Hi everyone. I worked at the store 6 out of the last 10 days, which is a lot. Things are ramping up because it's spring, which in this area means oscillating back and forth between sunny/70s and windy/50s. (Do buy your pansies and kale now if you're in Zone 5. But for heaven's sake hold off on the petunias and tomatoes. We'll have a better selection 6 weeks from now, and they won't have to spend that 6 weeks feeling cold and not growing because it's not time yet. Impatience has no effect on weather. I plant my impatiens right after Memorial Day.)
Yesterday I did a substantial amount of physical work putting hoses in place, and I feel a great sense of accomplishment, all the greater for having managed to educate my relatively new boss about what needed to be done and why, to get set up for the watering season, and that little-old-lady me can take care of it because I've been doing it for a while. He's on board now, and prepared to take care of certain arrangements that require his authority. I arrived home tired and dehydrated, but a glass of lemonade and a bowl of macaroni and cheese, consumed in front of the TV, are effective for those conditions. Today I'm like "OK, where did I leave off when I had to stop doing stuff on my to-do list?"
Well, the good news is my MIL survived her fall, although she got a nasty bruise out of it.
I texted Janet (cc' Bob) telling her after 60 years of marriage "falling for Bob" was a metaphor! Bob got a laugh out of it. She did have a concussion, so they are taking it easy with her.
Katie thought it was a mistake for Janet to come to the quilt retreat, as she wasn't feeling well. She shared how she spoke to the former camp nurse, asking advice on ER locations. The next day the former camp nurse had to run home; her husband smashed the ends of two fingers trying to run pie dough through a rolling machine. But Janet didn't sleep well the entire weekend, and was almost a zombie by the end of it. FWIW & IMHO I think she fell because she was so exhausted from a lack of sleep.
The former camp nurse was at Quaker Haven when Pam was on staff, so they were very close. She at first had her suspicions of me, but grew to accept me (I was often introduced as "the worst behaved counselor at camp", because of my mischief). She admires Katie for stepping in to marry me and be a mother to my son with Pam. Katie comments how much goodwill she has a camp due to Pam. I tell her it's a sympathy vote for marrying the worst behaved counselor at camp.
In book 3 of Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series (The Well of Lost Plots), Literary Detective Thursday Next (Prose Resource Officer, SpecOps 27) and Miss Havisham (yes, that Miss Havisham) are assigned to conduct the next Jurisfiction mandated Rage Counseling Session in Wuthering Heights.
Efforts by Miss Havisham to break the land speed record in a Higham Special at Pendine Sands may or may not lead up to a critical plot point.
In need of intelligent, delightful, absurd, erudite, goofy escapism? Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series* is the best. "His novel is satire, fantasy, literary criticism, thriller, whodunit, game, puzzle, joke, post-modern prank and tilt-a-whirl" according to the Washington Post.
*Meaning the first 4 books. Subsequent books are readable but do not invite re-reading, at least for me.
What came to mind after reading this post. What is the weirdest thing I’ve googled in the past 24 hours? “Rash that causes vesicles.” Noooo, not me but a friend at pickleball has the strangest rash I’ve ever seen. Started a week ago and is spreading and getting worse. Dr. Google didn’t help.
Could be hives due to stress or a cold virus. Daughter B used to break out in hives when she caught a cold. Most of us would have runny noses, Son A would have a high fever, and Daughter B would be covered with spots.
It's like nothing I've ever seen. It's super bright red, scaly, blistery, spreading. Patches on all his limbs, torso, moving up his neck. Was not outside exposed to any poison ivy or the like. My hubs was perplexed as well, he sees a lot of skin stuff too.
Now I remember what this reminded me of: My mother had a surprise intense reddening of her scalp one day. The skin was inflamed and irritated. She wracked her brains trying to think of what caused it, went to her doctor, even consulted a dermatologist on an emergency basis. No one could explain it, and she wound up with an intense treatment course of hydrocortisone (iirc).
Finally, she thought of consulting a local trusted pharmacist. They went over her meds (she doesn’t have many prescriptions), until they came into her own self-medicating vitamin/mineral supplements. One that she had used for years had been discontinued at the Sam’s Club and switched for another. They started reading the ingredients list, and found that a filler in the new pill was ethylene glycol. The pharm says to her: “Do you think you need anti-freeze as a supplement?” She discontinued this one supplement and the whole redness and everything cleared up within 24 or 48 hours.
You never can tell what someone’s unique chemical sensitivities might be.
Not a Kate Bush fan, but I have, like you, gone down the rabbit hole of these types of YouTube videos. My fav is two hip hop artists listening to Michael McDonald singing "I Keep Forgetting".
Actually, I don't. I probably have heard her songs at one time or another, but I don't recognize this one. My knowledge of popular music past the mid '80s is hit and miss.
Mind you, many of the celebrities today are people I have never heard of. One example is the TV pitchwoman for Hello Fresh meals, one Kiki Palmer, who seems to be recognizable when she pops out of refrigerators, but for whom I draw a blank.
Meanwhile, the mothership is reporting on the state of the race for President between those 2 old geezers, one doddering, the other delusional about his last election.
The only acceptable outcome is for those two both to be defeated. Neither should be anywhere near the levers of power in this country. Both are of such poor character as to be national shames and disgraces. They should never in life be rewarded with the job they seek: it only makes them think even more highly of themselves, and they do way, way too much of that already.
Since their dual defeat is not a likely outcome, I really don’t care to watch.
I think you're saying you're not a fan of either candidate. I keep telling Google News "fewer stories like this" for anything that mentions either of them in the headline. Nothing other than withdrawal from the race (either) or conviction and jail sentence (for one) interests me.
Kate Bush was a successful singer whose career I totally missed because I was listening to George Strait, Travis Tritt, and Alabama. According to the teenbros, she caught on again because the TV show "Stranger Things" used a song in the soundtrack.
This song seems to have been inspired by the book, and the dance moves look like good exercise, although older people should be careful about sprained ankles, especially if dancing on grass or other uneven surfaces.
It reminded me of this Civil War song from Claire Lynch:
The Steeldrivers have a song on the same topic. Both songs reference a well-documented night during the Battle of Stones River/Murfreesboro (TN) when the musicians of both armies struck up the popular song "Home, Sweet Home" and soldiers on both sides sang together.
Excellent. Some of the best recordings come out of the Muscle Shoals studios. There was a great documentary about that and the incomparable Muscle Shoals horn section. Everyone from Aretha to the Stones recorded there.
Today’s special animal friend is the Helmeted Guineafowl, Numida meleagris, a large, ground-dwelling bird in the Galliformes order, which includes turkeys and chickens. Like other guineafowl, this one has a large, round body with relatively small wings and a small, bald, weird head. The head of the helmeted guineafowl has red, blue, and/or black skin and a yellow or reddish bony knob on top.
They are up to 2 feet high and weigh up to 3 lbs. Except for the head, they are dark gray or black with white spots, reminding me of a cute dress that doesn’t fit me anymore. They can fly, but they usually don’t; when they do, they glide as much as possible rather than flapping. They can run quite fast, keeping that round body nicely balanced, and ornithologists say it is common for them to walk or run more than five miles in a day.
As you can see, they are gregarious, assembling in flocks of 25 or so that feed and roost together. The flocks are hierarchical, with a dominant male as boss and his sidekick helping him to defend the group. Breeding females prefer the higher-ranking males, and the flock devotes the most care to the chicks of the highest-ranked adults.
They are seasonally monogamous, breeding near the end of the local wet season, which varies across their range. The females make a scrape in the ground in an area with good cover, lining it with feathers and grass. They lay 6 to 12 eggs. Females do the incubation, but males help to brood the chicks after hatching.
Helmeted guineafowl are omnivorous. Outside the breeding season, their diet is mainly vegetable matter: tubers, seeds, miscellaneous agricultural stuff. During breeding season, they turn to a mostly bug diet. Like our friend the banded mongoose, they will eat ticks off the backs of warthogs.
The helmeted guineafowl is a species of Least Concern. They are found all across sub-Saharan Africa. They have been domesticated. You can buy them as food in stores in the U.S. Feral populations are found in the West Indies, the U.S., Europe, and Australia.
This appears to be a pop-culture phenomenon of which I wot not. I had to read "Wuthering Heights" in school, though. I recall thinking that most of the characters were dopes making poor life choices, although in my late middle age I recognize that they had fewer options available than I do.
Good morning. Birds are singing. I'm going over to the nearby Scout camp this morning to pick up some bows and arrows to take up the Scout camp in the mountains on Saturday to teach Archery Merit Badge. Later in the day, Daughter D is going to the eye doctor, and Son F is coming to get his glasses adjusted again.
I tried reading that book and after several chapters decided that there weren't going to be any romantic scenes and the movie must have taken some decided liberties with plot and character.
A's dog, but C was taking care of it last weekend. Daughter A came back from Philadelphia and retrieved it, and it's still hanging on as far as I know. Poor old Dog.
So true, but I have more sympathy with people whose choices are more limited. It's not as if Catherine in "Wuthering Heights" had the option of joining the Marine Corps or going to college and becoming a mechanical engineer.
Hi everyone. I worked at the store 6 out of the last 10 days, which is a lot. Things are ramping up because it's spring, which in this area means oscillating back and forth between sunny/70s and windy/50s. (Do buy your pansies and kale now if you're in Zone 5. But for heaven's sake hold off on the petunias and tomatoes. We'll have a better selection 6 weeks from now, and they won't have to spend that 6 weeks feeling cold and not growing because it's not time yet. Impatience has no effect on weather. I plant my impatiens right after Memorial Day.)
Yesterday I did a substantial amount of physical work putting hoses in place, and I feel a great sense of accomplishment, all the greater for having managed to educate my relatively new boss about what needed to be done and why, to get set up for the watering season, and that little-old-lady me can take care of it because I've been doing it for a while. He's on board now, and prepared to take care of certain arrangements that require his authority. I arrived home tired and dehydrated, but a glass of lemonade and a bowl of macaroni and cheese, consumed in front of the TV, are effective for those conditions. Today I'm like "OK, where did I leave off when I had to stop doing stuff on my to-do list?"
Well, the good news is my MIL survived her fall, although she got a nasty bruise out of it.
I texted Janet (cc' Bob) telling her after 60 years of marriage "falling for Bob" was a metaphor! Bob got a laugh out of it. She did have a concussion, so they are taking it easy with her.
Katie thought it was a mistake for Janet to come to the quilt retreat, as she wasn't feeling well. She shared how she spoke to the former camp nurse, asking advice on ER locations. The next day the former camp nurse had to run home; her husband smashed the ends of two fingers trying to run pie dough through a rolling machine. But Janet didn't sleep well the entire weekend, and was almost a zombie by the end of it. FWIW & IMHO I think she fell because she was so exhausted from a lack of sleep.
The former camp nurse was at Quaker Haven when Pam was on staff, so they were very close. She at first had her suspicions of me, but grew to accept me (I was often introduced as "the worst behaved counselor at camp", because of my mischief). She admires Katie for stepping in to marry me and be a mother to my son with Pam. Katie comments how much goodwill she has a camp due to Pam. I tell her it's a sympathy vote for marrying the worst behaved counselor at camp.
In book 3 of Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series (The Well of Lost Plots), Literary Detective Thursday Next (Prose Resource Officer, SpecOps 27) and Miss Havisham (yes, that Miss Havisham) are assigned to conduct the next Jurisfiction mandated Rage Counseling Session in Wuthering Heights.
Efforts by Miss Havisham to break the land speed record in a Higham Special at Pendine Sands may or may not lead up to a critical plot point.
In need of intelligent, delightful, absurd, erudite, goofy escapism? Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series* is the best. "His novel is satire, fantasy, literary criticism, thriller, whodunit, game, puzzle, joke, post-modern prank and tilt-a-whirl" according to the Washington Post.
*Meaning the first 4 books. Subsequent books are readable but do not invite re-reading, at least for me.
I just requested "The Eyre Affair" from the library.
That made me grin. I hope you enjoy it!
Great premise!
Sounds fascinating.
"Democracy Dies Behind Paywalls
The case for making journalism free—at least during the 2024 election
By Richard Stengel" MY NOTE: THIS IS BEHIND A PAYWALL. AND IS THE ANSWER TO, CAN YOU DEFINE IRONY?
What came to mind after reading this post. What is the weirdest thing I’ve googled in the past 24 hours? “Rash that causes vesicles.” Noooo, not me but a friend at pickleball has the strangest rash I’ve ever seen. Started a week ago and is spreading and getting worse. Dr. Google didn’t help.
Skin is weird stuff.
Could be hives due to stress or a cold virus. Daughter B used to break out in hives when she caught a cold. Most of us would have runny noses, Son A would have a high fever, and Daughter B would be covered with spots.
chickenpox, eczema, rash due to skin irritation or allergy, shingles, friction, bacterial infections, and herpes simplex?
It's like nothing I've ever seen. It's super bright red, scaly, blistery, spreading. Patches on all his limbs, torso, moving up his neck. Was not outside exposed to any poison ivy or the like. My hubs was perplexed as well, he sees a lot of skin stuff too.
Now I remember what this reminded me of: My mother had a surprise intense reddening of her scalp one day. The skin was inflamed and irritated. She wracked her brains trying to think of what caused it, went to her doctor, even consulted a dermatologist on an emergency basis. No one could explain it, and she wound up with an intense treatment course of hydrocortisone (iirc).
Finally, she thought of consulting a local trusted pharmacist. They went over her meds (she doesn’t have many prescriptions), until they came into her own self-medicating vitamin/mineral supplements. One that she had used for years had been discontinued at the Sam’s Club and switched for another. They started reading the ingredients list, and found that a filler in the new pill was ethylene glycol. The pharm says to her: “Do you think you need anti-freeze as a supplement?” She discontinued this one supplement and the whole redness and everything cleared up within 24 or 48 hours.
You never can tell what someone’s unique chemical sensitivities might be.
Yikes. Sounds like shingles. Has your friend gotten the Shingrex vaccine? If so that would likely rule that out.
Not presenting like shingles and it's not painful, just itchy. I'll let y'all know if they ever figure out what it is.
Could it be tinea versicolor? It sounds a little like the case Fang the Son had few months ago.
Well, we have now exhausted this history major’s knowledge of medicine. I hope her doctors figure out what it is and can cure it.
Him, I guess Chris can go either way! Couples league!
It’s like a hypochondriac’s smorgasbord!
All at once? Bad luck!
Sorry. Not all at once. Just possible causes to help her friend diagnose.
(I was joking.)
You think I don’t know that?😬
I will work on those dance moves as long as y'all come visit me in the Emergency Room.
They could help with flexibility and balance next season.
Or...
Or goat yoga?
😳
I was thinking something very similar.
Not a Kate Bush fan, but I have, like you, gone down the rabbit hole of these types of YouTube videos. My fav is two hip hop artists listening to Michael McDonald singing "I Keep Forgetting".
I tried to listen to Kate Bush back in the day. My artsy engineer friends were all mashed with her, but I just never got into her music.
I'm not critical of her, she just didn't resonate with me.
Good morning. Kate who? I thought “Wuthering Heights” was a Victorian era romantic novel.
You surely know this song. Coincidentally it was playing when I walked into the hair salon yesterday. https://youtu.be/wp43OdtAAkM?feature=shared
Nope
Actually, I don't. I probably have heard her songs at one time or another, but I don't recognize this one. My knowledge of popular music past the mid '80s is hit and miss.
Mind you, many of the celebrities today are people I have never heard of. One example is the TV pitchwoman for Hello Fresh meals, one Kiki Palmer, who seems to be recognizable when she pops out of refrigerators, but for whom I draw a blank.
Now excuse me while I go chase kids off my lawn.
Meanwhile, the mothership is reporting on the state of the race for President between those 2 old geezers, one doddering, the other delusional about his last election.
The only acceptable outcome is for those two both to be defeated. Neither should be anywhere near the levers of power in this country. Both are of such poor character as to be national shames and disgraces. They should never in life be rewarded with the job they seek: it only makes them think even more highly of themselves, and they do way, way too much of that already.
Since their dual defeat is not a likely outcome, I really don’t care to watch.
I think you're saying you're not a fan of either candidate. I keep telling Google News "fewer stories like this" for anything that mentions either of them in the headline. Nothing other than withdrawal from the race (either) or conviction and jail sentence (for one) interests me.
There is always prayer. (Beats drinking yourself into a stupor).
Archery Merit Badge.
Woodwork. More woodwork.
I thought about you yesterday when I saw a $10,000 stick - "the most expensive stick in the world" on Etsy yesterday. It was not carved or anything.
And its up to $50,000 today - one left, in 3 people's carts!
He does have some interesting pieces at normal prices, most made out of "osage orange".
I've got sticks in the yard I'll sell you for only $100, shipping included!
Osage orange is nice, but 10 grand? I searched Etsy quickly but didn't see it.
Need a stick? I made these as gifts: https://photos.app.goo.gl/g4HSM2afHBxxDdbQ9
Booooo-ring.
Kate Bush was a successful singer whose career I totally missed because I was listening to George Strait, Travis Tritt, and Alabama. According to the teenbros, she caught on again because the TV show "Stranger Things" used a song in the soundtrack.
This song seems to have been inspired by the book, and the dance moves look like good exercise, although older people should be careful about sprained ankles, especially if dancing on grass or other uneven surfaces.
It reminded me of this Civil War song from Claire Lynch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55m5kz2ZXyw
I co-oped in Alabama because of Alabama. In Muscle Shoals, in fact.
Cool!
very pretty.
Very sad. Nice picking!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Fy4SmeJ2kQ
The Steeldrivers have a song on the same topic. Both songs reference a well-documented night during the Battle of Stones River/Murfreesboro (TN) when the musicians of both armies struck up the popular song "Home, Sweet Home" and soldiers on both sides sang together.
Ambrose Bierce was there.
Not the author of "An Incident at Owl Creek Bridge" who disappeared in Mexico in 1913, I take it.
Yes, the same one.
Excellent. Some of the best recordings come out of the Muscle Shoals studios. There was a great documentary about that and the incomparable Muscle Shoals horn section. Everyone from Aretha to the Stones recorded there.
Today’s special animal friend is the Helmeted Guineafowl, Numida meleagris, a large, ground-dwelling bird in the Galliformes order, which includes turkeys and chickens. Like other guineafowl, this one has a large, round body with relatively small wings and a small, bald, weird head. The head of the helmeted guineafowl has red, blue, and/or black skin and a yellow or reddish bony knob on top.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvXU9vjk9OI
They are up to 2 feet high and weigh up to 3 lbs. Except for the head, they are dark gray or black with white spots, reminding me of a cute dress that doesn’t fit me anymore. They can fly, but they usually don’t; when they do, they glide as much as possible rather than flapping. They can run quite fast, keeping that round body nicely balanced, and ornithologists say it is common for them to walk or run more than five miles in a day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Lu2vB_Tfho
As you can see, they are gregarious, assembling in flocks of 25 or so that feed and roost together. The flocks are hierarchical, with a dominant male as boss and his sidekick helping him to defend the group. Breeding females prefer the higher-ranking males, and the flock devotes the most care to the chicks of the highest-ranked adults.
They are seasonally monogamous, breeding near the end of the local wet season, which varies across their range. The females make a scrape in the ground in an area with good cover, lining it with feathers and grass. They lay 6 to 12 eggs. Females do the incubation, but males help to brood the chicks after hatching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MobasiNcJFk
The chicks are called “keets,” and only about half live to adulthood. They can live up to 12 years in the wild. The helmeted guineafowl sings a bit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oASLiM5sSDY
Helmeted guineafowl are omnivorous. Outside the breeding season, their diet is mainly vegetable matter: tubers, seeds, miscellaneous agricultural stuff. During breeding season, they turn to a mostly bug diet. Like our friend the banded mongoose, they will eat ticks off the backs of warthogs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZshnzrUFV78
The helmeted guineafowl is a species of Least Concern. They are found all across sub-Saharan Africa. They have been domesticated. You can buy them as food in stores in the U.S. Feral populations are found in the West Indies, the U.S., Europe, and Australia.
Bouncing woodchucks, courtesy of my daughter. Weird.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j0DQYcMgXI
Birds are fascinating.
As we were biking past a farm yesterday, I noticed a big Tom Turkey serenading a chicken. It was quite comical.
I would watch that video. I wonder if "turkey", "serenade" and "chicken" have ever before appeared together in a sentence.
I'm kicking myself for not stopping and videotaping it. My one chance to go viral is lost!
You could adopt it as your emotional support animal.
Their heads are funny-looking. But they’d probably say the same thing about me.
I guess they were so fascinating you neglected to mention their natural range. 🙂
Thanks. I'll add that!
The bottom two videos appear to be duplicates.
Thank you. That's a mistake I haven't made in a while!
This appears to be a pop-culture phenomenon of which I wot not. I had to read "Wuthering Heights" in school, though. I recall thinking that most of the characters were dopes making poor life choices, although in my late middle age I recognize that they had fewer options available than I do.
Good morning. Birds are singing. I'm going over to the nearby Scout camp this morning to pick up some bows and arrows to take up the Scout camp in the mountains on Saturday to teach Archery Merit Badge. Later in the day, Daughter D is going to the eye doctor, and Son F is coming to get his glasses adjusted again.
I tried reading that book and after several chapters decided that there weren't going to be any romantic scenes and the movie must have taken some decided liberties with plot and character.
Any updates on Daughter C’s infirm dog? (I think it was C, right?)
Thanks for asking - I have been wondering, too.
A's dog, but C was taking care of it last weekend. Daughter A came back from Philadelphia and retrieved it, and it's still hanging on as far as I know. Poor old Dog.
Dopes making poor life choices are still with us today.
So true, but I have more sympathy with people whose choices are more limited. It's not as if Catherine in "Wuthering Heights" had the option of joining the Marine Corps or going to college and becoming a mechanical engineer.