That would be funny, were it not so tragic. 
My wife and I cannot believe what’s happening. As someone who grew up watching movies about WWII (Fascists are bad, m’kay?), and lived through the second half of the Cold War, and saw what was and is happening in Russia for the past quarter-century, it boggles my mind that this is happening. I’m too old for this shit.
But yeah, it would be nice to be annexed by Canada.
I am still dropping needles. People kept telling me that I’d turn magnetic if I got enough covid shots and it hasn’t worked yet. I feel cheated.
Did ya get your measles shots while you were there? Whooping cough is making a comeback again this year as well but you recently got your tetanus shot, right?
We’ve never had a coffee maker with a timer. That is the only reason I haven’t made a similar mistake pre-coffee. My first cup of coffee now comes from a Keurig, then I’m awake enough to manage my french press.
I woke up early this morning with a great letter to my elected officials almost fully drafted in my mind and am now letting it sit for an hour before going back to proof and edit. I know that nobody is really reading them, but this one reads well enough to get sent in the mail as well as emailed.
So of course it’s going to be the other place, them’s the rules when it comes to plumbing problems. Fingers crossed that this will be their final visit.
Hurray, may it work the same for us all. (Mostly, I’m worried about Medicaid. Our entire medical system depends on those payments, not to mention that folks on Medicaid are usually not young and healthy.)
I will worry with you. I’m sure she will come through just fine and that she’ll be a much happier puppers tomorrow.
I really do hope your new brace helps, we need to schedule that class soon. (I’m concerned about the teacher, the pics show that he is a POC and ICE has been seen in that part of the state.)
Hubs mowed yesterday. The neighbors across the street haven’t mowed once this year and their grass is still short and brownish.
One time I asked FIL how often they watered their lawn and he laughed and laughed. He told me that one year MIL had paid a company to come over and put down grass food and seed and that it was the worse idea she’d ever had because all that shit did was make the grass grow even faster than before.
Hubs fed the lawn in the fall and is planning on spreading seeds today or tomorrow. Looks like he takes after his mom after all!
The letters keep getting sent, I’ve stopped wasting my time trying to call anyone, I know my call isn’t important and nobody listens to the messages.
Well, how clever is that! It sounds like a great time and a wonderful afternoon activity. I hope your garden grows beautifully.
I hope your daughter loves her car for at least 300,000 miles!
I am boring and crabby, no reason for you to add sympathy for me being an idiot who doesn’t know to watch where I’m walking. You and your lovely wife are one of the reasons I’m waving my sign around and there are several other folks with LGBT signs out on a regular basis as well. In West Virginia. That’s how strongly folks feel, so there is a glimmer of hope left.
thank you.
Doing my civic duty and voting today. It’s county stuff so nothing exciting, but GD it, I have the right to vote and I’m gonna do it.
I got both Tdap and Tetanus last year. Yeah, I know. No MMR recently, but I think I had it somewhere along the line. I’ve had all the flu shots, and pneumonia and RSV. And I’m not magnetic, either.
OK, car’s tank is full. Once it’s a tad warmer in the garage, I’ll get out there and ready the interior of the car for the trip. And I told FCD when he gets home that I’ll vacuum his car, too. Because I’m nice, dammit!
I should probably empty the dishwasher and maybe haul the household trash out the the cans in the garage. That sounds productive.
I’m pretty sure you don’t need it, I’m also pretty sure I didn’t need mine either but my insurance paid for it and it allowed me to mentally say a big FUCK YOU to the clown in charge of the CDC.
As a point of reference, though. Folks born before 1986 who got the measles vaccinations might not be as fully vaccinated as they thought because the vaccine changed then.
I’m starting to think that we was lied to.
It boggled my mind the first time round, that it happened a second time is pure tragedy
I feel cheated that I’ve had all the Covid shots I was allowed to have, and my wifi still hasn’t improved.
Good for you! I am sure it is good for your soul to know that you’re doing something, anything, that keeps important issues under their noses.
It’s the middle of the afternoon here, I have written up the minutes from yesterday’s meeting and now I think I deserve a few minutes in here to reward myself for having done that particular job!
I was amused to see an add on our internal job board today - our ADHD Squirrel is going on a 7-month secondment soon and there was an ad for expressions of interest to replace her. I am guessing they didn’t get any because it should have closed on Monday, and now it’s appeared again with a closing date of 4th April. Anyone fancy coming over and managing my merry little band of rogues?
Well, dammit, sorta. I was emptying the dishwasher and I dropped one of my favorite small corningware pots, and it, naturally, broke. It was perfect for certain microwave tasks.
But after cleaning up the shattered bits (floor and drawer where bits created a special mess) I looked in another cabinet and discovered the forgotten corningware from MIL, including two - count 'em two - of the same size pot. So momentary tragedy, but I’m OK now. Whew.
And next on the agenda - gathering household trash. So much fun here today!
But you are Blanche!
JtC sorry to hear that your ankle is broken. I hope everything heals up quickly.
oopsie I’m rather surprised that they seated you all mid-argument! I would have thought they would move people in and out in between cases.
Wheelz So sorry for your loss, but thank you for not letting her suffer. She was beautiful and obviously very happy and content in the photos you posted.
Coppertone I’m glad your friend made it through his procedure, and that you have a lead on a potential new job!
The guy that mows my yard texted earlier this week to see if he could rake the leaves in my yard. I think he needed the money so I told him yes, and he did a good job. Unfortunately he filled both of my big outdoor bins to the brim with leaves and there isn’t enough room now for my weekly trash. Overall a minor thing since today is trash day, but with it getting warmer I didn’t want trash sitting out for another week. Speaking of which, I need to put some real pants on and go wheel those to the curb…
Started Typing: 9:34 AM ET
Clicked Reply: 11:23 AM ET
Good morning! Right now it’s mostly sunny and 41°F, with a forecasted high of 61. Not bad at all for the DC area on the last Thursday of March. 
Though between being off work Tuesday and being mostly off yesterday, I had to look at a calendar twice to remind myself what day of the week it is…heh.
I need to get some new work clothes, and was thinking about hitting the mall today – it will be less crowded than tomorrow/the weekend – but I have blisters on each foot from Tuesday that are still sore and in the wrong spots for 99% of my shoes (even when bandaged: I have one pair of flip-flops that don’t hit the sore spots, and I’ve been wearing them around the house). So unless I get a burst of inspiration this afternoon and decide to slam some Tylenol and tough it out, I think I’ll wait and see how my feet feel tomorrow…after the cleaners are done.
For the past few years the cleaners have come every other Wednesday, but now that I’ll be in the office every Mon-Wed (at least) I switched them to every other Friday. The new schedule starts tomorrow. They have a key to my place and I don’t care if they’re here without me, but they can’t be here without me if Bailey is home – and she’s too old for doggy daycare*, so the cleaners have to come on a day when I’ll be home with her.
*The daycare doesn’t have an age limit: Bailey is arthritic with muscle weakness and doesn’t play anymore when she’s there – she just wants to sleep all day – plus these days car rides are stressful for her, so a while ago I decided that she never has to go to daycare again (barring an emergency or something). She’ll be 17 in a few months, and I want her to be as comfortable/happy as possible in her final years. I’m also very deliberate about making overnight plans or going out of town; I try to kennel her infrequently.
I did laundry yesterday, so now today’s plans are pretty much just waiting for the Lego delivery so I can keep working on the Batwing. I might splurge and get lunch delivered from somewhere; I need to decide what I feel like having.
I appreciate the compliment, but building Lego sets is really just paint-by-numbers but with small plastic bricks. 
I don’t design anything. The Batwing is 2363 pieces: there are 500+ steps, in a 300+ page instruction booklet. Some of the sets do look quite impressive when they’re done, but there’s zero creativity on my part. Plenty of people design their own builds; I just ain’t one of 'em. I get enough satisfaction out of following instructions that someone else came up with, and seeing the sets take shape.
He’s 23, and actually my BFFs’ son: I’ve known him his whole life, and he’s called me “aunt” since he started talking. 
Anyway, he’s currently living in TX with his girlfriend. She graduates from Texas Tech this semester, and already has a job (in Dallas) that starts in July: he won’t graduate for another year, and is enrolled at a college around here but all of his classes are online. They just started living together last fall, so he still has a room in his parents’ house.
The fact that I’m fixing the Batwing is a surprise. He and his girlfriend will be here for a couple of weeks sometime this summer, and he’ll come home to find the fully restored – and cleaned (some of the pieces still had drywall muck on them) – Batwing hanging on his bedroom wall again. Normally I wouldn’t touch one of his sets, but WifeBFF assured me that he’d given up on this one after trying to fix it himself. It’s one of his favorites, and we all think he’ll be super happy when he sees it. I can’t wait! I have a box and bubble wrap standing by for transporting it back to my BFFs’ house.
Ack, that was terrible wording on my part! It’s impossible to sit behind both counsel and the Justices: what I meant was that I sat directly behind counsel, who was directly in front of (facing) the Chief Justice. Does that help? You’re correct, there is no seating behing the Justices: each Justice has a clerk directly behind them, and the clerks sit in front of a big black curtain.
All except for Justice Thomas, who was often slouched down in his seat and/or holding his head in one of his hands. He was paying attention, though; he just didn’t seem to be.
All except Justice Barrett – which I noticed. But she might have asked questions during the two hours of court that had already taken place before we were let in.
Oh no!! 
I haven’t been there since I was a kid. 
Have a great time tomorrow!
OMG…I’m so sorry about Chloe! 
People suck. Sigh.
Nice! 
Do you know when you’ll find out whether you won?
You guys don’t have one of those “clean/dirty” magnets?
That’s what I expected, too!
There were three cases scheduled for that morning: one in the 10:00 session, and two in the 11:00 session. But all three involved the EPA – as the prosecution in one and defendant in the others – and one of the lawyers mentioned that they’d all been in the courtroom for two hours already, so I wonder if they just decided to combine all three cases into one big session. Still, I would have expected the gallery from the 10:00 session to be led out at more like 11:00 and not 11:45! After court adjourned it was pretty clear that we weren’t welcome to hang around and ask questions, but I’d love to know what actually happened. At around 11:30 I did ask one of the staff – he looked young; might have been a page – whether the second session ever got cancelled if the first one ran so late, and he said no. He could have told me that the 11:00 arguments had already started!
Anyway, if I ever enter this lottery again I’ll only choose 10:00 sessions.
Hearty thank you from all your fellow travelers on this spinning global village 
My mind was not boggled the first time. In 2016, the Democratic Party nominated the most-polarising candidate they could. I was shocked that, in spite of that, Trump won. But it really wasn’t mind-boggling. That he was elected a second time, after he showed his utter ineptitude, that was mind-boggling.
Anyway, that’s all I’m going to say about that in this thread.
Yep, you should. Here’s the latest geezer Covid recommendations from the cdc.gov:
You are up to date when you have received:
Exactly right, as usual.
Not true. The British pint is more than 20% larger than the US pint. Almost all other countries have standardized on the metric system, so although some of them still have traditional units called pints (such as for beverages), the volume varies by regional custom.
The imperial pint ≈ 568 ml is used in Ireland, the United Kingdom, and other Commonwealth countries. Even in the United States, two kinds of pint are used: a liquid pint (473 ml) and a less common dry pint (551 ml).
So a pint isn’t even a pint the world around
The house seems extra quiet today, even though Chloe didn’t really make any noise.
Of course I know we did the right thing, and the light of a new day has only confirmed that. There’s just that lingering emptiness, yanno?
Zoe knows we took her sister away and didn’t bring her back. She seems a little confused, but I think she’ll be OK. Someone upthread asked how old Chloe was; she was 11, so old enough to be considered a “senior” cat, but not exactly ancient. Zoe is from the same litter. She has a thyroid issue (which we’re successfully regulating) but is otherwise quite healthy and energetic. With luck, she’s got a few good years left.
Anyway, great timing, huh? I come back to the MMP after months away, and bring everyone down with my dead cat. Sorry about that!
The quiet is always stunning. I’m so sorry you lost her so young.
Hey, we’re just glad we have a dishwasher. We went 19 years without one in the old house.
We’ve talked about it, but honestly even if we did, we’d probably forget to use it and end up in the same boat.
We had Higgs put down last November and I still expect her to come running when I’m working in the kitchen, begging for scraps. It’s rough.
Totally off-the-wall question: do you prefer doing on-line stuff on your phone, tablet, laptop, or PC? Personally, I don’t like doing anything on my phone if there’s an alternative. PC is always first choice. The “keyboards” on devices hate me and the feeling is mutual.
For our cruise, I bought a little Bluetooth keyboard for my tablet. It will save much cussing.