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Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Sept. 21 to Sept. 24

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Welcome to The Moose Pond! The Welcomings diaries 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.

Greetings continued here: Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania (Part Deux)

In lieu of daily check-ins, which have gone on hiatus, Welcomings diaries will be posted at the start of each week (every Sunday morning) and then, if necessary due to a large number of comments, again on Wednesday or Thursday to close out the week. To find the diaries, 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?

…


Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 93 Comments

93 comments

  2. DeniseVelez

    Remembering the terrorist assassination today of Orlando Letelier  and Ronni Moffitt in Washington in 1976.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L…

    Several articles about the march today – main coverage from NY Times

    New York City Prepares to Host Climate Change March

    http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09…

    Top headline in my news feed the breach in WH security.

    Hope you all have a good Sunday – and hope the march has a spectacular turnout.

     

  3. anotherdemocrat

    Wow, I was in bed before 10 & I was asleep when the alarm went off. I guess I was tired. Got a busy day today: promised my friend I’d take her a sandwich, got a party for the Walk at 3, and I need to make next week’s lunch. And clear out the dvr, because stuff starts next week. And keep an eye on the climate march diaries.

  4. Diana in NoVa

    which means Dearly Beloved can grill dinner on the barbie tonight. All I’ll have to do is the potatoes and dessert.

    Good morning, Moosekind! Feeling pleased because my man Lewis Hamilton just won the Singapore Formula I Grand Prix, so he’s now in the championship lead. Who’d a thunk it? He had a lot of bad luck earlier in the season with race car problems.

    Going to run errands now, then check back to see what’s happening on the Climate Change march. So pleased to see some action at last on this issue! Saw a bit on the Recycled News last night about the drought in California. Wonder when California is going to impose water rationing? People in Australia take it very seriously when called on to do so.

    Hope everyone will have a wonderful Sunday!

  5. princesspat

    Leonard Cohen is 80 yrs old today…..this is the closing track from his new cd, Popular Problems

    The first song on Leonard Cohen’s new album,Popular Problems, which is released on Tuesday, two days after his 80th birthday, is called Slow. It begins: “I’m slowing down the tune/ I never liked it fast…” It is a song about encroaching mortality, but it is also a reaffirmation of a lifetime’s dedication to creative reflection, to taking his time in order to find the right words and the right melody, while keeping intact the mystery at the heart of every great Leonard Cohen song.

    http://www.theguardian.com/mus…

  6. JanF

    It is 42 degrees in Madison on its way up to 69. Sunny.

    The People’s Climate March drew an estimated crowd of 320,000 in New York City. There were some great Tweets covering the event and I will post a few in the PCM diary. The United Nations is having a summit on global warming this week and the president will speak there on Tuesday.

    Not Breaking: Chuck Todd is still an idiot and Meet The Press is still irrelevant. Did you know that we are two countries: Chick-fil-a and Starbucks? So I guess we are either homophobic racists or people rich enough to pay $6 for a cup of coffee. Simple to understand … and adds so much to the national conversation!! This Tweet says it all:

    @Impolitics: Chuck Todd divides the USA into “Starbucks nation” and “Chick-Fil-A country.” So his plan to save Meet the Press is asinine generalizations.

    Busy morning. See all y’alls later!

  7. anotherdemocrat

    Monday. Blech. My eyes are open, I’ve had enough breakfast that I can have some caffeine. Back to hot & sticky weather, though they say it’ll cool off tomorrow.

    I’ll believe in “cool” when I’m not wearing sandals.

    I see my governor said something stupid about Joan Rivers’ death. idiot.

    Very few thoughts in my head this morning. Earworm is, strangely, Every Breaking Wave, the song I skip over to listen to California. Funny, that.

  8. Portlaw

    comments. I promise! First the news. I just saw a headline saying we are ramping up our nuclear arms.Must read it and have coffee.

  9. DeniseVelez

    Feeling a bit lazy today – need to get myself fired up to grade papers and do some writing.

    Wondering what the political action follow-ups to the climate marches will be?

    Sun is out – it will be mid 60’s all day here.

  10. bfitzinAR

    I put an update in my solar pv diary but it’s just a one-liner – Friday 9/19 mid-afternoon we logged one megawatt hour of electricity generated – that’s 1,000 kilowatt hours.  Of course I won’t live long enough (although the system might – who knows) to hit the gigawatt hour (one million kilowatt hours) but it looks like I’m going to get between 3 and 4 MWHs a year.

    My brain is less fuzzy than last week which is good because I’ve got some stuff I should have done last week for the Chair who will be back today.  Got QC tonight.  1st the 2nd reading to get the Drug Court Judge her staff attorney (or actually to raise the salary so she can keep her), then Budget committee.  I’ll be lucky if I’m home by 8.  Shouldn’t the equinox be hitting sometime today?  Anyway, {{{{HUGS}}}} to the peaceful pool of the purple people and all who reside – or even just occasionally visit – there to.

  11. princesspat

    The stitches come out of my back today…..yay!

    We’re getting ready to go to Oregon on Thursday for grandparents day at our grand girl’s school so I’ve got lots to do. It will be good to have two functioning arms again! My shelved to-do list is alarming.

  12. DeniseVelez

    heading up to mid-60’s.

    Today is National Voter Registration Day!

    http://nationalvoterregistrati…

    Yay!!!!!

    Students in my classes have already been registered by our campus New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG)

    photo 8b9ce5f1-53f7-4a45-827d-b14675357d50_zps54d1c8b5.jpg

    (NYPIRG coordinator Eric Wood explaining how to fill out the forms)

    but they will have a booth on campus today as well.  

  13. JanF

    It is 50 degrees here on its way up to 73 … perfect Fall weather.

    A Blessed and Fruitful Mabon to my pagan and non-pagan friends alike!

    Now it is time to start storing our summer things away and getting ready for winter. In times past, we would harvest and store. Most of us now do other things. We empty our rain barrels, shut off our outside water, drain the hoses and cover our delicate plants. We might put down (environmentally safe) weed and feed, we might make that last shorter cut on the lawn before putting away the mower.

    I use the autumn to rebalance myself: to remind myself of my connection to the earth and to reaffirm my belief in her cycles. Autumn means winter is not far off but after winter comes spring and then summer. We are never too far from that which we cannot see.

    See all y’alls later!

  14. JanF

    On Sunday, 310,000 people marched in New York City to remind people of how important this issue is.

    I hope this doesn’t offend anyone here but I was upset by what happened yesterday. I am not sure if what happened was planned … if it was, I am disappointed in the People’s Climate March group for allowing it. To my mind the goodwill generated by the march was all tossed away as a different political group used the march for their own purposes. Just like Ferguson MO became anarchists causing trouble, the Climate March became people declaring that they would “destroy Wall Street” and “eliminate capitalism”. That is NOT how you effect change. You don’t burn institutions to the ground and hope that what grows from the ashes is more pleasing to you. It is likely to be worse as it will be born of chaos. No, you bring people around to your way of thinking, you have respected economists like Paul Krugman write articles showing the economic benefits of addressing climate change, you spotlight the budget director’s assessment showing the costs to Americans, in taxes and lost property, of doing nothing. And you vote to put people in office who will support policies to achieve our goals. I have never and will never understand the “burn it down to make it better” people. And those who say that voting is a waste of time.

    Now … I have to get to work!  

  15. Diana in NoVa

    Have a few minutes to grab a slice of toast and down some yogurt drink before I dress and set off. What happened at the Climate Change March–was it the “Flood Wall Street” group that disrupted it?

    Had a difficult day with the baby yesterday. Mornings are OK because we have Chinese, French, and “reading,” but in the afternoons he gets fussy and I don’t know why. It could be the tummy or it could be the bummy. When feeds and diaper changes don’t work I wonder if it’s his little gummies. Too bad he won’t go to sleep! I think he wails because he’s tired.

    Oh, well, enough of that. Thanks for telling us the exact times of Earth Balance, Jan! I might try balancing an egg on that day.

    Don’t knnow if I’ll be able to keep up with news today–it’s only Tuesday and I already feel tired. Hope everyone in Mooseville will have a good Mabon! Blessed be, all.

  16. anotherdemocrat

    Awful night’s sleep. Must walk 30 minutes today, even if I have errands to run after work. The weather is nice today. Technically not any cooler, but way less humid so it feels better. So, today: busy day but we’re only down 1 person, errands, walking. Earworm is back to California.

    “I’ve seen for myself, there’s no end to grief. That’s why I know & all I need to know is there is no end to love. Yeah, there is no end to love.”

  17. Portlaw

    find my alarm clock and start using it. Am very worried about Syria. Will be back later. Hope it’s a good day throughout Mother Earth for all her children.

  18. Portlaw

    President Obama plans to speak from the White House at 10 a.m. in the wake of airstrikes on Syria, just before he leaves for the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York, a senior administration official said.

    The timing of the strikes, as leaders of 180 countries gather at the United Nations, is likely to galvanize the meeting, with several Arab countries taking part in the military action.

    Mr. Obama is expected to make a forceful case for a broad coalition when he addresses the General Assembly on Wednesday

    http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2014/09/23/?entry=332

  19. bfitzinAR

    Both last night’s meetings were better and worse than expected.  QC meeting did the 2nd reading on the Drug Court issue and then tried and failed to move it to 3rd reading to finish it, so we moved 3rd reading to next Tuesday (when one of the Rs who is for it gets back from a conference in FL).  Budget meeting started off by chewing on the rural fire association for asking for $85K for 2 (that’s two) night dispatchers – until the Chair exercised “Chair’s prerogative” to chew out the Court (anything starting with “I am APPALLED…”) so the remaining speakers spent their allotted time praising the rural fire depts and the ambulance service (who dispatch all 911 calls in the rural areas).  We tabled 2 issues for lack of information (the person who could have provided the information had a family emergency and had to leave while we were still wrangling over whether or not we would do the final vote on the Drug Court person then or later).  So.  We got some stuff accomplished even if not as much as we could have and at least I was home by 7:30.

    I got all my last week’s projects finished up yesterday just in time for the slightly delayed this week’s projects to hit – I have stuff to do but am not trying to go up the down escalator on Black Friday.  {{{HUGS}}} to the Purple People.  

  20. JanF

    Michael Dunn Facing Second Murder Trial

    The last trial was a hung jury on the murder count. He was convicted in February of attempted murder of the surviving occupants of the car he shot into but not for murder of the guy who died. It will be interesting to see if having the single count helps the jury focus better. It will be hard to seat any jury:

    Judge Russell Healey is allowing jury selection to begin, but said he reserves the right to grant a defense motion to move the trial out of Jacksonville if there is difficulty seating an impartial panel.

  21. JanF

    Democrats Sink Controversial Obama Nominee Michael Boggs

    Progressives appear to have won their fight to sink President Barack Obama’s controversial judicial nominee Michael Boggs.

    The New York Times reported Monday that Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in an interview that Boggs lacks the support to pass the committee and should withdraw his nomination.

    “He doesn’t have the votes,” Leahy told the paper.

    There are some compromises that simply should not be made and giving a lifetime appointment to a known racist homophobic misogynist in return for other nominations being “allowed” is one of them. Good for Patrick Leahy. Now he needs to kill the stupid “Blue Slip” rule that lets home state Senators veto judicial nominations in their state. It is an anachronism in an era when the Senate Minority Leader has declared publicly that his one goal is to obstruct the president’s agenda.

  22. princesspat

    I really overslept this morning….just couldn’t wake up. So the stitches are out but the wound has some sort of itchy irritation and until that’s resolved I still need to limit my activity 🙁  This means we’ll drive to Oregon as taking the train will involve more lifting and walking than I can do.

    I did get finish the pillow sham, using a cute combo of fabrics featuring puppies in baskets, puppy treats, and flowers. It took so long though….felt like I was trying to sew my way out of a wet paper bag!

  23. DeniseVelez

    march to the polls rally, which took place yesterday.  Yancey-Mitchell NC.

    http://new.livestream.com/acco…

    What is interesting about it – it’s in rural NC – demographics almost all white

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y…

    The racial makeup of the county was 97.99% White, 0.57% Black or African American, 0.34% Native American, 0.13% Asian, 0.41% from other races, and 0.56% from two or more races. 2.69% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race.

  25. JanF

    It is 51 degrees in Madison on its way up to 73. Another perfect fall day!!

    I haven’t had time to read the news but I found a story with this delightful headline:

    In Brownbackistan, everything is awesome! And don’t let any liberal tell you different

    Brownbackistan!!!

    A quick scan yielded this blockquote:

    Sam Brownback’s reelection campaign is begging voters to persuade themselves that everything they’ve read in the newspaper is a falsehood; that things are really and truly OK, despite the evidence of the senses: “The sun is shining in Kansas and don’t let anybody tell you any different.”

    That last is the tagline Brownback delivers in one of his TV commercials that you can watch yourself on YouTube. It is something to behold. I have never been in a cult indoctrination session, but I have started to think that this ad depicts the procedure. Here is this weirdly smirking man, Governor Brownback, telling you something he obviously doesn’t believe-and then he’s telling a different group-and then another. Each of these audiences is nodding constantly; each of them is made up of clean, neatly dressed people-some of them in a well-appointed suburban kitchen, some of them sitting on a pleasant veranda, some of them in a corporate boardroom. And the subject the governor is advising them on is how you get out of poverty! You know: hard work, family structure. “That’s the way out of poverty!,” he exults, with that odd smile of his. To judge by the clothes and the settings, however, these people have never even had cause to doubt the timely arrival of their next meal, let alone fear a lifetime of ill-paid toil. For practical purposes, Brownback might as well be giving them tips on how to land a spaceship on the surface of the moon.

    And this!!!

    What is going on here is so freakishly self-damaging, so bizarrely self-contradicting that it makes you think of a man trying out his new shotgun on his own foot, or of a president putting a meth addict in charge of the nuclear football.

    Heading back for a reread. See all y’alls later!!

  26. DeniseVelez

    Spent much of last evening watching/reading the NY Times related articles re Shonda Rhimes.

    The Times is getting a major drubbing from readers, and other journalists.

    Their “nopology” from public Editor Margaret Sullivan has made things worse.

    http://publiceditor.blogs.nyti…

    From Sullivan:

    My final take of the day: I still plan to talk to Mr. Baquet about the article, its editing, and about diversity in the newsroom, particularly among culture critics.  The Times has significant diversity among its high-ranking editors and prominent writers, but it’s troubling that with 20 critics, not one is black and only two are persons of color.

    Update, 12:58 p.m., Monday: Early Monday afternoon, I spoke to the culture editor, Danielle Mattoon. She told me that arts and culture editors are well aware of the response to the piece, and she offered words of regret, as well as an explanation and a resolution for the future.

    “There was never any intent to offend anyone and I deeply regret that it did,” Ms. Mattoon said. “Alessandra used a rhetorical device to begin her essay, and because the piece was so largely positive, we as editors weren’t sensitive enough to the language being used.”

    Ms. Mattoon called the article “a serious piece of criticism,” adding, “I do think there were interesting and important ideas raised that are being swamped” by the protests. She told me that multiple editors – at least three – read the article in advance but that none of them raised any objections or questioned the elements of the article that have been criticized.

    “This is a signal to me that we have to constantly remind ourselves as editors of our blind spots, what we don’t know, and of how readers may react.”

    (my bold)

    The piece was not largely positive, was riddled with errors…and I’m curious about how they plan to erase “blind spots” – when the editorial staff is clearly clueless and blind.

    http://publiceditor.blogs.nyti…

    The “comments” are still rolling in.

    What was heartening was how many self-identified “white” readers are giving the times hell.

    One of the best responses to this from elsewhere I’ve read is from NPR:

    The Only One: A Talk With Shonda Rhimes

    http://www.npr.org/blogs/monke…

    While reading the comments at the Times  several readers, who identified themselves as “white” also pointed out that the Times new “Food” section

    features all white cooking Editors/chefs.

    Since it isn’t a section I read I took a look – yup.

    Well I guess no blacks, latinos or asians are capable of cooking and writing about food.

    This has been an interesting examination of major media staffing, editing and power.

    One would hope the Times would learn a lesson from this – but as of today it doesn’t look very hopeful.

  27. Diana in NoVa

    after the Night from Hell. Could not sleep. Absolutely. Could. Not. Don’t know why, since I’m not worried or upset. It was just one of those occasional nights.

    And it would be the day when Niece is coming for coffee and Elder Son and DIL are coming for dinner. She will meet his flight from San Fran, drive him here, and then we’ll have dinner. I seem to think today is Rosh Hashanah. If I can keep my eyes open, I’ll look it up and see what we should do to celebrate. DIL is bringing a honey-apple cake that she says is traditional for Rosh Hashanah.

    Hope everyone will have a good day!

  28. Portlaw

    The first thing I do every morning is check the status of the Air France pilots’ strike. No progress. I am not leaving for ten days but if the strike continues I will not be able to postpone the trip and will have to cancel. Meanwhile, I am just buying presents for people and worrying.

    Off to read about Syria and more worrying.

    Hope it’s a good day throughout Moosylvania.

  29. anotherdemocrat

    It was actually cool this morning. Not so cool that I regretted the sandals & capris, but, still – cool.

    Still hoping for a $100 donation. It goes through today. If I don’t have one by noon, I may just put $100 on my lowest-interest credit card.

    No other thoughts in my head. Music is kinda loud, drowning out most other thoughts.

  30. Portlaw

    thinks that the Supreme Court’s conservative attitude on abortion access can be traced to one of her colleagues.

    “To be frank, it’s one person who made the difference: Justice [Anthony] Kennedy,” Ginsburg told Elle. “He was a member of the triumvirate used to [reaffirm] Roe v. Wade in the Casey case, but since then, his decisions have been on upholding restrictions on access to abortion.”

    and her reason for not resigning is


    Ginsburg said Senate Republicans would use a filibuster to block anyone Obama would pick.

    “If I resign any time this year, he could not successfully appoint anyone I would like to see in the court,” Ginsburg said. “So anybody who thinks that if I step down, Obama could appoint someone like me, they’re misguided. As long as I can do the job full steam…. I think I’ll recognize when the time comes that I can’t any longer. But now I can.”

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

  31. bfitzinAR

    QC could have been worse – if the LieberDem would quit bringing up how we all voted for a millage rollback 3 years ago (without mentioning the extenuating circumstances – in was in a package that also funded all the schools and libraries, some of the fire departments, and half of all the towns in the County), and then blaming me for “starting it” when I respond…  According to her it’s going to be my fault if the entire Dem slate, from Mark Pryor on down, loses this year.  But then, her LeiberDem-ing is a large part of the reason I’m not going to be there next year.

    At least no QC tonight.  Thanks for the peaceful purple pool 🙂  

  32. princesspat

    Our neighbors are having a party welcoming new neighbors this afternoon…..looks like we’ll be indoors instead of on the deck.

    I’ve got bills to pay, a visit to the lab for an INR check, then to the doc for the results of the PT scan, and then packing to do so it’s a busy day.

    Thanks everyone…..checking in at the moose is a nice beginning to my day.

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