because that dh is obviously meant to be pronounced “gw”). I think of the day less about the legend, which is bunk, and more about my ancestors
this link takes you to a whole concert from my boys in 1982 on St Patrick’s Day 1982, at the Ritz in New York – Bono recently said of that show that they thought playing the Ritz meant they were real punk rockers. giggle
back to the thing about St Patrick’s day — I remember an interview with my boys way back — it may have been that 1982 tour, where someone asked them about SPD & they said they found the American celebration bewildering. What they described the day like for them sounded more like our Thanksgiving. Sadly, our way of celebrating has invaded over there now
Many years ago I asked an Irishwoman what they do about St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland. She looked at me like I was nuts and said, “We go to mass. It’s a saint’s day.” I chose my current last name when I was a practicing RC and have kind of regretted it for multiple reasons. If it weren’t such a pain in the wazoo to change one’s last name, I’d make it Kilbride. Oh well, bfitzinAR at least has the punniness being close to befits in AR – bkilinAR would probably weird everybody out. Have a Happy day whether or not you are celebrating anything about Padriag.
Started the day at 38, 50 now, and heading for 65. Also started sunny but the clouds are moving in. Saying rain tomorrow rather than Saturday and the chances of snow has been kicked out a week but still looking at a possible freeze early Sunday morning that I’m not happy about. Springtime in the Ozarks (backed up 6 weeks due to global warming). {{{HUGS}}}
beautiful from NASA:
https://twitter.com/NASA/status/710475534950604800
and another one:
https://twitter.com/astro_timpeake/status/710458913888583680
Good morning, 36 and sunny in Bellingham today. I have a very green garden with lots of moss and ferns growing but he temperature is still to chilly to plant my containers. I have a red pot full of yellow primroses on the front porch, and hellebore are blooming in the pots by the back entrance so that will do for now.
We were at a three school orchestra concert last night. The gym bleachers are not comfortable seating but seeing the room full of young musicians was wonderful. Emma plays violin and her group performed a Japanese folk song. She starts high school next year and has decided not to continue with orchestra but she has enjoyed her middle school music programs.
Good morning, meese! Friday …
It is 35 degrees in Madison on its way up to 43. Cloudy skies are in the forecast.
Tomorrow is the Equinox for me! I was curious last night and googled it, wondering if it was the 20th or 21st this year and found that it is the 19th, specifically at 11:30pm CDT. That would be 12:30am on the 20th for most of you and 9:30pm tomorrow for princesspat. So an “early” spring it will be … except for the weather which will not get back into the 50s until midweek.
Lindsey Graham, who said that Trump or Cruz would be the death of the Republican Party, one like being poisoned and one like being shot, has decided to endorse Cruz. No clarification on whether he chose the bullet or the poison. Rubio is working out the details of a Cruz endorsement and it will probably involve some sort of nopology; little Marco did rule out being a vice president on any ticket saying he wants to spend his remaining days in the Senate destroying what’s left of our constitutional form of government by opposing the Merrick Garland nomination.
I have a few pieces to put up in Dee’s post with the Elijah Cummings take down of Gov. Rick Snyder and the president’s interview with NPR on the Garland nomination to put into the Garland post. Harry Reid also spoke yesterday at CAP and I have video.
The president is telling Democratic Party donors that it is time to rally around Hillary Clinton. I wish he, or another prominent Democrat, would tell Bernie Sanders to tone down his attacks on Hillary. If Bernie wants a President Trump or a President Cruz, he couldn’t have a better game plan. p.s. their “plan” to win the nomination now includes winning New York by 20 points – the latest poll shows Hillary winning 71 to 23.
See all y’all later!
Thanks Jan – that was a rush post – just wanted to ensure folks knew the hearings were happening.
I had the hearing video up in a tab but never had time to flip over to it. I caught up later and was glad to see your post.
Good morning Meese
My spring break is next week (YAY) 43 here going up to 52. We’ve been having bad thunderstorms last few days – my dogs freak out.
Trying to keep up with the SCOTUS nom, Flint, POTUS trip to Cuba, primaries…
Liked this news story
President Obama Empowers Women Who Are Standing Up Against Online Harassment
“One thing I’ve been thinking about this past week is the unique challenges women face in the virtual world” said Obama.
“Last Friday, I was at South by Southwest, where the epidemic of online harassment was a topic of discussion. We know that women gamers face harassment and stalking and threats of violence from other players. When they speak out about their experiences, they’re attacked on Twitter and other social media outlets, even threatened in their homes.”
Crap – just saw this
Northeast Could Get Foot of Snow on 1st Day of Spring
The official start of spring this weekend could be marked in the Northeast with about a foot of snow, according to NBC News.
It is cold here and we barely avoided snow a few days ago. This does not surprise me.
Happy Freya’s Day, Moosekind! It’s 37 F. here on a sunny morning here in NoVa, going up to 66 F. later today. We are supposed to receive “wet, heavy flakes” on the grass during the small hours of Sunday morning. We shall see. Not sure why I bother with weather reports, they’re so inaccurate.
Busy day ahead getting ready for the afternoon tea tomorrow. Wish it were going to be warmer on Saturday, but oh, well.
It’s interesting that the hacktivists at Anonymous have now targeted Trump. Who’d have thought that our democracy would be hijacked by a trash-talking thug like The Donald? But y’know, this has been in the works for a long time. Remember how Dubya cheated during the “debates” with a box on his back under his suit jacket, whispering answers to him cuz Dubya wadn’t rill, rill bright? Remember how anyone from the opposing party was thrown out of Dubya’s little rallies when he was campaigning? I hope all the crap that’s going to come down means the end of the Rethug party. It’s about time.
The Republicans are scurrying around like rats on a sinking ship trying to decide what to do with Trump. He is the Frankenstein monster they created and they refuse to take responsibility for him. A Stonekettle Tweet this morning:
The “Cruz is our savior” meme has me a bit itchy, though. Cruz is probably worse than Trump but you wonder if this is an attempt to move the Overton Window enough so that Ted Cruz looks “reasonable” or “acceptable”. I take solace in the fact that the only reason that Cruz v Clinton national matchups show a tight race is because people don’t see the name “Cruz” – they see the name “Not Trump”. Once they see his awful plans for America, they will not be able to pull that lever either.
I watched Rachel interview Bernie last night. Nothing spectacular. I had the temerity to tweet to her that she should ask Bernie about the Sierra Blanca nuclear waste facility & his rude dismissal of poor people who traveled halfway across the country to ask this supposed progressive to not dump Vermont’s nuclear waste in their area. I spent the rest of the evening blocking Bernie Bros, getting several rude/sexist etc responses. Made friends with a nice Bernie supporter, though. We agreed that we can disagree civilly.
It is still way too warm for March here. We’re supposed to get severe weather this evening — hail & stuff. And there’s all kinds of science news — the Hubble thing (found the largest sample of very massive stars identified to date) and a possible new particle found by the LHC. It might be heavier than the Higgs, it might be a graviton. It might be nothing.
So, happy Friday. And I swear I’m exercising this weekend.
Happy Friday! It’s 40-something now and overcast, rain due in a few hours and we might or might not make it to the low 50s today. Weather fits my mood. Today Daddy would be 94 if he hadn’t killed himself at 50 and 4 years ago today my Scotty cat went over the Rainbow Bridge. Tomorrow is Tricia’s memorial – the Peeps are doing an online memorial at the same time (10 EDT) for those of use who can’t attend. Kind of fits though, the end of whatever you want to call the season that stops at the equinox – because one of my Austin grandsons will be 7 on the 20th and my youngest sisters will be 57 on the 21st, starting the next part of the wheel pleasantly.
President Obama’s choice sounds like a good one – not as liberal as we’d like, but definitely not bad. I doubt recall petitions have a snowball’s chance in hell of even getting enough speed to make a point, but I’d certainly sign a recall petition on any senator (like both of mine) who refused to even hold hearings. That really is part of their constitutional duty that they are being paid almost 6x my salary for a lot fewer days at work already.
I hope I can get these blasted pieces of paper off my desk today – it’s all very well to send me reminders to deal with them, but if you don’t provide me the information I need to do it… Will try to get back and read about the Flint hearings today. If not, at least I know it will still be here when I can. Spring Break next week but that’s for students and faculty, staff get Friday off. At leas it will be quieter with the students gone. Have the good day, whatever your weather. {{{HUGS}}}
It will not roll off the Featured Posts list very quickly. :)
Good morning, 35 and clear skies in Bellingham. It’s a quiet morning here….Ron is in Seattle with our grandson and I’m going to the pool. Reading around the internet and watching tv news programs has given me a good case of the Bernie Blues. He’ll be in Seattle on Sunday :::sigh:::
Bernie Sanders heading for Seattle rally on Sunday
His opposition to the Export-Import Bank is not in Wa State’s best interest, but that doesn’t seem to matter to his supporters.
Sanders’ wrong-way trade policy bad for Washington businesses, workers
I’ve got some desk work I have to do this morning, then I hope being outdoors this afternoon will chase the blues away.
He needs to rethink his scorched-Hillary strategy. It is not going to help us in November for him to make the case to his supporters that she is too corrupt to be president.
I am naively surprised re his anti Hillary rhetoric…..I expected better of him. I’ll be pleasantly surprised if HRC wins the caucus vote in Wa State. She has unified support from elected Dems, but the socialist/libertarian vote is growing in this state and they will be motivated to vote. I really don’t want to go to the local caucus but I’ve pre- registered and will go regardless.
I am fairly confident that he will win in Wisconsin. The “can’t bother to vote in midterms” crowd is quite enamored with the magic unicorning surrounding Bernism. Tough pragmatic choices? Not for them!! Voting for down ticket Democrats? NOT IF THEY ARE NOT PURE!!!!
He needs a 50 point win here and he won’t get that. But I hope they all show up to vote so we can get our Supreme Court candidate elected.
Morning all! Finally got some real rain here yesterday, so it’s less dry air today, better for my sinuses.
I didn’t watch the Bernie interview on Maddow, but what I gathered from following it on Twitter is that he said he will stay in the race all the way to the convention, AND confirmed that his current path to victory involves stealing Hillary’s pledged delegates. Not just superdelegated, but pledged delegates, the ones we have voted on – a, that is insane and could not ever happen, and b, some democratic process, Bernie. He has sunk even lower in my estimation – and apparently Maddow just ate it up with no critical questions. He also said that if he won the election, he’d ask President Obama to withdraw Merrick Garland’s nomination so he could name his own nominee. I would imagine he is about on Obama’s last nerve at this point.
But it would do no good for any Democrat – with the possible exception of Warren – to “have a talk” with Bernie at this point – he’s addicted to the adulation now, and since he’s not a Democrat, he doesn’t care what damage he does to the party. He’s the fox in the henhouse, and destruction is a byproduct of his purity trolling all of us. I just can’t stand the man now. And now I see he just walked out of a local interview in AZ when the questions got round to Arpaio, lol. He’s such a putz.
Favorite poll answer of the day (which I see Denise saw as well on twitter lol): 41% of likely Trump voters want to bomb Agrabah, the fictional city in Disney’s “Aladdin”. That about sums it up, doesn’t it? I’m reading a really good scholarly/popular history by a Cambridge historian (Evans I think the name is) on the rise of the THird Reich – I wanted to see if there are any parallels or even similarities with what is going on with the rise of Trump and the other authoritarian Republicans. I’ll report back when I finish, but so far (haven’t gotten past WWI yet) it occurs to me that one of the many big differences, and the one that may save us, is the diversity of our population – the Germans really only had the Jews, who were a tiny, tiny minority in the country, like less that 5% if I remember what I read last night. In contrast, our POC’s are going to be majority probably in my lifetime, and are probably the key to saving their country.
OK, on a happier note, today Netflix released the second season of Daredevil! I loved the first season, have watched it multiple times, so I’m hoping this one is as good – my biggest challenge will be spreading it out and not watching it all at once this weekend! Have a great day everyone!
This: “I would imagine he is about on Obama’s last nerve at this point.” I think so too!
Nancy LaTourneau in WaMo What Happened to the Revolution?
I did not watch The Rachel Maddow Show but some of my friends said it was quite worrisome as he simply wants to take his negative politics of personal attacks all the way to the convention. I noticed that Dee got into the “conversation” on Twitter. :)
Even more disgusting than going after superdelegates, whose very existence he keeps saying is undemocratic, is going after Hillary’s pledged delegates! I voted for Hillary in Florida, and now Bernie wants to negate my vote by taking the Hillary delegates I voted for? It’s both ludicrous and revealing – he is simply a charlatan now.
But Geordie! Those delegates don’t count because they are in the Old South!!! Hillary is running for president of the New Confederacy!!! If it weren’t so disgusting, it would be comical.
By the way, I have been adding comments to the Merrick Garland nomination post (as is my habit for breaking news stories) and some of the articles are quite good. Don’t miss Al Franken’s epic takedown of Orrin Hatch yesterday (but try not to look at Orrin’s suit/tie combination – it burns!!).
By the way, here is an article from last October that lays out the strategy of his trusted advisors. They were negative from the beginning. Obviously their plan was to suck in gullible voters with pretty pictures of honesty – integrity – principle, then crush her like a bug. [bad word redacted} them.
And THIS is the Bernie Sanders I remember from living in Vermont. Very revealing article from the former editor of the Burlington Free Press.
http://lansingcitypulse.com/article-12189-the-trouble-with-bernie.html
And who could ever imagine that a guy like that would storm out of a TV interview???? Probably hormonal. :)
Good morning, meese! Saturday …
It is 32 degrees in Madison, on its way up to 41. Morning snow showers are in the forecast.
The Vernal Equinox will be tonight at 11:30pm CDT, 12:30am tomorrow morning for the east coasters. Since I will be asleep when it happens, I will celebrate in the morning. :)
The last of the Paris killers was captured yesterday and, quelle surprise, all the perpetrators were European nationals, this last guy was born in Belgium. So all the screaming and yelling about refugees coming to kill you was the same sort of nothingburger that the Ebola virus was – simply “othering” to gin up outrage to win votes and/or sell ads. There was some breast-beating over the media’s role in the rise of Trump and it is all media, the campaign is a reality TV show that they can run for commercial gain on a continuous reel and don’t have to pay actors to produce. But the Republican Party would not be in the mess it is in if right-wing media had not been given control of the Republican message. Now the various splinter groups of True Conservatives, each with their own network, syndicated radio shows, magazines, and online media are fighting over the shrinking angry white man vote, their only reliable demographic. Sowed, reaped – no tears shed here. Every idiocy on display on the right simply serves to highlight the steadiness and reasonableness of our presidential candidate.
The president’s weekly address is regarding his Supreme Court nomination. I am still not sure how Mitch McConnell would be able to back off his position. No meetings, no hearings, no votes may have always been a bridge too far because it involves other members – the meetings are already taking place and Chuck Grassley is about to become an endangered Senator for his refusal to hold hearings. But McConnell controls the final vote so it will simply not happen.
See all y’all later!
Good Saturday morning, Meese! Gray, gloomy, and 44 F. now, going up to 47 F. later with cold rain and snow mixed. Or something. To think I chose this day for my Ladies’ tea, hoping winter would be behind us! Now it’ll be snow falling on daffodils.
After breakfast must quickly make the Victoria Sandwich cake, then run to the store to get artificial sweetener in case some of the ladies want that for their tea. The fairy cakes are already made and frosted with chocolate frosting. Next up: cucumber sandwiches and scones.
Bad news from the book publishing people. It arrived so late in the day on Friday that I didn’t have time to sit down and deal with it. Will have to get on the phone with them Monday morning to respond. From their remarks I gather that I’m going to be paying more money for less service than with my previous ebook. Okay. Next time I’ll look for another publisher. :(
The news continues to be fascinating. Not sure what to make of it all. The nephews in Australia wrote worriedly that they’re afraid for us if Trump wins. Told them that the media make out that everyone is voting for Trump, rather than 40 percent of Rethug voters, and that many more people have cast votes for Hillary. I wrote on FB that I was going to contribute $1 for every misogynistic anti-Hillary remark on my newsfeed and some of my FB friends surprisingly “liked it.” It appears that not everyone is in the bag for Bernie.
Wishing a restful Saturday to all!
The number of people who support Trump is roughly the same number (if you include their immediate families) who believe that the Earth revolves around the sun.
The Republican Party’s primary goers are not reflective of the general population and they are becoming more and more out of touch with the rest of us. The GOP will have a huge shock in November when they choose either Trump or Cruz and realize what Lindsey Graham pointed out to them a few election cycles ago: “there ain’t enough white guys to win a national election”. It will only get worse because “white guys who are not angry” are not likely to want to vote for a racist jerk. Go to Swing The Election and, keeping everything the same, move the College Educated Whites from 54% R to 54% D and see what happens to the electoral college map. And of course, the Latino and Asian vote will not stay the same … they will trend more D than R to keep either racist xenophobe out of office.
I am sorry to hear about your ebook costs rising! I hope you can find a better alternative for the next book.
And those Republicans with their anti-Trump mewlings? They might not like him because he is vulgar but they will vote for him. LOLGOP:
Went & got my blood drawn, I know my cholesterol won’t be where the doc wanted. Now I’m eating breakfast & contemplating a nap on this cold morning. The rain moved out — no hail here as far as I know. Just cold — I know 40s isn’t cold where most of y’all are, but remember we had 2 mornings this week with lows of 70, and the highs were mid-90s. I know I need to exercise, and get my bike to the shop, but right now….. “nap” sounds good….
Good morning, 41 and partly cloudy in Bellingham. I was in bed by 7:30 pm last night and I’m just waking up 12 hrs later……hope my new found energy lasts awhile!
Looks like the Seattle Times is having second thoughts re the Bernie endorsement…..
Bernie Sanders should bone up on Washington state issues
On a more pleasant note, it’s spring in Skagit County. The fields are crowded on the weekend, so we hope to go next week.
Gallery: Tulips, daffodils in bloom in Skagit County
It turns out that “terrible awful no-good” trade deals is mainly an issue for demagogueing; most people – and most Democrats – are just fine with them:
No tulips here! But the daffodil shoots are emerging from the frozen tundra.
Morning all! Grey and drizzly here, but not really chilly – we really need the moisture, so I’m not complaining. A good day to stay inside and listen to my opera this afternoon – L’Elisir d’Amore (The Elixir of Love) by Donizetti, a wonderfully melodic and light hearted opera that is always a pleasure to listen to, no matter who the singers are, really. I’ve got to get my tax records together and try to file this week electronically thru Turbo Tax – apparently the IRS has suspended its PIN program, because of all the problems they’ve had, so I probably can’t get one now. I’ll see if they let me file electronically, fingers crossed. Maybe one day I’ll get my refund from last year, sigh.
I tried to have a conversation with my WOW friend who caucused for Sanders in Colorado about Sanders’ scuzzy plans to steal Clinton super and pledged delegates, and he just didn’t want to hear about it. He will vote for Hillary in November, he says, and I believe him – but the degree to which even responsible, relatively sophisticated adults apparently bought into the Myth of Bernie is just astounding to me. I won’t try again with anyone else – it’s like trying to reason with Bernie supporters at DKos – waste of time.
Watched the first 4 episodes of the new season of “Daredevil” on Netflix – extremely violent, even moreso than the first season last year, but very well done and relatively thoughtful. And basketball! I was pretty thrilled to see Yale win in the first round on Thursday – my oldest brother went there, and if it had been co-ed when I applied to college, I probably would have as well – Yale’s first ever NCAA basketball tournament win! Of course, today they meet Duke, so their tournament run probably comes to an end today, but I generally despise Duke’s coach, so I will watch (now that I’ve figured out how to watch live TV on my computer yay!) and root for Yale to win.
Have a great day everyone!
Twitter was buzzing when Yale won! There were some very funny Tweets.
When did Yale become co-ed? I know a woman who is close to my age (early 60s) who went there.
I think they started taking applications in 1969, the year after I graduated high school and entered Swarthmore, because I remember a woman in my class at S’more transferring there – I think it was ’69, might have been ’70.
Started the day at freezing and heading for mid-50s, but at least sunny. We’ve got frost warnings the next two nights. Hopefully not as cold as projected or it’s going to damage this year’s fruit crop.
Dropping by to say “hi” and take a breather from crying over at DK – Tricia’s memorial has been up for 2 hours now and is still getting comments. One of the nice things about an online memorial over a real-space memorial is it can go as long as it needs to for everyone to visit (and comment if they wish). But there’s laughter as well (remember when Andy turned Trish into a wooden toonah? LOL) and good memories to take forward with us. Reaffirming family is comforting. {{{HUGS}}}
Here is the link that Nurse Kelley made sure was sent to everyone who knew Tricia but who no longer participated at DK:
Memorial For Tricia, The Pootie Queen: 19 March 2016.
It is a fine tribute.
Nurse Kelley has been great these last several weeks being the liaison between DK and Tricia’s FB groups – she and I and Raincrow gathered information from our various sources, shared it, and made sure it got out everywhere we could get it.
The Marti did a fine job with the diary, but the tribute is continuing to write itself.