WAPO vs. NYT

 This is the headline from WAPO regarding the town hall held last night in Oaks, PA.

If you can get past the paywall, here's the entire article from WAPO.

Meanwhile, back at the NYT, this is how they framed the event.

Since last night, his scheduled appearance on CNBC has been cancelled.  George Conway is encouraging people to sign up for the upcoming Klan Rally in Times Square and then not show, it would be like Tulsa, OK when all the Tiktok kids signed up and then didn't show.

So that's what's happening this morning.

 

More Fall and the Orange Guy

Today was a glorious fall day.  I think it may have been the last ride.  Tomorrow we have the guy out to drain the irrigation system, and the guy who maintanances the furnace, and then we visit the Medicare Plan D sales lady.  We need a different plan, and I want to have this done before we head south.  Then the rain comes and temperatures get out of my comfort zone for riding.

Here is the always lovely lake.  

This is fall across the street.  I like the bushes to turn red in autumn.

Who has been following the lunatics?  Armed people in North Carolina stalked FEMA workers.  They had to be pulled out of two counties due to fear for their safety.  FEMA!  They're stalking FEMA. 

The orange menace has just been off the rails as of late.  Last night he had a rally in Coachella, CA.  For some reason, people had to be bussed in 4 or 6 miles to the venue from where they parked.  After it was over, no busses came to take them back to their cars.  They were out in the middle of nowhere, it was pitch dark.  Apparently the campaign did not pay the bus company, so they didn't return.  I have not heard if they walked the distance back or how they got home.  Many of those people were old, that's a hike for an old, out of shape person.  He can't organize a rally, but he wants to run the country.

Then there was the town hall meeting in Oaks, PA.  This is a thread done by Aaron Rupar, he chronicles much of what the orange guy says.  There's a lot, but you can get the gist of it, just reading what Aaron wrote about the video clips.  Or you can suffer and listen to the orange guy speak, which is fairly concerning.  Apparently he spent 20 minutes on stage swaying to different music clips.  Pretty weird.  The thread opens in the middle, scroll up and start at the top.  I don't know why it does that.  Here is a short clip of him swaying to Sinead O'Conner.

He's back on the Nazi speak, talking about the "enemy within."  If he wins again, it's going to be so bad.  I firmly believe that he'll be removed from office and JD Vance will be installed.  It's going to be a war on contraception, IVF, abortion, freedom of movement over state lines for women and etc.  Yes, I know, I sound like a conspiracy nut, but given his rate of decline, they'll have to get him off the stage.

So, that's my fear and dread for today.

Fall and a PSA

Greetings on this beautiful autumn day, most of which was spent sitting in front of laptops until it was time to leave to get flu shots.  Why, you wonder.  I will address this later on the page.  But first, some fall foliage.

I've posted this picture many times this summer, notice that the familiar yellow streak across this middle of the lake is gone.  The milfoil has quit blooming and is once again sinking to the bottom of the lake.

The lake is really low.  Flow from the Spokane River is down, and not the banks are visible.

Yellow trees on the way home.

This yard gets many leaves.

So, back to the laptops.  Medicare open enrollment starts October 15.  If you are on heritage Medicare, ie not Medicare Advantage, or Medicare C as it's also called, this is the year to pay attention to your plans.  Our monthly premium for Plan D went from $3.37 per month, to $38 per month.  The deductible doubled.  Our Medigap policy premium is going up 15.8%.  Plan D is up due to the cap on insulin prices, the $2,000 limit on drug costs for seniors, and general greed and malfeasance.  So, we will be building a spreadsheet to see who is paying how much for what, and adding in the monthly premium to get the most bang for the buck.  I, personally, am considering a zero monthly premium plan because my two generic drugs are cheap on Cost Plus Drugs.  Jim's generics are not, so that will require some thought.  We went to sleep on it last year, and it was OK, this year is different.

Carry on and keep calm.

Yard Work and a Walk in a Park

Hola!  We've been doing fall stuff.  Saturday was the annual wrapping of the arborvitae in deer netting.  It's a terrible job, the mesh is the perfect size to catch the buttons on the shirt sleeves and it's just a pain.  As much as I hate the arborvitae, I don't want them maimed by the deer this winter.  So they're done now.  You can see the light glinting off the mesh.

Yesterday was the pruning of the hydrangeas.  It's not difficult, but it's pretty boring.  They had a good year this past summer, and were up against the house and surrounding trees.  So, bye bye pretty blossoms.

Then it was on to trimming the boxwood hedge.  I didn't take much off, but there were some wingers that needed to be dealt with.  Over the three years we've been here, we have not been sufficiently brutal with the hedge trimmer.  It's taller than it was when we got here, and it's closer to the walk way.  I'm not sure if it would be a good idea to cut it back a lot.  I guess if we don't let it get any bigger, things will be fine.

Today was chilly, we were just not in the mood to put on all the layers to ride, so we went to Manito Park. It's a delightful park.  It's surrounded by older homes which are well kept and I would imagine updated more than once in their history.  We also saw some new construction done in the style of the neighborhood.  It would be a cool place to live.  I have photos!

The Mirror Pond.  It used to be a natural seasonal lake, but there was a desire for it to always have water, so they paved it.  There are tiny fish and ducks living there.

After wandering for a bit, we found a map next to the Cafe (which was closed) and discovered the location of the conservatory.  They have a lot of foliage plants as well as cactus and succulents.

There is a Japanese garden.  The water features are lovely.  The orange blog is a big koi.

It was fun.  It's kind of a hike for us, but for the people who live near the park, it's a treasure.

Sunset the other night.

That's it, that's all I've got until Milton hits Tampa Bay.  Currently it's a Cat 5 hurricane, so not good.

Human Nature

Greetings Humans.  Today we have had human nature on display.  The dock workers are threatening to strike.  Actually, I think they did go out.  Their union president is a fan of the 45th president.  He was heard to say that he would cripple the economy prior to the election.  The union guys were offered a 50% raise, nope!  They want 61%.  For that, they'll strike while there's  hurricane disaster relief going on, with another storm waiting in the gulf.  Anyway, they've decided to hold off on the strike until January.  This is where the union boss lives.  Pretty nice, eh?

Anyway, back to human nature.  The materiel on the ships that would have been impacted by a strike is stuff from China.  Toilet paper is made in the US.  However, the hoarding has begun.  Today we were at Costco (for toilet paper, just in case) and every single package of TP and paper towels was gone.  They employee we spoke to said there would be more tomorrow, but we'd need to get there right when the doors open. 

We stopped at Target on the way home (and bought toilet paper), they had plenty.  I'm beginning to wonder if mass hoarding is a characteristic of the Costco demographic.  Target was not busy at all.  Costco was packed, and people were panic shopping.  Many people had the big flat trolleys just loaded up with everything.  So, it's good that the dock workers are holding off a few months, it will give toilet paper manufacturers time to increase production.

I saw this in the neighborhood down the street.  This is funny.  The people who live here have a cat that roams at night, and brings them presents.  So, they've put them out in hopes that the owners of the presents will see them and take them home.

Costco has nice plantings.  They've spent some money on landscaping.  This is the view through the wind shield.

In terrible news you can't do anything about, there is this.  Rwanda has had a Marburg outbreak.  It has made its way to Germany.  Marburg is known as the "bleeding from the eyes" virus.  Until this chart, I did not know just how bad it is.  I also did not realize how bad bird flu is.

This was on twitter yesterday.  It, too, is funny.

Other than observing my fellow humans, I have not too much to say.

Hurricane Helene and the Usual

Well, Hurricane Helene was terrible.  The devastation is beyond belief.  How does recovery even start?  Roads are out, power is out, transformers are in short supply to fix the power grid.  In the Asheville, NC area the roads and bridges are wiped out, there's one way in that is long and circuitous.  One of the worst things to have happened is water treatment plants have been submerged in water, debris and mud.  Augusta, GA will not have water for weeks.  Greenville, TN will not have water for awhile, their plant is also underwater due to the Nolichucky River.  There is a global impact, 70 to 90% of the pure grade quartz used in the manufacture of chips is in Spruce Pine, NC which has pretty much been wiped out.  There is no word yet on the state of the mine or the processing facility.  NPR has an article here.  However, none of these things out weigh the loss of life.  

Valdosta, GA took it in the head from Helene.  The orange ectoplasm was there today for a campaign event.  His podium was built from bricks salvaged from a collapsed building behind where he stood.  Since there is no power, there was no microphone available.  He read from a prepared statement about how President Biden had refused to take GA Governor Kemp's phone calls.  This is just an out and out lie. President Biden called and spoke with Governor Kemp  twice in the days after Helene hit Georgia and prior to Trump's photo op in Georgia today. Biden has declared states of emergency for all of the affected states.  

This event makes anything I have to say seem frivolous.  I first wrote that in March, 2022 when Russia was invading Ukraine.  That event, like the hurricane, seemed to over shadow every part of my unexceptional life.  

There has been riding to the lake.  We're going later in the day because it's colder at night.

This photo was supposed to show the amazing amount of pine needles that were down from the wind storm we had.  However, my phone camera does not do well with shadows and bright light, so it's tough to see.  There were many needles everywhere.

This is the local turkey family.  Mom and Dad turkey have been busy.

Other than this, I truly have nothing to report.