No Tresspassing

Today's temps should be climbing into the mid 80s  (F) today, before another cold front moves through the area and drops our temps back into the 60s (F).  We do know, however, that forecasts can be whimsical as hell.  According to last week's forecast, yesterday and today were supposed to be overcast with drizzles, and we had sunshine and warm temps.

The funeral went well.  There was an open casket viewing and my cousin Robin and I agreed that my aunt Lois looked very waxy.  That's one good reason to be cremated, no one's going to critique the mortician's talent at trying to make you look lifelike.  After the service there was a reception at my cousin Holly's home.  It was small, maybe 20 people or so, most of whom I didn't know.  Many anecdotes were told.  Panera catered, which meant tasty sandwiches.  Everything went well until the conversation turned to sports, and teams, and well... subjects I am totally unfamiliar with, which was my cue to make my exit.  

I also got a nice workout in yesterday morning.

I'm off today because it's Tuesday. so I have some chores that need to be done this morning before I get a bike ride in this afternoon.  I'm thinking of planting some flowers around my raised garden.  There's nothing wrong with a little color.

And the Strait of Hormuz is still closed.

Iran said that it damaged 2 ships, one a South Korean tanker, and the administration says it didn't happen.  Unfortunately, the South Koreans have put out a statement noting that they are going to be reconsidering sending ship through the strait after one of their tankers was damaged.  Why does the administration lie so much?  Well, if you've ever worked for a large corporation, you know that the CEO is never wrong, and never makes a mistake.  We have one of the dumbest, dementiated CEOs in the world destroying this country, so should we expect anything else?

There are primaries today in several states and the GOP is looking for just the slightest ray of light, a small morsel of hope indicating that the midterms are not going to be as disastrous for them because of the Orange Anus.  As a side note, evidently the administration staff is being tutored with power point presentations on how to deal with a Democratic run House and Senate.  Somehow, I don't think they've told Orangie this is taking place.

Good Gosh, it's Wednesday

Good Gosh!  It's Wednesday.  If you're in a 5-day work week that began on Monday, this is your Hump Day.  However, if you're semi-retired like me, or are fully retired, or just don't have to work, then tomorrow, Thursday, is your Hump Day.  Because of the schedule I've set up for myself, I will always work on my Hump Day.  

Yesterday morning, as I went to start the coffee brewing, I saw mouse droppings behind the coffee maker.  That's means it's time to set the traps again.  

I called a made an appointment for Biggie at the $$$ Vet yesterday.  He still has his cough, but it's not nearly as bad as it was, still, he needs to get a shot or two so I figured he might as well get checked out.  Because he's a dog, and he has a cough, they're treating this as if it were Kennel Cough.  This means I need to call them when I arrive, and they'll let me know when an examination room is ready.  You can bet there's going to be $$$ in that wait.

As I was preparing to suck the dust bunnies from under my futon, I snapped this picture of Lilly with her own bunny.

And being that today is a Wednesday during primary season, it goes to figure that there were elections on Tuesday.  As every person with a sound mind should have expected, the Cracker Jack Crazies failed.  From New York down to Florida, there was failure, except for Matty Gaetz.  Of course, Republicans are always going to go with pervy with the weird hair who likes sleeping with very, very young girls women.  Loony Laura Loomer lost by a decent % and she's wailing about voter fraud.  Expect this. These people will never concede since that would make them look like losers in the eyes of their savior Donald J.

What is considered a bellwether special election, Democrat Pat Ryan won in a district that leans Republican.  He ran on abortion rights.  Fellow Democrats take note, the Republicans shit in their pants on this one.  The time has come to hold their noses to the grindstone and make them pay.

Oh, and prepare yourselves, there will be some interesting news coming from the Trump camp today.  You see, his desperate ploy to sue the United States was kicked back by a judge he put in place because there were sooooo many mistakes.  And that judge?  She's a little pissed at him for filing in her district because he thought she'd be a pushover.  Anyway, his team of inexperienced attorneys has until today to refile correctly.

And finally, I saw this bit in the Washington Post about Herschel saying his campaign was genius.  I found it worth a chortle, or two, or three.

 

The Weak Grip

 The heat Jennifer was talking about yesterday arrives in Central PA today.  We will, however, only be sitting in the low 90s (F) rather than be hitting the triple digit temps she is experiencing, of course, we have another week before summer officially arrives.  I will have to water my little garden, though.

Yesterday was a day of accomplishment!  

I tried something different during my 43 minutes on the treadmill: weighted spats.  I've had them for years, and years, and have never really used them.  The weight can be adjusted up to 5 lbs. per foot.  I started light, strapping just one pound on each foot.  Easy peasy.  Your legs are the engines of your body.  The idea is to make them work harder to make them grow stronger.  

I decided to put in some marigolds out front.  I planted seeds, but also picked up a pack of 8 small plants thinking they'd get a head start on the seeds.  Well, the seeds are going to town, while the plants are struggling.  They're struggling.  Here's a blurry pic of my dahlias.  They should be bursting into bloom any day now.  

The next January 6 committee public hearing was moved from today until next week, tomorrow's hearing is still on.  I work tomorrow, so I'll not be able to watch it with any type of consistency.  

There were primaries yesterday.  I find it fascinating that the media is so laser focused on Republican candidates, especially those endorsed by Trump.  Take Lombardo in Nevada.  He's backed by Trump, getting 38.4% of the vote.  That's the headline, rather than 41.1% of Republicans in Nevada voted for someone else.  If they're trying to show how strong Trump's grip is on the GOP, they're failing.  His candidates might win, but when a majority of Republicans vote for other candidates that grip is not nearly as strong as the media implies.  Trump's dinky little hands aren't nearly as strong as his MAGA base wants them to be.

Primary This

 A happy Saturday to everyone out there!

I am scheduled to work today, and tomorrow, and Monday.  Full eight-hour shifts, too.  The temps are forecast to hit the high 60s (F) today, so I sure our garden department will be busy.  This is the season of mulch.  We sell tons of it... literally.  I don't use it, possibly because my mom, using what I believe was an attempt at a French accent, always referred to it as 'mulsh.'  She did the same thing with charcoal, so when we grilled, we grilled with 'sharcoal.'

Weather wise, today is predicted to be nice.  Tomorrow?  Rain is supposed to come to town. 

I picked up Biggie's prescription for gabapentin and there was a price increase: 2 cents a capsule.  Everything goes up in cost, the income stays the same. 

One of the things I am truly grateful for is owning my home.  I have friends who are in the upper 60's who rent and are not going into semi-retirement because they will need to be paying rent for the rest of their lives.  I don't think renters ever realize that rent payment is never going to go away until it's too late for them to buy.  

And, of course, Primary season is approaching, taht wonderful time when voters decide who is going to run in the fall midterms.  In Pennsylvania, we have 2 out-of-staters vying to replace that loser, Pat Toomey.  Who will garner the nomination?  The Cracker Jack Crazy Thompson?  Or the Trump backed wonderful wizard of Oz?  Oh... wait, I'm wrong, it's Mehmet Oz.  The wizard wants nothing to do with this.

And if you think the Pennsylvania primary interesting, you'll simply love the North Carolina primary in which Madison Crawford is running to keep a failed political career alive.  I understand there is a video with Crawford's male scheduler groping Madison's crotch.  No, I haven't seen it, not that I think it matters.  While I would love to see him notch up the nomination for what would be a sure win for Democrats in November, I'm fairly certain he has racked up enough irreparable damage to lose.  Of course, we are talking about North Carolina republicans here, so at this point anything goes.

Sans pictures... almost

Well, I go back to work today.... note the enthusiasm in my font.

I also got up early with the intention of getting in some cardio....  my legs have the same enthusiasm as my font.  This is how it goes some days.  

My neighbor asked if I was off the entire week.  "Nope," I explained, "just a weird schedule."  Now I get to work 4 days and then have off for 2 and work 6.

I will be off next Tuesday, which is primary day in Pennsylvania.  Democrats will vote for Democrats and Republicans will vote for Moral Degenerates.  What makes this interesting is that this year, as in every past primary election, I get bombarded with flyers for the other party.  One candidate brags that she's the "wife to Anthony; mother to John and Leo."  She considers this pertinent information.  Another candidate brags that she's a "33 year veteran."  Does that mean she was in the military 33 years ago, or that she's been serving the country in the military for 33 years?  She also has 3 amazing children!  Isn't that nice?  I've received 2 mailers from her so far...  Oh, and she wants to be a judge.

As for the Democrats, I got one letter endorsing one candidate from the Democratic committee.  I suspect this is because Democrats tend to spend more time educating themselves on their candidates.  For them, issues are far more important than having "3 amazing children."    Educate yourselves.  Know your candidates.  Do not rely on mailers filled with vague information and family pictures.

And, speaking of pictures, I took a whole bunch yesterday with the intention of posting more today.  So, you ask, why am I doing an entry sans pictures?  Well, they're still in the camera.  You see Nikon decided this camera was going to use either WiFi or Bluetoom to transfer pictures.  There is an HDMI port, but no cable was provided.  Unfortunately connectivity has always been a problem.  Yesterday I started getting the message "camera is out of range."  This means the camera is not transmitting anything.  So this morning I ordered an HDMI cable, something which should have been included at the time of purchase.

Since I did want to include at least picture and since not from the camera were available, I thought I show off Lug the Nut.  I'm going to try and take him out this evening when I get home from work.

If you scrub off their makeup, most Republicans will look like Lug.

Storm Damage

Well, it's Wednesday and it's raining... and I'm off - don't work today or tomorrow.
Yesterday was interesting for several reasons:  we had primary day in PA - and there was a pink / blue surge... a rather large one, which most likely dumbfounded vast numbers of the GOP - How could large numbers of voters... including a sizable number of women, vote for candidates not associated with the GOP?  No one ever said they were smart.  I'm wondering if there was any relation between the weather and the politics.
Yesterday, at 4:41 my phone buzzed.  My watch buzzed.  The store phone I was holding buzzed.  Tornado warning.  So, what did quite a few of the customers do?  Walk into the plate glass vestibules that mark are entrance and exit to watch shit blow by outside.  That's right.  Carts are careening across the parking.  Branches and chunks of wood are flying through the air, and these people decide to stand in an area that has glass to their left... glass to their right... and glass directly in front of them.  They wanted a 270 degree view of destruction.
When I got home from work I discovered the high winds had ripped a number of  branches from my trees. Storm Damage.

Those are 2 branches the winds ripped from trees on the hill and blew 40 or so odd feet.

And this one was taken from my back porch, looking towards the hill.  Halfway up, on the right hand side, you can see the top of my fence.  Somewhere underneath are my garbage and recycling cans.  Oh, and there are more branches beyond the fence - to both the left and the right.  If the rain lets up, I'm going to go out and start cutting them up.  Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to get out chainsaw.  That means I'll get to wear my lumberjack outfit.