Striking the Match

 We have another cool morning here in Central PA.  Yesterday, the temps climb fairly high on the thermometer, upper 80s (F).  Even though our afternoon high is only supposed to be in the low 80s (F), I'm suspecting today will be a repeat.  We are under an air quality alert.  I suspect it's the wild fires in Canada.  Oddly enough, I don't remember all of these wildfires taking place when I was a kid, but then things are different today, we have satellites, and air monitors, and people who get paid to keep track of such things.  Back then the weather forecaster would look out the window and decide if the day was going to be cloudy or not.

I worked yesterday and so my routine is not even close to what I like to think of a normal.  I like to write starting in the mid to late afternoon, however when I work writing needs to be done before I leave.  Sometimes that works well for me, but frequently it doesn't.  Yesterday it worked well, but then the storyline is at point where action is happening and things are moving quickly.

Even though the store is making plan, foot traffic was very slow, mid-February kind of slow.  One of the hardware associates was complaining about hours being cut.  Evidently at one of the morning meetings last week an announcement was made that fewer hours are going to be scheduled.  Right now this only  concerns part-timers.  This also means that there are going to be gaps in the coverage when no one will be schedule to work in certain departments.  This is all related to the tariffs.  If the orange home improvement retailer I work for isn't going to raise prices, they're going to have to cut expenses and the easiest expense to cut is payroll.

And this was Howie's birthday present.  He loves the stuff, unfortunately it costs $4.59 for a little 12 ounce can.

And the Democrats from Texas have temporarily relocated to several other states to avoid pushing through Republican redistricting in order to give the Orange Anus 5 more seats in the House of Representatives.  The fact that Republicans are trying to increase their count to avoid the Orange Anus from being impeached tells you what's terribly wrong with the GOP.  The party that wants authoritarian rule in the United States has a big, big problem: they're a minority party who simply can not deal with the fact that a majority of Americans hate them.  The anger is growing and they don't know how to handle it, you see they convinced themselves a long time ago that all they had to do was get themselves in charge.  They truly believe that if they say, "shut up, we're in charge," everyone will simply bow their heads and meekly say, "okay."  That isn't happening.  America is watching as the Republican party proves they will accept any evil if it helps them stay in power.  This has always been the problem with Authoritarians, their ability to comprehend is at a minimum at best.  This is why they've always ended going down in flames.  They will torch themselves and burn themselves to the ground without ever understanding that were the ones who struck the match.

Without the Lies they are Nothing

 Good Morning!  Hopefully your weather is as good as mine, except for the smoke which has returned.  It's like looking through low level fog.  It doesn't smell like smoke, but you can see it.  Forecasters are predicting the temps to climb into the mid 80s (F) today, which makes it prime lawn mowing weather and believe me, my little front lawn needs it.  All the rain we've been getting as kicked the grass into a high level growing rate.

There's a car parked in front of my neighbor's house, though as far as I know, no one stayed over night.  I was talking with some of my other neighbors yesterday afternoon and we're all in agreement that who ever buys it is going to have to rehab the rehab.  Because of our location, all of us believe the seller's going to get what he's asking.  Unfortunately, the new owner's going to have to put on a new roof... and then there's the bit about the unfinished basement.

I went to see Asteroid City last evening.  Some parts were very funny in a quirky sort of way, others had a lot to be desired.  Part of the problem is that it begins in black and white as a narrator introduces a play and then shifts to color to represent the play.  It switches back and forth between the two and there's no correlation between the two.  The black and white section is disjointed and becomes more of an intrusion into the colored story line.  You'll notice in the trailer, all you see is the color section. 

Evidently Kev McCarthy said some unkind things about the Moral Degenerate and was so severely chastised by the MAGA base that he went groveling back to the Orange Anus asking for forgiveness.  Watching the Republican party devolve is... well, interesting.  It's not that they don't realize that a majority of the country is Centrist, the truth is they just don't care.  During the 2020 election, Trump got 74 million votes and for them that number is now etched in stone.  They believe those voters are guaranteed.  They rely on their own polls to reinforce this belief.  Trump does a townhall in New Hampshire, 200 MAGA cult members show up and Twitter gets flooded with pics showing the small crowd because because the Cult will post deep fakes showing thousands in the room.  It's like the pics they showed of Dodger stadium before the Pride Game.  The stadium was filled to capacity, however the cult posted pics that were taken an hour and a half before the crowd was allowed in, proving that if it weren't for their lies, Republicans would have nothing.

Air Quality Alert

 So, yesterday was nice.  We actually got some rain; enough so that I didn't feel the need to go out and water the flowers.  I'm going to spend some time outside today weeding, but probably not much since we are under an Air Quality Alert.  The Canadian wildfire smoke is upon us.  If the NYT is correct it should be what they term medium thickness.  I have no idea how they judge or grade the thickness.  Are they referring to it's density, or to the particulates that make up the cloud?

A number of audio files for The Body Under Ice were uploaded last evening.  The narrator sent me and email telling me to take notes and that corrections would be done after I've listened to the entire book.  So, thanks to the Air Quality Alert, my inside hours should be well occupied.  I can't wait to hear them cutting through the ice to retrieve the body.

Looking out the window, things do look a bit hazy.  When I take Lily for her morning walk, I will sniff around to see if I can smell.

:"We Don't Talk About Bruno" from the movie Encanto was a big hit for Disney.  One thing that has always bother me was my inability to hear all the lyrics at the end; there are so many different voices singing.  Last night I solved that problem.  I watched the lyric video.  Had Disney made the right choice and nominated this song it would have walked away with the Oscar for Best Song of the Year. 

And, of course, the Internet was abuzz yesterday because Mark Meadows has testified before two (2) Grand Juries in regard to the Trump investigations.  There were a lot of cute little videos of pancakes being turned over.  So far, I haven't seen and all caps commentary by the Orange Anus.  Don't worry, it will happen.

Ronnie D may be in some legal trouble for flying a 2nd flight of immigrants to California.  His campaign is hurting, hence the flights.  He wants voters to think he's doing the right thing.  His 2 hot button issues are evidently the illegal transport of legal aliens and wokeness, something he cannot describe.  And just think, the real Republican shit show hasn't even truly begun yet.