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 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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– Page One of Comments is HERE!
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Good “morning”, Motley Meese! The week begins …
Morning low of 23 degrees in Madison WI with an expected daytime high of 41. Mostly cloudy skies are in the forecast.
Have a great day, all y’alls, and beware the Ides of March!!
Good Sun Day morning, Moosekind, although it’s actually raining pretty steadily in Ashburn at this hour. Monty kept his business meeting as brief as possible when I took him to the courtyard at 6 a.m. (I woke up far too early.) At the moment it’s still pitch-dark and 38 F. Showers are in the forecast for today, along with a high of 52 F.
Every day more restrictions are imposed on the community here: all entertainment events have been cancelled, for example. Amazon and Fed Ex delivery persons will have to leave their packages at the front desk of the main clubhouse. Staff will then deliver them. However, the most important restriction of all has yet to be put in place. They should let us carry out meals from all the restaurants, not just one or two. My husband has COPD, so I don’t want him dining anywhere near Trumpists who may think this whole thing is a joke and refuse to take it seriously.
Well, enough gritching. I hope I can find time today to finish tidying up here.Yesterday evening a good deal of the family was at Younger Son’s house so I had the pleasure of seeing all three of the local grandchildren, Elder and Younger Sons, and DIL. Elder Son’s wife, who is still recovering from pneumonia, stayed at home.
Still wrestling with the urge to touch my face every few minutes. It’s incredible! I simply never realized how often I rub it in response to an itch. Yesterday I put Vitamin E oil on it in the hope the itching would stop, but no such luck.
We intend to stick very close to home for the duration. I’ll be interested to see Tuesday’s election results. Wishing all at the Pond a safe, quiet day.
Gawd, first they inflict tRump on us and now their anti-science ignorance will make us sick and possibly kill us!
They do think it is a joke, I have seen it firsthand. I was hoping that their leader would test positive and give them a rude awakening but the “announced” test says he is negative. Of course, we have no reason to believe anything coming out of the White House – and certainly not the White House physician – so it is anyone’s guess what his true status is. Also, the test is a snapshot of that moment in time – his continued carelessness may yet infect him. Given his exposure and the surprising test results, you wonder if even viruses cannot survive on his gross body and flee to seek other hosts. :)
The schools and universities are officially closed here and businesses are sending their workers home to work remotely. Now we wait for the first wave to get sick and get treated and hope that new infections can be handled by the health care system.
{{{Diana}}} – Healing/Protective Energy. And yeah, stay away from the Deplorables even in passing as best you can. I’m not even trying to not touch my face. Sinusitis means if I want to breathe I’m gonna touch my face. sigh. The vitamin E oil might work, but it will take multiple regular applications before it does. Moar Healing Energy, moar {{{HUGS}}}
Sunday Meese. 38 going up to 48 in the NY Catskills.
RIP.
Puerto Rico
Greedy white capitalists inflicting harm on Puerto Rico. How long must PR endure this?
Got an e-mail yesterday, no church for the next 2 weeks. They’re going to have a short service on Facebook Live, but it’s not the same. I know they’re making the wise, correct choice, but it’s very depressing. Today I’m going to make a stir fry & do housework. Going to see if I can afford to get some Chinese takeout. Warm, rainy weather, I feel bad for the kids on spring break. Yesterday U2 streamed a concert from their recent tour on their website. It was 2 ½ hours of people watching together & sharing happy memories and birthday wishes for the bassist, whose 60th birthday this was a celebration for. Got to find fun & joy where we can.
Sunday Sermon
Read it, tipped, rec’d and shared. It’s a wonderful essay!
It’s 42-feels-like-39 and overcast. But not as overcast as yesterday at this time. No rain forecast until after midnight so maybe it’ll even clear off for a bit. I hope. Yesterday lightened up enough to get another 3.5 KWHs and with this morning’s bit we’ve inched up to 150 for the m-t-d. If it clears off today we could make it to 165. If not, not.
I’m pretty isolated anyway so it’s not making a whole lot of difference to me to self-quarantine. Fewer trips to the grocery store, fewer visits from my son (who has to work or lose his job as manager of a carry-out-only pizza shop), do the treadmill even on nice days instead of taking the walk around the neighborhood. Thank heavens for the internet though. I live with cabin fever but it’s gonna get worse. But nothing like for folks who are still working, must work. Especially folks with kids whose schools have closed. I don’t know what long-term changes this is going to ring on our society. We aren’t that social anyway any more so once the panic buying and hoarding stage is over folks who don’t go out much (money or health or just preference) won’t see much difference. Work places will need to put some space (and walls if possible) between their workers, again if possible. My son was telling me the ‘new’ guidelines for restaurant owners/managers is exactly what they’d better have been doing all along for sanitation. Sort of like the “wash your hands” hysteria. And you weren’t already washing your hands? What, you think that’s “owning” your mom, grandma, and all the aunties who’ve been reminding you to wash your hands all your life to not do it? But yeah, the Deplorables are gonna be out there infecting as many people as possible. Partly because they think it’s a Dem hoax. Partly because – white supremacy – they don’t think they can get it. And partly because they think it will infect BIPOC and help make Amerikkka white. Evil people. Hillary was being polite calling them Deplorable. Food venues – restaurants & bars – artist venues like concerts, and churches (at least the popular ones) are gonna take the biggest hits – the workers getting hit hardest. Office-type businesses can do and some already are doing a lot of their stuff via Skype and other distance programs. But plague is going to take the last remaining places for creating the community we need to survive the global warming that’s causing these new plagues. Without being silly or endangering others we need to find a way around that.
This mess is exacerbating the issues of my various friends. They’ve already got health and financial problems. Isolating more than they already are may not even be possible but they’re the most vulnerable. And preparing for longer stretches of not going out at all takes money they already were short of for just living. Sigh. I was saying to someone on twitter yesterday that every generation is given an opportunity to be great. They don’t take it unless they’re forced to. I guess the Universe decided it was time to force greatness on this one. We shall see what we shall see.
Lots of prayers/invocation/Channeling Healing/Helping Energy to everybody. I’m taking a “Sunday chores” break – need to do the big bathroom and the floors yet – for coffee and checking in. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 33 and light clouds in Bellingham. So it appears COVID angst has either merged with or replaced tRump angst but regardless I need to find my way to live with uncertainty and anxiety because that’s our normal now. We’re still fine, but our kids can’t isolate as much as we can so they are more exposed, as are our grand kids. Our grand girls schools are closed now but should we plan things to do with them, or should we isolate from them too? Our son has what we think is a cold, so is it safe to be with him? Will our Seattle daughter’s work change to a less public position keep her safer? Do Clorox wipes protect RonK when he’s grocery shopping? Will our beloved bookstore cafe survive the economic impact of everyone staying home? :::sigh::: Looks like I need to go for a walk around the garden and have a chat with myself.
Best wishes to all from the PNW, where we used to feel safe!
Princesspat, I hate to say it, but it’s better not to see the grandchildren in person. Read in the paper this morning that doctors say children, although they don’t get very sick from coronavirus themselves, are innocent carriers. If your son has a cold, it’s better to wait until he’s over it to see him. I texted the kids this morning and told them the doctor also recommends no play dates. It’s hard for everyone but this enforced isolation with TV, movies, and the Internet is still better than “dying face down in the muck of some Pacific island in WW2,” as someone tweeted.
Morning, meeses! Monday …
It is 30 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 43. Mostly cloudy skies are in the forecast.
I spent last night trying to shake the sense of impending doom that has settled over me. I had a free Disney+ trial that I activated and used it to watch movies until midnight. There are no sporting events and you can only watch HGTV for so long before you will have seen every episode of every series. I am too distracted to read right now – I play solitaire games on my tablet to keep my brain active but even that was not enough to keep my thoughts from imagining the worst. Today I will be busy helping clients set up remote access – our schools are all closed now until April 6th and a lot of people will have no child care and will need to stay home with their kids. What a mess! I told my daughter last night that maybe it would help if we could imagine how our lives would be different in an alternate universe where ignorant and berned people had not elected Donald Trump president. The pandemic response office would have been fully staffed and would probably have spotted the virus last fall and put in place plans to deal with it. Back when the United States was a global leader and had scientists in government, we might have even been able to help China recognize and contain the outbreak before it became a global pandemic. :(
I did not watch the debate – it is too depressing to think that Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders are the best choices Democrats could come up with. The nominating contest will be over tomorrow night and I hope that if Bernie does not concede the nomination and let Joe Biden build his general election team and strategy so we can hit the ground running after the convention, that someone intervenes and shuts him down quickly. He cannot be allowed to ratfk another presidential election.
See all y’all later!
It’s hard for me to stop reading. I have a historical romance series that is great escapism.
I kind of got out of the habit because I used to read before bedtime and fall asleep on my open book. The number of pages I could read before dozing off got smaller and smaller until it was measured in “paragraphs” then “sentences” then “words.” I may try again, I really need to find something to do to escape reality.
I’m re-reading old favorites. They’re like a security blanket. I know the ending is happy already. ????????????????
Monday Meese. Weather is back to March normal here in the Catskills – 27 degrees going up to 42.
Didn’t watch the “debate.” Followed a few responses on twitter.
Puerto Rico
posted a quickie
Woke up at 4:30 & instead of trying to get back to sleep for less than a full sleep cycle, I got up and was downtown & walking by 5:30. 1.16 miles. Had church online yesterday. It was comforting & sad at the same time. My congressional candidate is doing all campaigning virtually. The execs of my agency are meeting today to discuss teleworking. I don’t see how my part can be done remotely. We’d have to get the applications somehow — and at that point, why not work here? Anyway, there’s a twitter thread from U2 fans of songs that bring us comfort, here’s Love Is Bigger Than Anything In Its Way.
In the 40s, might get to the 50s, overcast and drizzling this morning. Nature’s not giving me any moral support here. We did get a bit over 6 KWHs yesterday so it at least covered my usage. The m-t-d is 156 and definitely not on track for anything but last place. sigh
I connected with my younger son yesterday. He lives outside Austin. Their schools are on Spring Break so closed anyway and are “monitoring the situation” to see if they open up again before the end of the month. His company is encouraging everyone to work from home but is keeping the office open for things that can’t be done remotely. He says he’ll have to go in at least one day this week as there are some employees who still get paper checks and a couple of companies they do business with that also insist on paper checks but that otherwise he’s working from home. Everybody trying to take precautions but not panic and otherwise go on about their lives. Which is really good. Anything else is gonna freak out the kids. His older boy’s birthday is Friday. He’ll be 11. He’s on “the spectrum” and doesn’t like parties anyway. Fix him his favorite foods and download a new game for him and he’ll be happier. My older son is really the one most at risk as manager of a fast food place. But even then, his is a take-out-only pizza store. And I still love his response to the “new” sanitary guidelines. “Why weren’t they doing this already?” Just like so many of us just shake our heads about “wash your hands”. So as alright/safe as a person who has to be in public can be, I think he is.
(Also the folks who come get pizzas from him. & since that includes homeless folks I’m of 2 minds about him staying open – but they gotta eat.) At least the folks on my “list” have enough sense/knowledge to not only already been doing the sanitation but also how to prepare for – and deal with – periods of isolation.
Rantt media put out an article on the virus (https://rantt.com/coronavirus-explained) that has a nice chart in it comparing symptoms of it with colds, flu, and allergies. There’s overlap of course. A lot of overlap with regular flu. But there are some differences and knowing them might stave off panic anyway. It would be nice (!!!!) if we had a competent, “over-prepared”, president who’d have done things to make sure we never got into this situation. But since we don’t we have to help each other as best we can. Sharing facts is one way to do that.
Healing/Helping Energy to everybody. Until we get more sunshine – and the clock time has 7 am be after the sun’s up – I’ll be running “late” on checking in. Fortunately there isn’t anything else for me to run late on. Now to coffee. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good Moon Day morning, Moosekind! Late this morning because I barely had time to shower, dress, and have breakfast before my doctor appointment. It was at 9:30, which was the only appointment I could get today. Had the Night from Hell, unable to get to sleep because of worrying about a couple of things and having to get up during the night for the usual reason.
Anyway, when I told the doctor about seeing double on Feb. 28 and the funny feeling I sometimes get that I’m about to topple over, she said that without more symptoms it’s hard for her to ascertain the reason for the double vision. The episode last month lasted only 15 minutes, and since then, despite the funny feelings, I haven’t toppled over yet. She said she could write me an order for a CAT scan, but I told her I didn’t want to take up valuable time and effort by medical personnel when this coronavirus is everywhere. She said we would just “watch and wait,” but to definitely get in touch if this happens again.
So I’ll just go on self-quarantining and cheerily putting together my “Death Papers.” My Dearly Beloved and I are so old that if we get “IT,” it’ll be lights out for us. Even if they had enough ventilators for everyone, they’re not going to allocate them to people our age. And that’s as it should be. I’ve lived three-quarters of a century and Dearly longer than that; neither of us would want to take up resources needed by much younger people with half their lives ahead of them.
Now that I’ve cheered y’all up, let’s talk about the weather. It’s a lovely, sunny day here in NoVa, current temp. 44 F., going up to 56 F. later. I’m hoping to get a half-hour walk in.
Wishing a good day to all at the Pond and the ill people beyond. May karma punish the evil McTurtle as he deserves for holding up the coronavirus legislation.
Good morning, 36 and mostly sunny in Bellingham. RonK cooked a lovely corned beef and cabbage dinner last night and our son’s serving was delivered to his porch. Heidi got a bone and a hello pat on her head, but sick son just got a wave from a safe distance. I strolled around the chilly garden and looked for early spring blooms. Just being outside cleared my muddled thoughts so I’m going to try to do that every day.
I tried to watch the debate last night, but had to mute bernie so I finally just stopped and returned to playing Mahjong Solitaire on my phone. I use the classic Chinese character tiles and tell myself that learning to see the differences between them is good for my angst addled brain :)
Best wishes to all as we try to stay safe and cope with our fast changing world.
{{{princesspat}}} wise decisions all around. Makes me hungry for corned beef and cabbage – something I eat like maybe twice a decade ???? The best corned beef and cabbage I ever had was in San Francisco. From a Chinese restaurant and served over rice. ???????????? I can almost taste it still. Walking in the garden, even one that’s still mostly sleeping, is a very good mind-clearing and coping thing to do. moar {{{HUGS}}}
Morning, meeses. Tuesday …
It is 37 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 46. Sunny skies are in the forecast.
So NOW the literal pile of human garbage in the White House says the coronavirus may not be a hoax ginned up to make him look bad. Goddess help us – Barack Obama warned us, Hillary Clinton warned us, Tony Schwartz (tRump’s biographer) warned us. You cannot have a man whose entire existence is consumed with protecting his fragile ego in charge of a response that requires empathy. And you simply cannot put a political party that wants to “shrink government so small you can drown it in a bathtub” in charge of governance and tasked with a response to a crisis. Republicans can’t govern, period. They are unable to grasp the concept of common good that has to underlie governing and taking care of the people who depend on government. The fking Senate Republicans came back into Washington yesterday screaming about needing to DO SOMETHING NOW after their boss sent them home on Friday rather than keep them in town to vote on coronavirus response bills. Mitch McConnell is demanding that his probable opponent in the Senate race this fall take down her ads that point out his pitiful response and the party/president over country choices he has made. The truth hurts and every Republican is going to own this disaster come November. It is not just the number of people who will die – which is ghastly – but it is that the economy has been built to be a consumer economy: when people can’t “shop”, it grinds to a halt, businesses close, people lose their jobs. It is why George W. Bush told people to “go shopping” after 9/11. Except we can’t “shop” our way out of this, it is going to take a massive infusion of cash to keep people alive while we shelter in place and let the virus run its course.
The last I heard, people will be voting in primaries in Florida, Illinois and Arizona. They won’t be voting in Kentucky, Louisiana, or Georgia. A state judge declared that Ohio can’t delay their primary (it has been appealed) but this morning I see a headline about Ohio closing the polls under a public health order. The takeaway from this is that every state right now needs to develop and implement mail-in/drop-off ballots, similar to what Colorado and Washington state do, for the November election. I don’t give a rats ass if that means that some people may vote who shouldn’t, the bulk of the votes cast will be legitimate. We need a way to get this terrible, incompentent administration – and their Senate enablers – out of office and return the government to those who know how to run the government.
I am helping clients deal with the “new normal” – telecomuting – and I need to get back to it.
See all y’all later!
Tuesday Meese.
42 going up to 55 here in the Catskills. Am headed to doc today to get pneumonia and flu shots. Not clear whether it helps protect – but doing it in hopes it does.
Puerto Rico
When I went in for my annual check-up last November, they gave me the pneumonia vaccination (it is free for people over 65 – paid for by Medicare). What I read about it is that it can possibly keep you from developing pneumonia as one of the symptoms of COVID-19. However, it won’t stop you from getting COVID-19. I have no idea if it will help but I am glad that I had the shot on the off chance that it does.
Why didn’t you get the flu shot last fall, dear friend???
Another morning of waking up at 4 freaking 30. I need to change my dinner time or something, this is ridiculous. Anyway, got in 1.16 mile. They told us yesterday there’s no way to route our calls to home or cell phones, so if we have to close the call center, we can only communicate with patrons by e-mail — which is a distinct minority of our users. I hope they just put everyone on automatic selections of some variety of audio books, so we can keep books going out to people who were already isolated & now will be more so. Meanwhile, we’re still here working. Song that was in my head while I was walking: Stay, from the Berlin concert U2 streamed on Saturday. So, so gorgeous. The switch to black & white, and the rehearsal footage in the empty arena, and the switch back to the audience singing at the end….. just amazing. Even if you aren’t a fan, I highly recommend watching — Bono stops with the chatter & starts singing at 2 minutes, so jump to that. And of course my gorgeous silver fox looks especially great in the black & white footage.
Good Tiu’s Day morning, Meese! This is St. Patrick’s Day (who cares), election day in some places, and the birthday and wedding anniversary of people I know. It’s quite gloomy here in Ashburn—in fact, we just had a shower. Currently it’s 44 F., going up to 64 F. This afternoon it may be partly cloudy, which means I can go for a walk. I prefer to walk outside rather than going to the gym, which might have People In It.
We are daily becoming more sequestered. Corned beef and cabbage were to be on the restaurant menus today, and we rather fancied some, but will do without rather than sit next to someone who may be shedding germs but is asymptomatic. As of tomorrow ALL restaurants will close except for takeaway. We’re supposed to go to our nearest restaurant (in our case, the Pub) and get our dinner. By the end of the week they’ll be delivering boxed dinners to our door.
Thank Goddess we still get the newspaper delivered early in the morning. I was up at 5-bloody-30, and the paper was lying there on the mat outside our door.
We have enough food that I can cook a vegetarian stir-fry, a slow cooker chicken dinner, and a Mediterranean fish stew. Tonight we’re having pork chops and roasted potatoes.
Thank Goddess I don’t have to rush off anywhere! Today I want to work on rounding up the financial papers and writing to friends. I feel so sorry for people who live alone. My poor friend at Greenspring asked her son not to visit even before the ban on outside visitors was imposed. He’s her closest relative, both by blood and geography.
I do hope Ohio will be voting today. The last word I received said the Secretary of Health had no authority to ban elections. Agree with Jan, states had better get their act together. November will be here before we know it.
Wishing a better day to the whole world.
It’s 47 supposedly going up into the 60s today and cloudy. sigh. We might get some sun Friday & Saturday but otherwise cloudy for the foreseeable future. Yesterday we got just barely 3 KWHs – least single day for the month so far – and the m-t-d is 159 (not even on track for 300 much less 400). Spring is proceeding apace never the less. The various flowering trees are either in full flower or starting to drop the petals. Some of the trees are putting out leaf buds. I’m worried about my cherry tree. It doesn’t have a single blossom on it. True that last year was a bonza year. For mold and fungus too so I didn’t get much fruit that I could eat but there was enough for a batch of cherry jam, a few unopened jars of which are still in my fridge (4-oz jars – I don’t eat much jam). And equally true that there’s usually not much fruit the year after a bonza year. But I usually get something even if it’s so high up it actually goes to the birds. Oh well. Since I don’t depend on it for food, it’s a first world problem.
I haven’t any more clue than anybody else how well we’ll weather this emergency. I know a lot of folks are going to die needlessly because of the Deplorable, genocidal, mindset of the Rs. I hope our team can manage to finagle enough help programs to keep us going until we can take the helm again. Got a few specific folks I’m worried about but even that is being overwhelmed by the magnitude of what we’re facing. It’s hard when the really, truly best thing I or anyone can do is isolate/self-quarantine. Goddess bless – and protect – those who get out and make sure there’s food and other necessities available. And Goddess even more protect those who deliver it – carefully, following all sanitary measures possible – to those who are quarantined and were unable to prepare for it.
Healing/Helping Energy (prayers/invocations) to everybody. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}
Good morning, 34 and cloudy in Bellingham. I went to sleep on the sofa last night and never did wake up enough to climb the stairs and officially go to bed. Oh well, I needed a change of scenery and now I’m already dressed for what ever day this is and the clean sheets on the bed are sill clean!
To my relief out son saw his doc yesterday and he is officially “buggy” but not tested for COVID because there are no tests. His blood clots have caused some permanent heart/lung vulnerabilities so I’m less worried about the chest congestion I hear when we talk on the phone.
RonK is worrying about how he will manage to chair a remote community college board meeting today. Real life meetings are easy for him, but managing the tech and leading a group discussion via Zoom is a learning experience.
Best wishes to all as we keep our balance in a world turned upside down.
Good morning, meeses! Wednesday …
It is 39 degrees in Madison with an expected daytime high of 45. One of my weather widgets says snow but my eyeballs detect “no snow”. We are expecting mixed precipitation this morning and a possible winter storm later in the week. It will not snarl rush hour traffic because there is none nor will it close any schools because they are all shuttered. :(
UW-Madison just announced that there will be no in-person classes for the rest of the semester – the other UW schools are expected to follow suit today. How sad for people who spent 4 years going to college and who will not have a commencement ceremony to mark their achievement! And sadder too for them to be graduating into an economy destroyed by Republican incompetence (again, for crying out loud!) where the unemployment rate is expected to be 20%. They won’t even have restaurant and retail jobs to fall back on while they wait for jobs in their fields to open up. Assuming that universities re-open again in the fall (not a given) those who are still in school should be able to continue their studies and hope for better days. Will the economy mend? No one knows – and a lot will depend on who wins the 2020 presidential election. If it is our guy, he will also need a Democratic Senate to get legislation passed. If it is tRump, all that is left is to hope that an asteroid hits that planet and ends our suffering.
Joe Biden won big and if Bernie Sanders does not suspend his campaign he should be shunned. We have no time to spend on bullshit lost causes – Democrats need to pivot to the general election NOW.
Tomorrow is the Spring Equinox, the earliest it has been in 124 years. I was sitting in my living room yesterday, listening to the birds and the (very noisy!) sandhill cranes that live behind my home and thinking that for them, it is just another spring, the cycle of the earth continues and they aren’t bothered by the pandemic or the economic uncertainty. I need to get out in nature and connect to that feeling to relieve the stress that is accumulating.
See all y’all later!