Today in the House of Representatives

Today the republicans trotted out their "witnesses" for impeaching President Biden.  It did not go well for them.  Basically, the "witnesses" all admitted that they had no first hand knowledge of wrong doing.  Some of the clips of the Democrats responding to the pathetic loser republicans are hysterical.  Huffpost has an article up with footage.  They are so worth watching.  If you're pressed for time, scroll to the bottom and watch Ms. Crockett's clip.  I think I've played it 5 or 6 times; it's amazing how long she can speak without breathing. 

Unfortunately, what they did not do was make any progress towards continued funding of the government.

Weather and the Orange One Loses Again

As it turns out we rode Sunday and Monday because the weather forecast for the rest of the week was dismal.  Both days were pretty good.  We may not get the glorious fall that we had last year, we may have the damp and miserable version.  Here is the view from where we park.  Today has been wet and a penetrating cold.

An adolescent rabbit has been visiting.  He also is entirely too comfortable sitting out in the open.  The cat that lives across the street menaced him today.  That cat is too fat and old to get him, but there may be other cats.   If you look closely you can see the newly planted grass in the background.

Our neighbor is having his roof replaced.  They started a day late because they thought it would rain, it didn't.  So they got half the roof off, and haven't been back since because it has been raining.  This may take awhile.  They have a really cool trailer for debris.  I have not seen one like this before.  It raises up and gets close the the roof.

The Trump organization lost bigly in court yesterday.  Judge Engoron has given the organization the poison pill of death.  Their license to do business in New York has been revoked.  All of the LLCs are now in receivership, and they are quite likely to be sold off.  If DA Letitia James gets her requested $250M fine, proceeds of the LLC sales may be used to pay that off.  It's a good day to not be a crook.

Today Judge Chutkan delivered a scathing rebuke to Trump's lawyers who suggested she recuse herself.  The answer was a resounding no.  So, another loss for the orange one.

We were in Target yesterday.  CVS has small branches in many Target stores.  It was closed due to staffing shortages.  That's the first time we've actually seen that.  I read about pharmacies closing, but this was in person.  Customers were directed to go a store in South Hill, which is a pretty healthy drive from North Spokane.  Chaos is breaking out in commercial pharmacies, and in independents.  PBMs are milking the system for all it's worth, and in some cases a pharmacy will have to sell a drug at a loss due to all of the fees stacked on top of the wholesale prices.  Corporate owners are not staffing enough to ensure patient safety from errors.  This is a very disturbing trend, which bodes ill for the future of health care in the US.

From twitter we have this.

It's dark, but funny.

Not Riding and Vaccines

Greetings Humans!  Today was forecast to be cloudy and cold.  So we decided to get the annual flu shot for the elderly and the monovalent X.B.B Covid vaccine (booster).  According to the people who know such things, the monovalent will be protective against the two new strains that are now circulating, wanting to sicken us all.  I've never done two vaccines at the same time, this should be interesting. 

Update 9/24/23:  Last night I felt a little bad, slightly feverish.  Today wasn't terrible, the covid arm hurts more than the flu arm.  Jim had both in his right arm, which was sore.  All in all, the aftermath has not been bad.

Instead, it was a beautiful day, and would have been perfect for riding.  We'll go tomorrow, it's the same forecast so maybe it will be as good as today was.  We did get the terrible bike saddles off of our new bikes and replaced them with better saddles from the bike stuff hoard we have down stairs.  That was a big improvement in comfort.

The corner where we dug up all the crab grass is showing some shoots of baby grass.  We are wildly excited about this, previous attempts at growing grass have been failures, it would be nice to have a win, especially given how difficult the whole project was.

The last ride was done on a very windy day.  The lenticular clouds over the lake were just outstanding.

The geese have started the migration southward.  A bunch of them were in the swimming area honking and pooping.

We got the vaccines at the Safeway (a grocery store chain) pharmacy.  They said turn out has been pretty good, so far.  The last vaccine did not have that many takers, so it's good that people are lining up for this one.  Anyway, this was in an aisle.  Coke, now created with artificial intelligence.  I'm not sure this is a real selling point for me.

That's it!  That's all I have to say.

Fall Turns Cold and Wet

Ack.  We were about a week too late getting the grass replanted.   It has gone from being a delightful fall in the Inland Empire to being cold and damp.  Last year this time it was delightful, it was just a treat.  The wretched bird that lives in the big tree next to one of the grass sites has discovered the grass seed.  We put it down thickly, so hopefully he will not eat all of it.  It's always something.  The other grass seed site has a lot of original grass which is looking very happy and it's growing now that it is surrounded by composted steer manure.  It spreads by runner so even if the seeds don't come up, the original grass may spread and cover the bare spots. 

I realize none of you are particularly interested in this, but if I don't write it down, it fades from memory.

There has been riding to the lake, riding on the Aubrey L White parkway.  Things were looking particularly autumnal that day.

A rabbit has been visiting frequently.  He, at least, stays out of the grass seed.  He likes to sit in the shade of one of the cone shaped trees.  In the first photo, notice that his ears are up.  He's comfortable, and happy.  We were several feet away, using the telephoto setting on Jim's camera.

Here he's aware of us, ears are down, he's not moving.  They seem to think that if they're perfectly still, we can't see them.  Soon after, he made a run for the neighbor's yard.

The Rose of Sharon continues to grow too tall, bloom too much, and drop spent flowers everywhere.  Next spring we're taking four feet off it's height.  I hate trimming things with a hedge trimmer while standing on a ladder, it's too painful for the aged.

Here is a photo of the Japanese lantern, in the afternoon sun.

As you know, the UAW is on strike.  Politicians like Nikki Haley are saying stupid things like that if Biden is pro-union, the workers will start wanting things.  Things like a share of corporate profits, for one thing.  CEO payment in one of the car companies is 400 times the pay of the people who actually do the work that generates profit.  Tim Scott has come out with, if you strike you're fired.  The orange ectoplasm announced that he would skip the next Republican debate to go spend time with the striking workers.  I thought the UAW response was right on point.

So that's it!  That's all I've got.

Riding and Planting Grass

Greetings, Fellow Humans. It's nearly fall in the Inland Empire.  That's what it's called here, really.  It's not so hot as it was.  

There has been purchasing, in defiance of the non-acquisition fatwa.  Two new bikes managed to make their way into the house.  The first bikes we bought had lower end components to keep the price down.  We had wanted the bikes with the next level up of components, but the supply chain said no.  Anyway, after looking in to the cost of a new derailleur, and associated components, we decided it wasn't worth the cost.

So we bought new mid-level bikes.  The main attraction of two more bikes is that we can leave two in Tucson and quit towing that wretched trailer.  We'll leave the bike rack in Tucson for the day we decide we're too old to keep making the drive twice a year.  Look at the paint on these, it's really cool what it does in the sun.

There has been yard work.  Yay!  Grass lawns are a pain in the butt.  One corner of the yard had a crab grass infestation.  Do you know about crab grass?  It's an annual weed.  It puts out prodigious amounts of seed in the fall.  It chokes out the good grass by spreading along the ground, and in general looks bad.  So, we spent a few days digging it up.  You would not believe the roots they put out, reminds me of day lilies. A pitch fork was required to get under them and lift. There is sort of a trench running around the edge of the yard, caused by years of string trimmers edging.  That needed to be preserved, so we dug to within about two inches of the edge.  Then there was a fun part - a weed burner.

The crab grass is gone, the structural integrity of the yard is preserved.  Now there will be spreading of lawn dirt, seeding, raking and spreading of composted steer manure.

There has been riding out on the Aubrey White parkway.  In the pretty neighborhood there is road between the houses and the river.  The riverside part of the yards are very lush and green. 

We have turkeys.  These people have peacocks.  I think I'll take the turkeys, they make way less noise.

Oh yes,  there was scrubbing of the deck.  It's an annual event, beloved by all.  As much sun as it gets back there, I'm always amazed at the amount of moss and algae that grows out there.

So that's it; riding, scrubbing, and yard work.

Local Photos and Things That are Bad

Long time, no post.  My tendency towards procrastination is getting worse.  That's going to have to stop soon, because it will be time to pack and load the wagons for points south.  At least I will have something new to take pictures of.  Even I am getting bored with pictures of the rock. 

We've walked up the big hill a couple of times.  The weather has not been spectacular as of late, and between that and killing things in the yard there has been less riding.  We're going to have to buck up and realize that summer is on the wane and dress more warmly.  Here is said rock at the top of the hill.

We saw this deer a few times.  She would look at us for awhile, and then run ahead, then we'd see her again.  She has sort of a come hither look.

This is a younger deer in someone's yard.  Mom is in there but you can't see her because of the grape vine.

We were up there today and saw this addition to the woods.  It's a sea monster, I think it's made from vines.

Jim got a new compressor.  We have a tire that we thought had a slow leak.  Les Schwab says it doesn't, so I do not know why it keeps losing air.  Anyway, now there is a very manly way to inflate the tires.  Note the ear defenders, the thing is amazingly loud.

There was a gorgeous sunset the other night.  It was very close to being Tucson quality gaudy.

Rolling Stone has put up an excellent article on the lack of water in the west.  It's from a new book called River Notes.  It's very interesting and well worth reading.  Below is a paragraph that was particularly horrifying.

The future unfortunately is now. The entire story of the Grand Canyon is one of wind, water, silt, and sand. Since the Glen Canyon Dam went up sixty years ago, the equivalent of sixty-one supersized Mississippi River barge-loads of sand and mud have been deposited in Lake Powell every day. The total accumulation would bury the length of Manhattan to a depth of 126 feet — close to the height of a twelve-storey building. As the reservoir has shrunk, this silt, exposed to the sun, has formed what can best be described as mud glaciers. As lake levels fall, a gradient is formed, down which these massive sediment accretions are moving at a rate of a hundred feet or more per day toward the dam. Should they reach and plug the dam, threatening the integrity of the structure, the only option would be to bore tunnels at the base of the dam, allowing the sediments to pass, while killing for good the reservoir. “That natural sediment load,” notes Jack Schmidt, director of the Center for Colorado River Studies at Utah State University, “cannot be blocked from the sea forever.”

If they lose the reservoir, they can't generate electricity.  So, that's it then, the SW is going to die.  It continues to amaze me that so much manufacturing that requires water is being built in AZ.  The Saudis continue to grow alfalfa and pump ground water with wild abandon to do so. 

In other news, I believe Dr. Fauci has taken leave of his senses.  During the administration of the orange ectoplasm, Fauci was the voice of reason.  This has changed as of late.  In an interview with the BBC he said the following:"Even though you'll find the vulnerable will will fall by the wayside, they'll get infected, they'll get hospitalized, and some will die. It's not going to be this tsunami of cases that we've seen."  So, I guess it's ok if the vulnerable die.  If you want to watch the interview, it's on twitter here.  Later he was on CNN (also known as Fox-lite) and the talking head was discussing the Cochrane study that said masking did not work.  That study has been debunked from all corners of the scientific community, but Fauci just sat there and let him say it.

I am presently confounded by the Biden administration's approach to the current Covid surge.  The CDC continues to advocate for hand washing, but there is no mention what so ever about masking or clean air.  Waste water studies are showing it's on the rise, but no one seems to be taking it seriously or suggesting any kind of mitigation strategy.  Most likely there will be no real action taken until after the 2024 election.

For all of you punctuation people, and you know who you are, there is this.

That's it, that's all I've got.