Friends, I’d hoped to update the blog on the way back from Toronto, but the wifi on Via Rail was on the fritz. I ask you! Where is my free flying carpet of information, Canadian rail system? How is a civilized human being supposed to endure in this sort of primitive state?
We didn’t get home until after 11, so I was pretty zonked to do it then. In the meantime, accept this photograph:
Because this is what I have to do now: Get to work. See you tomorrow.
brian stouder said on November 2, 2015 at 8:52 am
Looks like the Republican clown-car exiting the last debate venue!
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Dorothy said on November 2, 2015 at 10:46 am
Our cable, internet and landline phone were down on Saturday from about 3 PM until after 2 AM Sunday. I only know the approximate time because when I woke up at 2 AM to use the bathroom, I picked up the phone on my nightstand and it was still dead. It was working at 6:18 AM however. You’d have thought someone stranded us on a desert island, we acted so put upon. At least it was Halloween and we had trick or treaters to entertain us from 6-6:50 (they stopped coming after that.) We both got a lot of reading done in magazines and newspapers that were on the coffee table. And I got lots of knitting done.
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coozledad said on November 2, 2015 at 11:20 am
Unprosecuted murderer (and guy who thinks glasses make him look smart), Joey Scar, wants affirmative action to make sure there are fewer journalists in journalism.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/joe-scarborough-media-diversity-hire-republicans
I’d be willing to cut a deal. Sure, more people from the Bush administration on the TV. Doing their fucking jail time.
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Julie Robinson said on November 2, 2015 at 11:36 am
Oh how we need our electricity and electronics. I can’t do anything at work without the computer and a specialized program. Well, they’ve been renovating our office and guess what, it wasn’t done when I went in today. NBD, except we’re in the middle of the stewardship program and I’m expected to produce all kinds of lengthy reports. I’ve just fired off a mass email and told everyone I won’t have the reporting done by the deadline, and hang them all. And now I’m going outside to enjoy the balmy temperatures and sun, and maybe do a little cross stitch.
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brian stouder said on November 2, 2015 at 1:41 pm
Let me just say, if my wifi gets tired of me, I’m toast-i
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Sue said on November 2, 2015 at 1:52 pm
Who better to give us the news than the folks who routinely sent talking points memos to Fox News from the White House?
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Sue said on November 2, 2015 at 2:00 pm
Some poor public-relations hack is going to have to explain in a day or two that he was talking about his iron supplement.
http://forums.talkingpointsmemo.com/t/discussion-jeb-swears-hes-tough-i-eat-nails-when-i-wake-up/28460/25
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Bob (not Greene) said on November 2, 2015 at 2:11 pm
Oh, look, there are some KKK members in the U.S. Senate. I wonder which party they belong to … http://usuncut.com/politics/anonymous-unhoods-kkk-prominent-politicians/
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Connie said on November 2, 2015 at 2:34 pm
Including Tom Henry of Fort Wayne, Indiana. Is that the mayor?
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MarkH said on November 2, 2015 at 2:59 pm
Are we to take this uncorroborated anonymous info dump as fact, reporter BobNG? The KKK would really have openly gay mayor Jim Gray? I’d wait for at least some sourcing and preliminary scrambling from the rest before closing the book, logical as some of those names may be. I know how most of you will respond, but seriously, is Dan Coats THAT stupid? Not that I know much of what Hoosier politicians think they can get away with.
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brian stouder said on November 2, 2015 at 3:06 pm
I’m with MarkH.
Mayor Henry is as Catholic as the day is long, and the klassik kkk don’t like them Papists, right?
Looks like bullshit to me
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Sherri said on November 2, 2015 at 3:07 pm
Maybe the NYTimes article prompted Amazon to improve their maternity leave benefits: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/technology/amazon-increases-paid-leave-for-new-parents/
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alex said on November 2, 2015 at 3:38 pm
Hoosier pols think they can get away with a lot, and much as I loathe Dan Coats for being a cynical schmuck who has no respect for the intelligence of any of his constituents, there is no way he’d be stupid enough to be affiliated with the KKK. To be sure, he’s affiliated with other hate groups like the AFA, but being an anti-gay asshat is still a Hoosier GOP badge of honor.
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brian stouder said on November 2, 2015 at 4:07 pm
‘Course, tomorrow is election day (here in Fort Wayne) – so this got an immediate response
http://wane.com/2015/11/02/henry-coats-deny-claim-of-kkk-ties/
I honestly don’t think Councilman Harper (Henry’s mayoral opponent) would have anything to do with this sort of slime; looks like a lone internet super-hero, throwing lightening bolts (from his mom’s basement)
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Sue said on November 2, 2015 at 4:27 pm
How’s this for a headline? (the actual article revealed the victim’s name):
“Halloween night drowning victim ID’d as man in Captain America costume”
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Sherri said on November 2, 2015 at 4:47 pm
Sounds like 60 Minutes screwed this journo: http://samquinones.com/reporters-blog/2015/11/02/sad-for-60-minutes/
I don’t watch 60 Minutes anymore, so I don’t know what it’s like now.
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Sherri said on November 2, 2015 at 5:22 pm
A long but good article by Sarah Hepola about her own experiences with alcohol, blackouts, and consent: http://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/the-alcohol-blackout/
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coozledad said on November 2, 2015 at 5:33 pm
Jeb: I eat nails for breakfast. That’s why I keep falling off this goddamn cross.
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alex said on November 2, 2015 at 6:31 pm
I saw the “60 Minutes” piece on heroin and I’m disappointed to learn they’d rip off a journalist and not give him credit. But I’ve been disillusioned since the Lara Logan fiasco and still find it outrageous that Dan Rather got shitcanned for failing to thoroughly vet a source on a very real story whereas Logan barely got her wrists slapped for being an accessory to an outright fraud. Fuck CBS.
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Sherri said on November 2, 2015 at 8:00 pm
More Amazon news – they’re opening a bookstore. A physical one, in Seattle: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-opens-first-bricks-and-mortar-bookstore-at-u-village/
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Dexter said on November 2, 2015 at 8:09 pm
My current electronic problem is sorta laughable to most of you, I suppose. See, I have hundreds of VCR tapes full of old movies and I cannot bring myself to just throw them away, so I keep a few machines around…ya can’t buy them new anymore, so they are the only reason I shop Goodwill a couple times a year…they used to be ten bucks, now they are 12, or by now I bet 15 dollars. I was irritated yesterday as I encountered a problem, blue screen upon “press play”. Internet experts say all’s it needs is a thorough cleaning, meaning I have to take the damn thing apart and do stuff I never did before…or…yep!—go to Goodwill and say a prayer for a VCR somebody got for a gift and never took out-the-box. 🙂
Some co-workers, a married couple, bought a Beta player way back when hme recorders and players were the new hot technology…they were $1,200 back then. Soon they dropped to $800, and in 1986 when I bought a couple, they were on a “Black Friday” sale for $330 apiece. And now, long obsolete.
I do not have dvr service because I refuse to pay extra for it…cable bills are high enough, right? I know most of you cut the cable and trashed the sat-dish years ago.
Deborah, a friend who has had the procedure first locally and then at the Ann Arbor VA where I go Friday, said he was also put-out by all the instructions and restriction for five days. And I have to get up and drink some of that stuff at 6:00 AM on Friday and then drive to Toledo to drop off the dogs at daughter’s and then proceed to Ann Arbor, and I don’t have a toilet-equipped motorhome. This might get complicated. Sheesh.
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Deborah said on November 2, 2015 at 8:20 pm
Have any of you read the latest Jonathan Franzen book, Purity? I bought it over a week ago and I’ve only managed to get to page 45. It’s not that I consiously don’t like it but I keep making up excuses not to read it. I think I’m enjoying it when I’m reading it. This is weird behavior for me when I’ve started a book.
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Charlotte said on November 2, 2015 at 8:38 pm
Sherri @17 — Sarah Hepola and Kate Bolick (Spinster) did a terrific panel at the Montana Book Festival in September — smart and funny the both of them, but also really thoughtful about the continuing problems that ambition presents to a young woman who perhaps doesn’t want the traditional script, but isn’t sure what the alternatives are. Liked them both enormously, and had a chance to chat as we had writer friends in common.
Deborah — sigh. Franzen. He’s both terrific and terrible, often in alternating sentences — I couldn’t stand The Corrections because the characters reminded me of those kids from Lake Forest who went off to prep school and came back rolling their eyes at how provincial the midwest was. I liked much of Freedom, but his sex scenes are horrifying and any time he tries to imagine the inner lives of young people he’s cringe-inducing. And then there was the unhinged piece in the NY Times not long ago about birds, the anthropocene, climate change, and DOOM. Sigh. He drives me crazy because he’s so *close* to being really good …
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