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”, Motley Meese! The week begins …
Morning low of 43 degrees in Madison WI with an expected daytime high of 50. Light rain is in the forecast.
Have a great day, all y’alls!!
Sunday Meese
43 going up to 51 here in the Catskills
Will be featuring some Latinas running for office in my Sunday post.
Am so angry I can barely see straight – the Nazi Trump cabal is maddening.
PR
I wanted to throw something at my computer screen when I saw the right-wing Israeli government – the one that embraces the Republican Party knowing that they are the party of anti-Semitism – issue their “thoughts and prayers”! Any entity – countries, organizations, businesses, politicians – that refuses to reject trumpism and refuses to demand that decency become a litmus test has the blood of the victims of trumpism on their hands. Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, every Senate Republican, every House Republican owns this. The rejection of hate has to become more important than marginal tax cuts and those who support the Republican Party with clear evidence of the danger to our civil society should be forever shunned.
Plus fk them.
heh. joining you in fk them
It’s up
Got it!
We are back to gorgeous weather — sunny & mid-80s. Supposed to be a cold front on Wednesday, but till then we have the weather that people move here for. I’ve got quinoa cooking, will cook lunch & dinner for the week after church.
Here’s Peace On Earth, a song that is so heartbreaking I can’t listen to it. But it fits for today. I looked for video of the performance where they found out about a bombing in Ireland just before, but I couldn’t find it. This is from a 9/11 tribute.
58 humidity at 90% heading for 70 and sunny again today. Oak tree shade on my solar panels is causing some loss of generation – we need a hard freeze before it will shed its leaves. Yesterday got 9.3 KWHs and the m-t-d is 228. Good the weather is so nice as I am walking in today (to Dem HQ) – my friend needed to borrow my car. Oh well, I need the exercise. I’d prefer to have gotten a ride in and walked home but that’s life. Holding to my Faith in the Primal Will To Good in the face of the so-very-much-publicized terrorist attacks by #45’s equivalent to Hitler’s Brown Shirts. We outnumber them, we will overwhelm them. But as with any war, overt or covert, many will be hurt/die during the process. Healing Energy to everybody everywhere shaped to the need. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
reading the words is easier for me than hearing the song — the pain in his voice is just too much for me, not that the words aren’t heartbreaking
Heaven on Earth
We need it now
I’m sick of all of this
Hanging around
Sick of sorrow
Sick of pain
Sick of hearing again and again
That there’s gonna be
Peace on Earth
Where I grew up
There weren’t many trees
Where there was we’d tear them down
And use them on our enemies
They say that what you mock
Will surely overtake you
And you become a monster
So the monster will not break you
It’s already gone too far
Who said that if you go in hard
You won’t get hurt
Jesus could you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on Earth
Tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth
No whos or whys
No-one cries like a mother cries
For peace on Earth
She never got to say goodbye
To see the colour in his eyes
Now he’s in the dirt
Peace on Earth
They’re reading names out over the radio
All the folks the rest of us won’t get to know
Sean and Julia, Gareth, Ann and Breda
Their lives are bigger, than any big idea
Jesus can you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on Earth
To tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth
Jesus this song you wrote
The words are sticking in my throat
Peace on Earth
Hear it every Christmas time
But hope and history won’t rhyme
So what’s it worth?
This peace on Earth
Peace on Earth
Peace on Earth
Peace on Earth
Good morning meese. 54 with high of 77 here. Just getting out of bed to start the day.
Good morning, 52 and raining in Bellingham. I woke up at 3:30 am, to upset with tRump angst to sleep so I’ve been sorting and cleaning in the basement. The last of my mother’s quilts are being washed, the very worn ones (I think they were my great grandmothers) are set aside to deal with later, I’ve filled more fabric donation bags, and I’ve cleared space finish the work on my parents dining room chairs so they can go to our son’s home……whew! I’m tired and dirty but feeling a bit more settled.
Nap time soon! Best Sunday wishes to all.
Princesspat, you’ve accomplished a lot! Good for you!
Good Sunday morning, Moosekind! Partly cloudy, partly sunny here in Ashburn after a predawn shower. It’s 53 F. here now at 12:30 p.m. and not going to become much warmer, just another 5 degrees.
At LAST, the children are back with their parents! Dear Goddess, what a weekend. Today will be spent mostly in tidying up (washing bedding and so on) and restoring the place to rights. Poor old Grandma never gets a look-in with her iPad when the Littles are here. Actually, they were pretty good until this morning when Mr. Paw Patrol pitched an unholy fit because I said he couldn’t take his sleep animal home. (I keep stuffed toy beagles over here for them to clutch when they sleep over.) Once we got that taken care of, we were able to go to Virginia Kitchen for breakfast. By the end, Mr. P. P. needed a complete change of clothes, considering that half of the melted chocolate chips from his rabbit-shaped pancake were smeared over his shirt and trousers. Never mind, Mommy will have to wash them!
We dropped them off at the new house, which is in decent enough shape although the dining room table hasn’t been set up yet. They won’t have Internet until Tuesday, so the children may actually have to talk to each other, work puzzles and games, and go outside and play in the fresh air with the neighbor children in the cul-de-sac! Imagine that. They’ve spent the weekend on their Kindles. Too tired to argue with them, I let it go. Each child is easier to manage when just one of them is here for a sleepover.
Well, enough of that. Haven’t caught up on all the news yet (do I want to?). Yesterday the Moose kicked me out three times for commenting on others’ posts—one can only suppose the Moose objects to my doing that. Pity.
Sleeping with little people’s cold feet, hands, and elbows in my face and chest ruined two nights’ rest, so I think I might take a nap after I add potatoes to the pot roast simmering succulently away in the slow cooker. Dessert is a no-brainer: Costco had miniature crème brulées for sale! We’ll have them with blackberries for afters.
Wishing a good (sunny) day to all at the Pond and beyond.
“What [the enablers] have done will never be forgotten.”
Evening update:
Wiped out. Cooked a lot this afternoon. Took a southwest veggie bowl & added a bag of spinach, can of black beans, can of tomatoes with chiles & extra cheese — makes lunch for 2 weeks. Got a cauliflower curry veggie bowl, added broccoli & quinoa, should do for maybe 2 dinners; and a sriracha veggie bowl (my favorite), added spinach, tahini, more sriracha sauce & quinoa. Dinner for several days. And last: there was a sale on porcini mushroom pasta last week, yesterday they had a nice big packet of portobello mushrooms on sale, so I got them & for dinner tonight I had that with some alfredo sauce (my stomach has decided it hates tomato sauce). Put the extra quinoa in the freezer, now I’m resting my feet. But I’ve got to put together my overnight oats & slice up an apple. Just a normal Sunday.
Monday Meese. Raining and 46 here in Saugerties NY, going up to 54.
Appalled by the election in Brazil – very worried about friends there
This cover photo is a powerful statement about those who survive gun massacres
World Series
Alex Cora is a guy whose actions go beyond his words. I have not been a Red Sox fan since the age of unlimited payrolls for big-market clubs (my baseball team has to rebuild from scratch every few years when we can no longer afford our good players) but I was rooting for them because of Cora. I did not realize what he had been doing for Puerto Rico until I read a story about him last week. I hope his island trip brings some much needed attention to the plight of his fellow Puerto Ricans – maybe his plane can circle over the the blue-tarped roofs to show people that the island needs more than paper-towel tossing photo ops.
Add Brazil to the list of unstable Central and South American countries. One could tell, watching the Olympics in 2016, that the Brazilian government was making bad choices for their people – one of which was hosting the Olympics when there were so many better ways to spend that money. :(
Good morning, meese! Monday …
It is 39 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 50. Sunny this morning and clouding up this afternoon as some showers move into the area.
I am a perpetual optimist, I guess, in that I hope that maybe the Pittsburgh massacre will encourage the media to abandon their bothsidesism and point out that one political party has used white nationalism and religio-fascism to gain power and hold power. The Republicans seem pleased that fear of immigrants and the Kavanaugh court (poised to deliver the death blow to Roe v Wade) is exciting their base ahead of the mid-term election. But I wonder if they realize that suppressing the black vote is not going to be enough when they have awakened the youth vote. My daughter’s voting bloc – kids who are voting in their first general election and who walked out in March to protest gun violence and who are angry that Republicans are destroying their earth and threatening their non-white non-Christian friends – are sending text messages to each other “I voted, did you?” These kids are moving under the pollsters radar and they are in gerrymandered districts and in red states and they remember when the president of the United States was a cool guy named Barack Obama who embodied decency and honor.
See all y’all later!
Good morning, Moosekind! Woke up much too early at 3:30, at 5 a.m. couldn’t stand lying sleepless in bed any longer, so arose to begin the day. It’s still pitch-dark at 6:45 a.m., with a half-moon shining. The paved parts of the courtyard were wet when I took the dog out, so we must have had a shower last night. Currently the temp. in Ashburn is 50 F., going up to 56 F.
Jan, I too am hoping that the young will move under the radar and vote. The WaPo said this morning that elections should take place on Veterans’ Day, which should be a universal holiday. The government and schools get that day off, but private industry generally does not.
I may forego exercise this morning in favor of catching up on numerous chores I’ve been putting off.
Wishing a good day to all at the Pond!
The Election Day day-off should not be merged with another holiday, in my opinion. It should stand alone so that people don’t treat it as a vacation day but as a day when they have an obligation to vote and participate in our democracy. I saw on the Internets that 44% of businesses now have policies in place to let their workers take off from work to vote – that is a good start but doesn’t go far enough. What we really need is an update to the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) that requires automatic voter registration for 18 year olds, protects registration from automatic purges, mandates that states provide early voting at minimum the week before the election – including the weekend – and no-excuse absentee voting. That big blue states like New York and New Jersey only allow absentee voting “for cause” is shameful.
Virginia is one of the states that only allows absentee voting “for cause,” which is why I don’t do it. One year we knew we’d be in Australia at election time, so we did vote absentee before we left.
I agree that it should not be “for cause,” but for any reason.
Or allow the “cause” to be “I have small children at home and can’t stand in line for 4 hours to cast a vote” or “I am working a 12-hour shift and the polls will be closed when I get off work” or “I am not sure of my schedule and can’t be certain if I will be available on election day.” I am not sure how they determine that you had a valid cause but it strikes me as another way to cancel your vote if they choose to “You lied about being out of town – I saw you at the Krogers!!!” Virginia has a lot of election things to fix and I hope after the next wave of state legislature elections (in 2019?) that they finish sweeping in a Democratic legislature to fix them.
Michigan is another; currently these are the “rules” governing absentee voting:
Most of my friends who vote absentee have been stretching the “out of town” definition for years with no problems; I have not, because I’m uncomfortable with that degree of parsing. Now I, and most of my friends, are 60 or older, so it’s not an issue…but I’m still going to the polls instead of absentee. We have a ballot initiative that would change all of this if it passes; we’ll know on the November 7th.
That ballot initiative addresses gerrymandering, too, doesn’t it?
Yes, but as a separate ballot initiative. We have three this cycle: gerrymandering, a modest proposal to start bringing our voting into the 21st century, and marijuana legalization.
Austin’s boil water notice has been lifted, though they are still begging us to conserve as much as possible. We’re having perfect weather — 60s for lows, 80s for highs, till Wednesday when It’s supposed to rain again. But this is the weather people move here for. I did a ton of cooking yesterday, finally cleaned up the kitchen around 7. If “cleaning up” consists of putting the dirty dishes in the sink.
New song from Sara Barielles:
What you didn’t do to bury me
But you didn’t know I was a goddamn seed
You don’t scare me, I am of the earth
So tired of your empire
Blind men only set the world on fire
Sad you can’t see it
You brought the flame, here comes the phoenix
You make me try harder
Oh, it’s all I ever do, ever do
Oh, no no, my, my, my, my armor comes from you
You make me stronger, stronger
Hand me my armor
We’ve reached the time of year when my beautiful, strong, and sacred Oak shades the solar panels and cuts electricity production by 1/3 to 1/2. We need a freeze to convince Oak to drop Her leaves for the winter. Yesterday’s lovely sunny day only generated 8 KWHs and the m-t-d is 236 – we’ve got 3 days including today of generation left for October. Holding onto whatever hope we can find is just about all we can do to keep us keepin’ on right now. But we do hold on to hope and we do keep on keepin’ on – and we will overcome the Haters. Again. I’m working 10 – 2 (at least we plan on my leaving at 2) today so need to get ready. When I don’t go in with Natalia I either walk or ride the bus either of which takes more time and preparation. Healing Energy to everybody shaped to the need. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good poll – now let’s get everyone to the polls on election day.
Good morning meese. It’s 51 degrees with a high of 72, and I just want to go back to sleep. Although Belle has other ideas…
Good morning, Meesefolk; 39 when I got up this morning, with a cloudy high of 50 expected. The long-range forecast shows rain and very little sun anytime soon; this is definitely the part of autumn that I dislike most. Give me crisp, clear, sunny days, and I dance through the leaves. Give me rain and grey that makes the cold feel colder, and I turn into a whiney, pouty toddler.
But despite the forecast, today is a day for burbling. The Kiddo and SIL were given occupancy of their new house at noon yesterday. Kiddo went alone initially, because SIL is doing a show right now, but she was so excited by what the previous owners left. There were stacks and stacks of paperwork, going back to the earliest days of the house. Apparently, every previous homeowner has passed on information to the new owner, whether is was merely the title abstract or more fun items like before/after pictures of past renovations; Christmas cards featuring a pen and ink drawing of the house from years ago; advertisements from the original architect; and best of all, what appears to be the original blueprints. I say, “appears to be” because they haven’t opened the tubes yet. Kiddo wanted to wait to do it with SIL, and after a quick peek, decided she needed to bring her archival gloves to the house for their first look. I am bouncing up and down in anticipation. There’s no question that the updates and renovations have been done with great sensitivity to the period of the house, but there have been hints at larger changes that the blueprints could solve. Was the butler’s pantry once a narrow corridor to the kitchen (like most are), instead of open to the entire kitchen as it is now? Is the stairway to the attic original, or was that area once part of the [old] master bedroom as an en suite bathroom?
Two other nice discoveries yesterday: the previous homeowners left behind ALL of their curtains. They don’t intend to keep any of them in the long run, but in the short run, while I’m sewing, they will have some privacy and insulation. The second discovery was that there are items stored in the garage. They knew from some of the renovation photos that there used to be a swinging door between the butler’s pantry and the dining room; they discovered that door in the garage yesterday. They found other items too…including another door and some windows that are probably original (although they have no idea from where/which rooms). I can’t wait to go down this coming weekend and see all of these treasures.
Good day to and for all!
Good morning, 52 and cloudy in Bellingham. I woke up late but made it to the pool on time, so now it’s afternoon for must of you! I’m still feeling good from an easy workout. Sure hope the feeling lasts.
We voted last night and Ron delivered out ballots to the courthouse this morning so our contribution to what I hope will be a blue wave is officially done. While I want this election to be a complete rejection of tRump, the R’s, and all they stand for my realistic expectation is that this will be the beginning of the changes we need.
Take care everyone.