Random bits of my so-called life.

I posted this plant a few weeks ago and she was looking a little sad. I am not a good plant mom from the get-go but I was doing pretty well with this cute little one and I am pretty attached to her. But then we were gone for over two weeks and I forgot to engage a plant sitter to check up on her.

I asked a beach urchin if she would temporarily adopt my little plant. She is good at nurturing plants and has a number of them and I knew she would know how to care for mine. Yes yes yes! And look how well she is doing! Thanks to L and C for taking care of her!

In other news, we had another foghorn morning with a little (I mean a *little*) rain and moderate northwest wind with temperatures in the 60s all day. Good day to work from the moominbeach and I worked on an archaeological dig ALL day. My “local” NPR station is in mid-Michigan and I knew there were rainstorms around that area but I didn’t really think about the Planet Ann Arbor, even though the folks at my morning stand-up meeting were talking about them. Out of sight, out of mind?

Today’s rain (in Ann Arbor, not at the moominbeach) was undoubtedly an artifact of Hurricane Beryl. We had a similar phenomenon after Hurricane Ike but I was *on* The Planet Ann Arbor for that one. It is the only time our basement has ever gotten the slightest bit damp and it also set a smoke alarm off a few times.

So the next bit is a little odd. The GG noticed that the webcam at the Landfill had stopped working, indicating a probable power failure. I looked it up on the DTE app (lucky-shucky/gas utility down there) and it wasn’t clear whether there was an outage at the Landfill or not. I am not a fan of the latest upgrade to the app’s interface but we won’t go there because boring and even though I do user experience design for a living, I’m not sure I could’ve done a better job 🐽

Anyway, I opened up my laptop to write my blahg and checked my email and voila! There was an email from DTE telling me that that our METER had notified them that power had been restored. Since I didn’t even know the power went out, I had not notified them. I am pretty sure the DTE app isn’t lying to me because I haven’t seen umpteen bazillion complaints on Next Door Neighbor about power outages. At any rate, there isn’t anything in the freezer we can’t afford to lose. What remains of the precious peas I shelled in my own back yard are here in the moomincabin freezer. Next year I am gonna buy twice as many peas.

Oh man, sorry about that long higgledy-piggledy entry yesterday. I was Moom Alone and had the radio rolling through the background of my work day. And yesterday was all bad bad news to someone who does not want Trump back in office. Today I was heartened to hear that Big Gretch (who I totally support) supports Joe and I’ve heard some other folks have backed off a bit on calls for his demise. But we’ll see…

Yesterday was a “hot” day. I mean in the 70s somewhere, not 120, like Las Vegas has reported. We don’t EVER get anything near that here, not even 100, but if we’d had that here, I would’ve spent my whole day immersed up to my neck in Gitchee Gumee, one of the earth’s biggest air conditioners. But it was hot enough that I replaced the glass windows with screens in both moomincabin doors and opened a lot of windows. And we ate on the deck.

The GG likes to “take the edge off” so he had buttoned everything up by the time I was ready to go to bed and I was not a happy camper. It wasn’t exactly *hot* inside but I wanted air-flow. Fortunately, I have it in the “back bedroom” (once my childhood bedroom) where I can open two windows, one at my side, the other at my head, both just barely above my bed. Bliss. At least in mid-July. I have slept in that bed wearing Smartwool leggings under my nightshirt in my sleeping bag with a comforter over it.

I got this kinda fuzzy pic of the waxing crescent moon after we watched the penultimate episode of Fargo and before we crashed out for the night. This morning I woke up early to the sound of foghorns in the shipping channel. Looking at the Marine Traffic app, three freighters were out there. Somewhere. They certainly weren’t visible, hence the foghorns.

Some people are disturbed by what they might call mournful foghorn sounds but foghorns are comforting to me. When I was a young child snug in my little bunk bed (in the back of the moomincabin where I am sleeping this summer but not in a bunk bed), there were stationary foghorns out in Whitefish Bay. Nowadays the ships just blow their own horns. They have high-tech ways of knowing where other freighters are but need to warn small botes that might be in their vicinity.

I think this quote from February is where all of the current political chaos started. I can’t write about this complicated situation, at least not eloquently, so I’m not gonna try very hard.

But I want to know a few things. If y’all get Joe to step down, who are you going to run in his place? Kamala? I have nothing against Kamala but I don’t think she would beat Trump. I mean, I’m not even sure Joe can beat Trump at this point.

A lot of my MAGA buddies (yes, I have some) are terrified that “it’ll go back to the Obamas.” As near as I can figger, that vague statement seems to mean some sort of black magic will happen and Michelle will become president. This puzzles me to no end because that I know of, Michelle has said over and over and over that she has no interest in the presidency. So where the f*ck is this BS coming from? The so-called Deep State? And what the heck *is* the Deep State? [Don’t answer that.]

How soon is the Democratic convention? Pretty soon, right? I don’t know a whole lot about the 1968 convention. I was not very politically aware back then except maybe for “stop the [Viet Nam] war” and “lower the voting (drinking) age”, issues that affected meeeee pretty directly. But google that convention if you dare.

Why is no one talking about Trump and his constant spewing of lies, not to mention Word Salad? Cognitive issues? This drove me NUTS in 2016 and it seems like I’m only hearing other people *occasionally* talk about it now. Why is he being taken seriously?

Do y’all really want to vote for a guy who wants to be a dictator? Do you have any idea what it’s like to live under the whims of a narcissistic person? I do not, thanks to the fact that the generation before me fought to eradicate Nazi fascism. I don’t want to go back there. And yes, I believe Trump when he talks about being a dictator for a day. That scares the sh*t out of me, but even scarier is imagining him deciding to continue his dictatorship indefinitely with all of his yay-hoo “base” supporting him. The Q Shaman? The Proud Boys? No thanks. Then, when he dies, would we end up with “Baby Trump”? (Remember Haiti’s Baby Doc?) Is that what we want? Really? Why is he being taken seriously? Yes, I intentionally repeated that question.

I do not want a dictatorship, even for a day. As messy and slow as democracy is, I would rather keep the status quo. I do NOT think Joe has dementia. The debate was horrible but he doesn’t sound like that all the time. He sounded SICK! I mean with a debilitating cold virus, not Alzheimer’s. And his opponent is a narcissistic lunatic.

Okay, this entry is kinda all over the place. It’s not because I have dementia, it’s because these are all really complicated issues and I’m a relatively uninformed but very concerned citizen writing a quick blahg entry, not a book. And the lawyer who made the quote in the title had no business stating an opinion like that. He is not qualified to comment on someone’s mental status.

Love y’all, even my MAGA friends although I wish you would expand your information sources, not to mention hone your critical thinking skills. G’night from the Shores of Gitchee Gumee. A few MOE-skee-TOES but not terrible.

Back when I and my brother and cousins had young beach urchins, there were often moments of “strife” or whatever you want to call it. “Strife?” Yes. The strife that happens when multiple families with children share a small space, even for a short time.

Radical Betty, who spent many summers (but not all because she and the family were in Alaska for a while with her Air Force colonel husband) in the Old Cabin with her sister and their children, would gnoff and gnoff about the craziness that sometimes happened over there. She would say “shades of the past” when we would kvetch about whatever we had going on with our children and their cousins.

Here at the moomincabin, we are GREATLY enjoying watching my cousins and their children and grandchildren. My cousins’ children are my first cousins once removed and their grandchildren are my first cousins twice removed and my children’s second cousins once removed) Need a picture? Oh Granddaddy what the heck did you start here? Whatever it is, it’s good. We got The Engineer’s (my late brother) Tonka trucks out and some other beach toys for the young cousins to play with. Good to see them get some use.

The moomindeck provides a bit of respite for those who need to chill out and today it provided entertainment for a two-year-old who was insistent on visiting the “other” cabin. Which is the moomincabin. This sweet kiddo has figured out that the Old Cabin and the moomincabin are deeply connected and it was a total riot to watch and listen to him. He especially likes the door. Doors in general, I’m told. We don’t share the same language quiiiite yet but we will soon enough.

The pic is from a few nights ago when we put The Cranberries on Wonderboom (our pod). Delores O’Riordan committed suicide a few years ago (pre-covid) and we were here when we heard the news. This music was MAJOR for us when the beach urchins were teens and tweens and we would be rambling around through the northern lower, usually over by the beautiful Jordan Valley. Usually but not always in The Indefatigable (1992 Jeep Wrangler).

I had to take this pic before the GG took a MUCH NEEDED shower. He is sporting a North County Trail “blaze” on the bridge of his nose. I posted this photo on facebook and it has gone “viral” in a minor way.

The GG and Lizard Breath took off this morning on a junket to paint blazes on the North Country Trail north of Tahquamenon Falls. I was looking forward to a day of space-ification so I could “reset” the refrigerator, etc. Some next door cousins interrupted that for a bit but I love them and was HAPPY to hang out with them for a while.

The GG and friends are always working hard on keeping the Hiawatha Shore-to-Shore section of the North Country Trail in good shape but they are working extra hard this year because the annual NCT “celebration” will be held in St. Ignace this year.

People sometimes wonder why we, who live on the Planet Ann Arbor, are volunteers with an upper peninsula North Country Trail chapter. Well, it’s because I grew up here and thanks to my parents and grandparents, still own property up here. When I am talking to people I don’t want to get complicated with (like my boss, etc.), I just say, “A hundred years ago, my grandfather bought a beach and we still have it.” It isn’t that simple but it’s close.

Years ago, we hiked the NCT for the first time. We got lost a few times. Kinda scary when you are hiking in the woods and can’t find the trail. After that the GG ran across the Shore-to-Shore chapter. Most hikers are introverts so getting to know these folks was a bit awkward at first but they became wonderful friends. It helped that one of the group knew The Comm and Radical Betty. Our NCT chapter has been very active over the years and our section of trail is now actively patrolled by an enthusiastic group of volunteers who paint blazes, lop hanging branches, and chainsaw fallen logs and things. To be clear, our chainsaw folks (including the GG) are trained and certified.

I am not the worst bathroom cleaner in the world but my older beach urchin is much better than me. She scrubbed the heck out of this little space today, even behind the terlet where it is perennially damp and therefore always a little scuzzy. I hate cleaning behind there soooo much that I avoid doing it. She did it with *many* paper towels. This surprised me a bit because my beach urchins, like most millennials (or whatever they are), do not like to waste disposable things. But sometimes a little waste is worth less gross-osity, especially if you are cleaning a 40-something year old bathroom with the original linoleum floor tiles, which are 60-something. But paper towels? Note to self… You are never too old to learn new tricks and sometimes you learn them from your children.

So we built this little seasonal cabin the summer I was six and this room was NOT a bathroom for many years. I’m trying to remember if my brother maybe slept in there in a crib at first but my memories are cloudy about that. We did have bunk beds in the room next to this (to the left of the pic). For many years, it was a storage room that we called the Little Room. We also used it to change in and out of bathing suits or pajamas. The moomincabin “walls” are all partitions with space at the top so you could climb on things and “peek” over the partition at the person changing🐽 Sibling shenanigans. I mainly remember the Little Room as being a very crowded little space with a lot of STUFF in it.

I was in my twenties when The Commander finally decided to convert the Little Room into an indoor bathroom. I am *thinking* that decision more or less coincided with her gaining a daughter-in-law (aka my brother’s wife, now widow) but I may be misremembering although I could probably look it up. The GG (who I was “with” but we weren’t married yet) would probably not have cared if there was indoor plumbing or not but I was ecstatic after all the years of using an outhouse and bathing in the lake at 0-skunk-30 before work*. Or bumming showers from neighbor-relatives.

A standard sized tub/shower would not fit in the space so The Comm did some research and decided that a recreational vehicle fixture would fit the bill. As she was shopping for one, most of the folks who sold them acted like she was crazy but eventually she found someone who would *listen* to what she needed and that is what we have to this day. I’m sure a lot of today’s fancy RVs have much more elaborate fixtures than this simple one but it has always worked for us and continues to do so.

*Mr. Drysdale, my boss at the Tempo discount department store when I arrived with wet hair once: Did you go in the lake this morning? 🤣

I’ve been attending the annual Piedy 4th of July party since forever. The first one I can remember featured a cookout behind the Piedy/Mac Old Cabin followed by a huge beach faaaar during which the much older (than me) Piedy boys launched Roman candles over the lake. Scary and exciting at the same time.

It has long since turned into a potluck and I always make lasagna, joking that it’s the only thing I know how to cook. We use this little “trailer” of The Commander’s to transport the lasagna down the beach to the party location. This is an old pic. The beach is quite a bit wider this year and there isn’t that much seaweed. Also it was not foggy today.

As much as I love the Piedy/Mac clan, as a friendly introvert, I spent quite a bit of time today storing up social energy. I was reading on Bill’s Birch Point Beach Bank Bench this afternoon when a lovely young woman in a white bikini came waltzing along and plopped down beside me on the bench. It was none other than Cap’n*QUEEN*Leila! All grown up, in high school and with a job, no less.

When her family lived next door a few years ago, she would visit frequently. I think she especially liked hanging out with the GG in the garage or one of our motor botes. He’s a lot more fun and kid-friendly than yer fav-o-rite blahgger. Then they moved a few miles down the road and COVID happened and we have only had short visits with her in the last few years so it was wonderful to sit down and talk with her a bit today.

Social anxiety or not, I also enjoyed the potluck, a highlight being talking to “B”, the Piedy friend closest to me in age. Along with others, we got going on the hilariously jury-rigged water and sewage systems our families have used over the years, beginning back when there weren’t really many rules for septic tanks and drain fields, etc. Running water from your uncle’s well via a garden hose? Not even to mention the outhouses. How many holes? One, two, or three? 🤣🤣🤣

So today. First thing I dropped the GG off at Gladys Crossing for a bug-filled hike from the moomin to the Soo. I continued on to Meijer where…

I was talking to myself while navigating my cart between another customer’s cart and a Meijer stocking kind of cart. “Can I get through here? Yes, I can!” A friendly produce worker engaged me in conversation, telling me that this week was the Soo Meijer’s biggest week EVER! I was apparently lucky to be oot and aboot on the early side although 9:00 AM is not really early for me.

Back to the moomin to prep dinner for today’s anniversary event. Filet, mashed potatoes, broccoli, and corn on the cob.

Back to town to meet up with the GG at Wicked Sister, a great lunch as always. Then. Back AGAIN to the moomin where the GG took a nap in the back bedroom.

Cousins began arriving at the Old Cabin almost immediately after we pulled in from our lunch trip. More are expected tonight and tomorrow.

Porterized for a happy hour, hearing far-away thunder. It was way out in Whitefish Bay and turned out to be a “plassover”. A “plassover” is a storm that looks very threatening but goes by to the north of the moominbeach across Whitefish Bay. The Commander and Radical Betty used to call those “passovers” but one day they’d had a wee bit more of a beer lunch than usual and RB turned it into a “plassover”.

The earlier storm (in the pic) did turn out to be a plassover but we may still get some stuff tonight.

Via my mouse, who is checking The Landfill, MY BALLOT HAS ARRIVED! YAY! Mail has been so crazy lately I was a bit worried about that.

I am still too discombobulated to write anything about yesterday’s supreme court bombshell. Except that it really wasn’t a bombshell, was it?

Let’s see if I can make any sense talking about posting the 10 commandments in classrooms. Without writing a “book”, that is.

Putting aside the notion that it seems to be an egregious violation of separation of church and state for a moment… What are the powers that be looking to accomplish with this? Besides possibly shoving Christianity (more on that in a minute) down young students’ throats. Do they expect the students to READ the 10 commandments and suddenly grow halos? When is the last time you’ve been inside an elementary school classroom?

About Christianity, I will first reiterate my usual disclaimers that 1) I grew up attending a mainstream protestant church but 2) I have never believed in a religion. I’ll add a third one here: I am not a religious scholar. Driving up to the yooperland the other day after I *finally* (after three years) figured out how to switch radio channels on Cygnus without taking my eyes off the road, I stumbled across a very interesting segment on an NPR program.

On this 20-minute program segment, a number of actual religious scholars were consulted and quoted. I’m not talking about fire and brimstone preachers or medicine show snake oil “healers” or pedophile priests. I’m talking about people with PhDs who have spent years of their academic careers studying religion(s) in depth and are better equipped to analyze religious texts than your average politician. And YES, people who study religion to such a high degree are very important to our understanding of global culture. Don’t argue with me, MAGA. I am right about this.

The gist was that many versions of the 10 commandments exist. Not all of them are the ones us “Christians” were taught. Like just about everything else in life, there is a lot of room for interpretation. Different words are used in different versions. “Thou shalt not kill” vs. “Thou shalt not murder” was one example. To (sorta) paraphrase one guest, “There’s no point in posting a document like the 10 commandments in a classroom if you aren’t going to teach it to the students within some kind of meaningful context.” I’m not sure what Louisiana has in mind but I doubt that’s it.

That’s the GG in the pic and NO he has DEFINITELY NOT sprouted a halo🐽 It was warm enough to eat on the moomindeck last evening and that’s what we are doing. With Mr. Golden Sun behind us.

P.S. I am not going to list all of the commandments Trump has violated. Plenty of other people have already done that. It doesn’t seem to make a damn difference.

I’ve been told it’s No Politics Day. Even though it isn’t. No Politics Day is in January. But there’s so much soup in my baggy old brain, I couldn’t write about today’s events if I tried. I will say I feel like we are tipping into Handmaid’s Tale Land. And I am NOT just talking about reproductive rights.

I had a Market Assistant for my Meijer (big box grocery) run this morning. I like to do solo grock runs but I grudgingly accepted the offer. First, if I had a driver, I could work on my daily word puzzles in the car. Also, as it turned out he was helpful. I could not find yeast to save my life. I thought it was in one of the refrigerated sections but not. He found it by the flour. He did NOT find Boar’s Head sandwich dressing but that’s because they don’t carry it. I got everything else (I think) but it was handy to have someone to run around for stray items. I like to get IN and OUT of the grock store and don’t like when I have to traverse the store a bazillion times to find something. The staff is friendly and helpful and I’m not timid about asking for help but it’s a big store and there’s not always someone right where you need them if you are looking for something.

I went through the only open cashiered lane today. There was no one ahead of me in line (and I woulda gone through it anyway). I am a Uscan ninja but I had much more stuff than usual and the Meijer cashiers and their baggers are like WHOOOOOSH! I would tip them if I could but I did thank them rather profusely. Grocery workers have a hard job and need to be paid more.

After “co-working” for the day, the beach urchin and I decamped to the moominbeach to read for a bit. When the sun went over the yardarm, I came up to fix the refrigerator and get dinner (American Mom Chicken Shwarma) in the oven and the beach urchin channeled Grandroobly by sweeping the deck.

Reading? “Huckleberry Finn”, if you care to know. I have “James” on my TBR and figgered it would be good to revisit Huck first. Of course, I read Huck Finn in high school or thereabouts and remember almost nothing about it except for Huck and Jim and a RAFT. Good thing I am re-reading it.

Quiet Celtic music on the pod to chill us all out a bit. This Scottish gal (79% according to Ancestry) is loving it 🐽

I’m here at the moominbeach and I’m happy to be here so why did I have such a hard time dragging myself away from the Landfill this morning? I don’t think I have the words to describe that.

The moominbeach actually *is* home. Going to the moomin is actually one of my earliest memories. We would turn off (the then gravel) 6-Mile Road onto (the then gravel) Birch Point Loop. I’m not even sure that road had a name then. What I remember about this is hearing the susurration of the pine trees in the wind as we made the turn. I was lying in the back seat of the Old Black Ford (I don’t need no stinkin’ car seat). We drove out from our house in Sault Ste. Siberia. But that house (and the house the parents moved to much later) have long belonged to other people and they aren’t home for me now.

Back in those days, we stayed at the Old Cabin for the summer. It was the *only* cabin. My uncle Don’s cabin was being built that summer, I think. I also have a vague memory of a telephone ringing at the Old Cabin (hopefully I’m not crazy). He would need a telephone because he was often on call as a doc. After his cabin was finished, it was many many years before there was a phone at the Old Cabin again.

So until I was six and we built the moomincabin, my family spent summers in the Old Cabin with two families of cousins. I mostly remember the good times but The Two-Year-Old Summer apparently wasn’t much fun for our moms (The Commander, Radical Betty, and Bubs). The two-year-olds were me and the two FinFam girl cousins who were born the same year as me. Apparently it rained a LOT that summer. And during a refrigerator clean-out session, people were punching out eggs and stuff. (I think that was UKW, always the ring-leader.) There is an infamous photo of the three of us two-year-old cousins bathing in various tubs purportedly sized to our butts on the hearth in front of the faaarplace. I’ll have to look that up and post it.

After the moomincabin was built, it took a little pressure off the number of people in the Old Cabin but we all ran back and forth all the time, in and out all day. Nobody ever knocked on a door at the moominbeach in those days. You just barged on in. Often loudly. I’m pretty sure my grandmother loved all the hubbub.

So where was I? I was at The Landfill this morning and now I am here and (yay!) one of the beach urchins has arrived for the week. She is UBER busy and as of last night wasn’t sure she could make it (it’s a frickin’ five hour drive). I was feeling almost a little verklempt but here she is (and I wouldda been okay in any case). After yesterday’s hot sweaty day on the Planet Ann Arbor, today at the moominbeach it may be 60? And there’s a northwest wind. Chilly but not terrible.

Anyway. I didn’t wanna leave the Landfill this morning and I won’t wanna leave the moominbeach when it’s time to go back to the Landfill.

Thunderstorms overnight and this morning cooled us off for a while. Then, when I wasn’t paying attention, the temperature shot up into the 80s and all of that moisture evaporating from the storms left us in a sticky swamp. I hadn’t really been paying attention but at one point, the GG announced that he was going to turn the A/C on. Realizing that he was right, I did not argue. We were working on packing to leave tomorrow and needed the coooooool in order to function. I don’t know how we managed all those years without central A/C even though we don’t often turn it on now.

Did the next door neighbors bring their new baby home today? We think so but we did not see when they arrived so we did not see how many people got out of the vee-hickle. We did NOT go next door to ask or visit. Although they are very nice and friendly, about the last thing I would ever do is intrude on a pair of new parents with their two-day-old baby.

We had a bit of a happy hour in our back yard this afternoon/evening, with pizza from Anthony’s. Thankfully almost all of it was eaten, something the GG and I would never do by ourselves and I frequently have to throw out leftover pizza when I make it because it doesn’t get eaten in a timely manner.

We have robins nesting again and that reminded me that my photo memories showed me that four years ago today, I was sitting outside at the end of my workday when this baby robin fluttered down from its nest, a few feet away from me. A fledgling. I watched it “dance” with one of its parents until I lost track of them. (Don’t look at the garlic mustard.)

I begged off watching a Fargo episode tonight. I wanted to be outside in my yard watching the faaarflies. We’ll be up and out on the early side tomorrow and I will need to focus to finish packing. I don’t have a lot left to pack. I like to travel light. But still.

A higgledy-piggledy entry but that’ll have to do. G’night.

I don’t as a rule watch presidential debates [delete long complicated reasons or just go with “I get bored” or in last night’s case more like “I get disgusted”.]

I was making a Meijer run at 0-skunk-30 today (when there’s no traffic to speak of) when NPR played a clip of Biden speaking. OH MY GOD! IT’S ALL OVER! That was just about all I could think. But I also realized, this is a man with a COLD. A bad one. COVID or not, I dunno and who cares. He had lost his voice. Of course the media and various trolls jumped all over this. He is old and feeble, yada yada. I do wish we had a younger candidate. I almost bet Biden does too. But he doesn’t always sound feeble.

Back when I was a pirate (A pirate was a reading partner with elementary school children who were struggling to read and didn’t necessarily have academic support at home), there was a day when I was “sick”. I felt fine EXCEPT that I was constantly coughing, sneezing, and blowidg by doze. And I had no voice. I canceled my pirate that day. But you can’t cancel a presidential debate. Because that will make you look feeble.

Plus. You have to “debate” Trump. I put debate in quotes because Trump does not debate according to any rules except his own. I learned a new phrase, “gish gallop” today. I was not anywhere near the debate team in high school. I was TERRIFIED of speaking in public, arguing with people and all of what that stuff entails. Apparently gish gallop is an actual term? Right? It involves spewing out anything and everything you can, true or not, to bamboozle your opponent so they cannot figure out what to respond to. Something like that. Again, I am not a debater. This can discombobulate your opponent to the point of uh, uh, uh, stuttering. Even if you are NOT a life-long stutterer, like Biden is.

The thing is that Trump naturally gish gallops. He ALWAYS spews out all kinds of garbage, true or not. Mostly not. That is his modus operandi if I can grace a baboon with a Latin phrase. Mrs. Velde, my high school Latin teacher and Latvian concentration camp survivor may be cheering me on but I am sure she is not cheering for Trump, having lived through Nazi fascism in WWII.

Whatever went on in those debates, we CANNOT elect Trump again. Biden is NOT an idiot. He is a seasoned politician with a sense of humor who had a really bad day. We MUST elect him this time. After that, we can regroup. Hopefully with some younger candidates.

That was Amazon Woman (my then boss) the day I emailed her to say something like, “I am covid positive today and I’m taking a mental health day. I am fine. I have TWO symptoms, mild cough and EXTREME ANNOYANCE.” The annoyance was at the GG who ABSOLUTELY brought the virus home from an “I don’t need no stinkin’ mask” trip. One during which he hugged a hiking acquaintance he encountered on the trail who had “it’s just a cold” symptoms. In the middle of the initial omicron surge? Nope. I don’t think so.

In the end, I did not kill The GG last night. We went to sleep happy and are pretty much back to the usual silent political impasse. I was doing laundry this morning and the dryer notified me that the sheets were done while I was in a meeting. The GG happily went down to retrieve them, then made the bed. That is all modus operandi around here. When you are one of 10 siblings, doing laundry and making beds is not “women’s work”. If you want your own clothes returned to you from the laundry, you learn to do your own laundry. (Disclaimer: This is NOT to dis my mother-in-law. She raised a great family and helped many neighborhood kids out along the way. And she wasn’t bad at laundry but I doubt it was her top priority.)

I had to laugh though. My blahg was not accessible for a while today. When a blahggy friend notified me, I jokingly said that maybe my husband had sabotaged it. But not. The GG does not have the access required to do anything to my blahg. Er, I can’t remember if he has my password or not but I am not really worried about him destroying my blahg. Plus he doesn’t read it regularly so maybe he hasn’t even read yesterday’s.

Administrivia… If my blahg goes away, it will come back. One of the little perks in my life is that my blahg host is not one of the public platforms where you have to set up your own blahg (I have done that and know how painful it can be). My host is The Guru and The Guru is a friend in real life. When the server goes down (which is probably what happened today but who knows), he knows about it and if he is not somewhere he can’t access the internet, he is working on it. So I don’t have to notify some underpaid, uncaring tech support person. And I didn’t notify The Guru today because I knew he had my [blahg’s] back.

Now. If The Guru ever decides to retire from this thankless “job”, I will be in the same swamp as everybody else. Typepad? WordPress? For now though, Thank you!

Fen pic by mouse.

I am so frickin’ sick of the MAGA cult.

Back in 2016, we were at the Oscar Tango and a certain person asked us a bunch of questions. One of them was “Do you agree with open borders?” I answered no.

Mind you, this was waaaay before we ever thought Trump could or would win a presidential election. I wasn’t crazy about Hilary as a choice but jeebus. The Bad Orange Man cannot even string a sentence together without making it into chopped salad. He’s a “biznessman” and reality TV show “star” (and a frickin’ idiot) and how could he ever win… You know what happened next.

Tonight, that stoopid piece of paper was brought out once again. I STILL do not believe in open borders. But that’s where it gets complicated. First… What is the definition of “open borders”? I don’t think we actually have them in this country although I will acknowledge that many people manage to get in illegally.

So. I believe what we need are laws and rules and procedures for dealing with the folks who want to join the “land of the free and the home of the brave”. And I think we have those in place but from what I am hearing, it is very difficult to enforce them and we won’t even talk about getting these people’s cases through the court system in any kind of timely manner. Is this the fault of any one president? No president can solve these issues alone.

I have many issues with Trump’s immigration “policies” but the one that rankles me the most is the zero tolerance child separation thing. YES, I KNOW IT WAS AN OBAMA POLICY!!! Stop telling me that. Obama did NOT institute it with the intention of using it in a brute force way to separate EVERY child from their parent(s). It was intended to be used in a discretionary way when a child seemed to be in danger. TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP used it like a HAMMER. Every kid no matter what the circumstances. This is not a way to treat children and their families in any circumstances. And to those who have tried to liken it to AMERICAN children torn from their parents as they (parents) are being arrested, that is bad too but it is apples and oranges.

What bothered me most about tonight’s “conversation” or whatever it was because I ended up being angry and walking away… Was that I was not given a chance to talk. I was not given a chance to explain my 2016 answer to the question and I was not given a chance to explain why I haven’t changed my stance. I was not given a chance to talk AT ALL! Talked over every time I opened my mouth. Me, a *literate* and highly paid tech professional. Not that my pay grade matters. All people should be given a chance to talk and be heard!

As for immigration in general, I would remind people that probably an overwhelming majority of our citizens’ ancestors immigrated, if they themselves are not immigrants. I wish for more compassion for those who try to leave horrible circumstances for the “land of the free and the home of the brave” or whatever the United States of America is nowadays. We seem to have more idiots than not. Where are your ancestors from? How did they get here and what kind of travails did they endure on their journey?

And to whoever needs to hear it, STOP TRYING TO MAN ‘SPLAIN ME! JEEBUS KEE-REIST.

I was just about to go out and water my flowers this morning at 0-skunk-30. It had been a few days. They were looking fine but I knew I would need to get back into the habit if we didn’t get significant rain soon. I had no idea what the weather forecast was. Before I headed out the door, I decided to turn on the radio. They were talking about severe storms and power outages. I didn’t catch where but it sounded like a “local” weather report so somewhere in southern lower Michigan.

I looked at the sky (again). I looked at weather apps. We seemed to be at the very bottom tippy tip of rain storms although it was NOT raining. I decided to wait for a bit and see if it rained or not. I like to water flowers early in the morning. Long ago, a self-described “farm girl” I worked with told me if you water flowers/plants in the heat of the day, they get cooked. I dunno if that’s exactly true but somehow it makes sense to water things when they are not in full sunlight. I’m talking a few pots of impatiens, not trying to give farm crop advice.

BTW, I think I can be credited for giving my old co-worker a subtle tip about how she might turn her boyfriend into a fiance. (Go away for a bit.) I am not Ann Landers but in this case, I sussed things out correctly. It worked and I haven’t seen her in a bazillion years but their children have got to be through college and well launched into their adult lives by now. I hope she and her family are thriving.

Back to the weather… We got a good gully washer this morning. By the time it arrived I was about to head outside to commune with MMCB for our weekly “zoom” coffee. But then. Kaboom Kabaam. It went on for at least an hour. It was coming from Wisconsin, said the GG. In truth, there was a LOT of thunder but nothing severe. What there was, was a lot of was rain! Which we needed. And it was COOOOOL in the Landfill for the first time in I dunno 10 days?

The photo is one my mouse sent me, Likely from the Plum parking lot early this morning. With permission, although I think any pic she sends me is okay to post. I do draw the line at pics of people.

These might only work as hats for cone heads. This is actually a bunch of garlic bread loaves I made today. I bought Zingerman’s baguettes at The Plum this morning and I buttered them, sprinkled garlic powder (powder, not salt) on them, wrapped them up in foil and put them in the freezer.

I use garlic powder on garlic bread because… When I was a kid, The Commander would *mince* garlic (by hand) for garlic bread and once a piece of minced garlic gave me a “garlic hangover”. I mean the next day I could STILL taste garlic and it was not pleasant. Broccoli was part of the dinner plan the next evening and that actually got rid of the garlic hangover. So I use garlic powder for my garlic bread. But not garlic salt.

I also got half-length lasagna noodles and Soy Vay marinade/sauce at the Plum. I need the half length noodles so I can make two half lasagnas for the Piedy 4th of July party, meat and veggie, and put them in different pans. I got Soy Vay because although I can easily make marinade for steak or whatever, Soy Vay is good and quick. It was my brother who originally found that. I think he found it somewhere in Sault Ste. Siberia (Glen’s maybe?) but that was something like 25 years ago and I haven’t been able to find it there recently.

Can I mobilize my Mirrix tapestry loom to take up there and if I do, will I actually USE it?

I took a chance on buying this book for the GG. I am not much of a history buff but after listening to two NPR interviews with this author on the anniversary of D-Day, I was impressed enough that I thought I’d give it a shot. It turned out to be a winner, even though I heard about it on NPR, which can be “persona non grata” to some folks around here. Not to mention that reading a book in a kayak is a good way to spend a very hot week. He has finished it and passed it on to his ID twin, the UU.

Our heat wave finally cooled down over last night and although I think the Landfill is still retaining some residual heat, it was comfortable all day today and outside was glorious. I retreated there for much of the afternoon after I got some chores done.

I dealt with some quilt-type fabric today. A number of years ago, I hit some kind of flinging wall and decided to donate a bunch of quilt fabrics. One of the places I donated to was via a work friend who used to meet weekly(?) with a group that made quilts to donate. When they received my contribution, the group leader apparently immediately dropped her plans for the day and used some of my fabrics instead.

The other place I donated to was via my daughter and wouldn’t you know, I got some of that stuff back recently. And that’s okay. After I made my original donations, I kind of regretted doing it. This stuff is all so hard. Anyway, I enjoyed reacquainting myself with some old fabric friends today. There was one bag in the box that I had not donated. At first glance it looked like old socks or something. I didn’t take a careful look but this is also okay. I will wash those items and mail them off in a take-back bag.

That is about all for tonight. Love y’all, KW.

First, a note to the weather “gods”. I don’t mean the “gods” that actually MAKE the weather. I mean those who try to predict it.

From last Sunday through Thursday, I was getting regular “alerts” from Weather Underground (I think) that our heat advisory was updated and was going to end in x days and y hours. The expiration on this advisory seemed to be Thursday night. But. Thursday night arrived. And Friday? I didn’t get any more alerts but the only difference I could detect from Friday’s weather and the rest of the week was that THERE WAS NO BLASTED BREEZE. The temperature was STILL in the low 90s. So why end the alert?

Today was another hot hot hot day but the breeze was back so I felt reasonably cool when I shelled my eight quarts of peas this morning. I bought four quarts on Wednesday and another four today. The vendor I bought from today said there would PROBABLY be peas on Wednesday and MAYBE next Saturday. It’s always a short season but this one is even shorter because of the heat. I told him I was heading to the yooperland in a week or so and would probably stay there for a while and he said, “You’re going in the right direction.” Yes.

Back to the weather, why can’t “they” just say something like, “It’s gonna be hot!” On top of that, Weather Underground was reporting all day yesterday that it was 99 degrees. Nowhere near! And no that wasn’t the heat index or whatever it is. Seems like Weather Underground was once the gold standard of weather forecasting/reporting? Wait! Is AI generating these advisories and alerts? If so, fire it.

I do love these meeses to pieces. On the left, the yellow one is my Tigger dog’s favorite toy ever. The Commander gave it to me when they had Tig euthanized (she was old and sick) when I went to college and I have saved it all these years. It still makes a hearty squeak when you squeeze it. I have never had another dog. I am a one dog woman even on a three dog night. The other mice have their tails wrapped across their faces. It took me a while to process that…

Well, we bought our fancy she-shed from Jim’s Amish Structures in the nearby burg of Chelsea. Despite the Amish-ness of the name, the shed was trucked in by some big rig. We had to cut down the remains of our mostly dead apple tree so it could get into the back yard. So not anything like the buggies the eastern yooperland Amish drive down dangerous Six Mile Road aka Waiska (Whiskey) Bay Road.

The neighbor is having a shed built. Or is it a garage? Opinions vary. Lots of gossip when we should just ASK Dan next door what he is building! The materials were delivered a few days ago via a gas powered flatbed truck. Today the building crew arrived, again via a gas powered vee-hickle. They got to business right off the bat. Tappity-tappity tap hammer bing bang. The GG was watching from the back room and was amazed at how fast they were working.

This is a pic he took. The workers are dressed in a sorta Amish fashion. But they weren’t driving a buggy. Anyone driving a buggy around here would be risking life and limb even more so than up on Six Mile/Whiskey Bay in the eastern yooperland. We went to pick up Mooon Yooonit from scheduled maintenance at around noon yesterday and the traffic just about drove me cray-zee. I’m thinking that I’ve heard that not all Amish stick totally to the old ways any more? I dunno.