Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Battle won, war still ongoing.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

After roe, women are no longer free.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

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Reader Interactions

117Comments

  1. 1.

    JPL

    Downton was good. I was about to give up on the series and last night’s episode, made me happy that I didn’t. I love Grantchester and Norton is terrific. There is suppose to be a second season but after Happy Valley and now Grantchester, I’m sure he will get movie offers.

    Have some home brew if your guests didn’t drink it all. How was it?

  2. 2.

    Brendan in Charlotte

    Just got back from your neck of the woods Betty. Left Friday and returned yesterday to pick up some things from my parents’ condo they just sold. Avoided all the Daytona traffic, but pulled a Cole. Either pinched a nerve or pulled something in my left shoulder. And I’m a leftie!! Sigh…

  3. 3.

    gogol's wife

    @JPL:

    I mentioned last night that someone on the NYTimes Downton blog said there’s going to be a War and Peace with Norton as Prince Andrei and Lady Rose (Lily James) as Natasha, written by Andrew Davies, who did the Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice. He’s hated by pedants, but I think he’s really good. But I’m a pedant about Tolstoy so will probably hate it. But it should be pretty.

  4. 4.

    Rosalita

    Did you watch Downton yet? I saw somewhere it was sad. If it’s about the dog I don’t think I can stand to watch it.

  5. 5.

    MomSense

    I’m feeling really sorry for myself, uncharacteristically so, and want to quit my job and have a pity party. Going to watch some mindless tv and regroup.

  7. 7.

    Violet

    I went to the supermarket during early-ish post-work rush hour. I know there’s a slight possibility of some freezing precipitation here but you’d think we were looking at six feet of snow. Parking lots (I went to three supermarkets in search of something for my parents) were absolutely packed. Almost all checkout lanes were open and there were still lines. Shelves were empty (which is why I had to go to three stores). Ridiculous. Did nobody shop over the weekend or something?

  8. 8.

    Violet

    @MomSense: Awww…sorry to hear that. Maybe the long winter is taking its toll? And a puppy will tire you out no matter how cute. Do something nice for yourself. A nice soak in a bath with epsom salts might help relax you.

  9. 9.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Betty, didn’t you just have a big family reunion or something to celebrate your birthday? How did that go?

  11. 11.

    jl

    Christie hasda cough up da pension dough.

    Judge tells Chris Christie: Put more money in pension funds

    TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Republican Gov. Chris Christie and the state’s Democrat-controlled Legislature must find $1.57 billion to put into pension funds for retired public workers, a judge ruled Monday in a decision that comes as a major legal blow to the governor as he prepares to run for president.

    http://news.yahoo.com/judge-tells-chris-christie-put-more-money-pension-214909460.html

  12. 12.

    MomSense

    @Violet:

    Thanks. Long winter and probably need to rock the boat in my life instead of being the rock for everyone else in my life.

  13. 13.

    bemused

    @MomSense:

    Untold Stories of the ER might distract you. Tales of patients coming in with wiggling worms in the rectum or a crowbar through the head or older woman’s rear stuck in toilet (husband left seat up again) are oddly entertaining.

  15. 15.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    My Blu-Ray set of the “Batman” TV series arrived, and I am way too excited. It came with a replica of the Batmobile and various other goodies. Whoever posted here when it was 50 percent off at Amazon has my eternal gratitude.

    And G can’t complain, because he bought the complete “Columbo” on a similar Amazon deal. Ha!

  16. 16.

    Brendan in Charlotte

    @Violet: where are you? we had that a couple weeks ago – i joked that if we didn’t look outside,i’d swear we were in Massachusetts. Got glares from the natives, and chuckles from fellow damn Yankees

  20. 20.

    MomSense

    @Baud:

    Sounds like a perfect plan!

    @bemused:

    Wait someone’s rear was really stuck in the toilet bowl? That is one of those threats I make to the boys in my house that I was sure was an idle threat.

  21. 21.

    Violet

    @MomSense: Do some things to take care of yourself and put yourself first. Say “no” to someone or something just because you can. Sending hugs and good thoughts.

  24. 24.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @MomSense:

    Watch mindless TV, eat dark chocolates and drink red wine if you’re into those things, and basically pamper yourself for the next 24 hours. {{{Hugs}}} from Atlanta. Bubble baths and trashy novels also highly recommended.

  27. 27.

    JPL

    @MomSense: Cure for the blahs! Claim the sofa as your own and watch a good movie. When you hear the sounds what’s for dinner, say peanut butter and help yourselves.

  28. 28.

    bemused

    @MomSense:

    Yup. They seemed to try everything to get her unstuck from the bowl, even calling in maintenance, drills and such. Funny, I can’t remember how exactly they did it.

  30. 30.

    jl

    Chuck D told me to listen to this because it is ‘dope’ (these dang kids with there dang ‘hep’ vocabulary these days. Damn beatniks).
    I am intrigued. Probably just like the Harry Lime zither theme vibe. Or maybe because not what I expected from DJ Lord. I have to check out the album.
    Not sue how well it will wear.

    DJ LORDtv World Citizen [Official Video]
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2idyX_OvZKk

  34. 34.

    MomSense

    Ok you are all awesome. Hard to have a pity party with so many funny and wonderful jackals cheering you up.

    Going to find some terrible movie about cancer I can cry to, drink red wine, eat dark chocolate with chili pepper–and do a gazillion crunches and push ups so I don’t have to worry about getting stuck in the toilet seat or needing to be extracted from my house via helicopter airlift.

  35. 35.

    shelley

    Feel better, Betty. Your chickens need you.
    Far as TV, are you into ‘Better Call Saul’ ? There’s a mini marathon on tonight.
    *********
    It hit 40 yesterday. Unbelievable. Tonight we’re back to zero degrees.

  37. 37.

    gelfling545

    Here is Flora sensing that food is being prepared while she is being kept out of the kitchen. She gets a little over-excited sometimes.

  41. 41.

    Roger Moore

    @Gin & Tonic:
    Those of us on the West Coast would be happy if you could send some of that our way. We’ve gotten a bit of rain here in the LA area in the past couple of days, but we’re still well behind normal for this point in the season. We’d love to have some of your snow.

  45. 45.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @jl: I didn’t know a judge could do that. Cool!

    We just watched Grantchester from last night. It’s a good show.

  46. 46.

    shelley

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): Always loved the scenes when Batman and Robin were bat-walking up the side of a building.
    ***********
    In this cold weather, I’ve found that heated white wine is just as tasty and comforting as red. Hold the spices tho.

  48. 48.

    Josie

    @MomSense: As nice and sweet as our sons are, they can be really obtuse about how they are infringing on their mother sometimes. It is possible that either at work or at home, you need to stand up for yourself and explain why things need to change. Pamper yourself first because no one else will and then have a come to Jesus moment with whoever needs it. Sending you hugs and good wishes (and a wish for an end to this unending winter).

  51. 51.

    FlyingToaster

    @Roger Moore: Transport, however, is a bitch.

    Our roof pile mostly melted off; there’s still a cap over the actual gutter (grrrr), but the rest is gone. All but one of the long icicles fell down during the melt yesterday.

    It’s supposed to go down to -4 here, but may reach -7.

    Why does Weather Underground think that Watertown’s weather is the same Bedford’s (Hanscom Field)? We’re on the wrong side of the ridge, weather people. Take route 2 from Storrow to Concord, see for yourselves. Topography, who’da thunk?

  52. 52.

    Baud

    One for the annals of bad ideas:

    Police and family members said Tammy Meyers had been giving her 15-year-old daughter a driving lesson at a neighborhood school parking lot when they encountered a silver vehicle and an angry driver.

    Meyers went home and fetched her 22-year-old son, Brandon Meyers, who brought his handgun as they went out looking for the vehicle the mother had seen earlier.

    Tammy Meyers found the guy and she is now dead.

  53. 53.

    Calouste

    @Hawes: Yes, one of the things that made me less enthusiastic about Downton Abbey was its “we need a new story line, let’s kill someone” approach to scriptwriting.

  56. 56.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Calouste: Last night was pretty good, but I can’t freaking believe they’re going back to the well with Bates and Anna that way (I think that’s a non spoiler

  58. 58.

    shelley

    Never saw anybody get such a charge out of ‘thunder snow’ as Weather Channel’s Joe Cantore. Thast last clip of him a couple of days ago….it’s like he was having a dancing orgasm.

  62. 62.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @jl: We’re getting a lot of reporting on that story on the local news(Tammy Meyers grew up in the area), it’s becoming more and more unclear what happened.

  64. 64.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Is our Republicans lurning?

    Idaho state Rep. Vito Barbieri (R) “received a brief lesson on female anatomy after asking if a woman can swallow a small camera for doctors to conduct a remote gynecological exam,” the AP reports.
    Dr. Julie Madsen was testifying in opposition to a bill that would ban doctors from prescribing abortion-inducing medication through telemedicine when Barbieri asked the question. Madsen “replied that would be impossible because swallowed pills do not end up in the vagina.”

  68. 68.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Roger Moore: I’m tired of shoveling it. You’ll have to come pick some up. Although after yesterday’s thaw and today’s freeze, you probably need a chain saw to cut yourself some blocks.

  69. 69.

    Pogonip

    I went to the dr today. My doctor is a nice kid, but he is a kid and so does everything by computer, and evidently his computer confused the pharmacy’s computer because there has been a flurry of phone calls from the latter. I suppose he’ll have to straighten it all out tomorrow but tonight I am enjoying the Revenge of the Human.

    I have pills to stop the torn muscle from going into spasm so I can stretch and strengthen it. It’s a good thing I had him write me a real prescription for that ( I wanted to fill it NOW!). Usually his e-mail prescriptions work surprisingly well, but not today.

    My son hitched a ride with me and, at the age of 35, got puppy shots because of stupid anti-vaxers. May the fleas of a thousand camels invade their armpits. He had puppy shots when he was a puppy but because shot immunity fades, people under the age of 50 (!) are advised to have boosters.

  72. 72.

    danielx

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Honest to god, where does this man think babies come out?

    You really don’t want to know the answer to that question.

    However, I’m sensing the genesis of a really filthy and obscene insult.

  73. 73.

    Bex

    @Iowa Old Lady: Checked the library for the Grantchester books…on hold, get in line. Checked Amazon…”temporarily out of stock” on a couple of them. This might become a Thing. I know they’re doing a second season. Yay! Something good to watch.

  78. 78.

    PurpleGirl

    @bemused: You watch that show? It’s one of my guilty pleasures. There’s one RN who they’ve shown a couple of times (Terry Foster, IIRC) who I like a lot; he often has some incredible stories like the guy who had the camping stove stuck on his pe**s.

  80. 80.

    gogol's wife

    @Bex:

    Wow, I guess I’m going to have to try reading them. I’ve just barely gotten started on reading the Colin Dexters. At least I’ve read the complete Sherlock Holmes already.

  81. 81.

    gelfling545

    @MomSense: Yes, 15 weeks old. She may be all pug or may have some terrier mix, the vet isn’t sure but her mom was a pug. The pug heritage means that food is really, really exciting.

  83. 83.

    ThresherK

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Did you hear that Gary Owens passed?

    He was the announcer on Laugh In, and was credited with coining the phrase “Beautiful Downtown Burbank”.

    (His resume includes writing with Jay Ward on “Rocky and Bullwinkle”, too.)

  84. 84.

    Josie

    @gelfling545: I kept my son’s pug for the last year he was in law school. She was totally food obsessive. I have never had a dog that was so quick to get to food if it was dropped on the floor. She had perfected the art of watching the floor instead of watching the person fixing the food. That way she could pounce the instant something hit the floor.

  91. 91.

    danielx

    Also, too – I’m having difficulty in parsing this Noozmax headline:

    Top 100 Most Influential Black Republicans

    Top 100…Black Republicans – there are that many?

    Influential Black Republicans….?

    It’s too complicated, I just can’t do it.

  93. 93.

    gelfling545

    @Pogonip: Good old anti-vaxxers. I have been informed that I need a pertussis shot at age 65 because herd immunity is no longer reliable enough to protect the olds. I had pertussis as a kid (there was no shot and an ugly thing it was) but over time, etc…

  94. 94.

    Tenar Darell

    @MomSense: Try The Fault in our Stars it’s got doomed teenage love and cancer! Also, If I Stay works too, but there’s only a coma, no cancer. They are tearjerker approved.

  95. 95.

    gelfling545

    @Josie: This is why Flora is kept out of the kitchen during cooking. I learned from my previous pug, Snarla of blessed memory, that one or both of us could get hurt.

  98. 98.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Bex: Interesting. Runcie the elder was an officer in the Scots Guards and was awarded a Military Cross just like Sidney.

  99. 99.

    trollhattan

    @BillinGlendaleCA:
    Pretty sure everyone knows somebody who named their dog Deogee.

    Personal worst example of parents letting their darling toddler name the new puppy: Flavor.

    Imagine explaining that for twelve years.

  100. 100.

    Turgidson

    Better half isn’t feeling great and looks likely to turn in by 8 or 9pm, so I’ll probably try to get caught up on Better Call Saul after she goes to bed since I almost always stay up til midnight or so even when I’m tired.

    I’ve only caught the first one, which was pretty good – certainly good enough to keep going, knowing that Breaking Bad needed some time to hit its stride. Odenkirk was strong – had the same frenzied, kinda-humorous energy to him as he did as Saul in Breaking Bad, but with a convincing amount of angst too.

  101. 101.

    trollhattan

    @Turgidson:
    Favorite new show by a giant margin. Loads of fun, with more than a little intense angst stirred in. Great writing, great characters.

  102. 102.

    Tenar Darell

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): It’s got Shailene Woodley, one of the better “not quite teen” actresses around, but it’s also got a decent plot around living with and fighting cancer as a kid /not all tropes playing with tropes! It also got better reviews than the movie with Chloe Moretz. Won’t tell you it’s more than it is, but it was good.

  103. 103.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @Turgidson:

    G made me watch the “All That Jazz” montage/tribute. Not sure which episode it is, but it’s not the pilot.

    (For people who haven’t seen “All That Jazz,” you should be ashamed of yourself, but also it’s the sequence where Saul keeps saying, “Showtime!” in the mirror.)

  105. 105.

    PurpleGirl

    @bemused: They had a guy stand next to the lady at each arm and leg to hold her up; then one of the maintenance took a chisel and hit the front of the bowl as the guys held the lady up and then put her down on a gurney. Very moves to change the gurneys.

  106. 106.

    Tenar Darell

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): S’okay. I’ve read quite a few teen novels where I decided I just had to watch the movie. Only one I’m really wobbly on is The Giver because it would be terrible if it was really terrible, since the novel was so good.

  109. 109.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @lamh36:

    Oooh, Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole. One of my heroes. Years and years ago, when she was President of Spelman College, I had occasion to phone her office about something or other. She phoned back and left a message on my voice mail. I want to tell you, she had the most incredible, beautiful speaking voice I’ve ever heard in my life. I kept that message for probably the next fifteen years, just so I could occasionally have the pleasure of listening to her voice. I was at a conference with her several years later and told her about never erasing her voice message and why. I think she was flattered (bemused, anyhow).

  112. 112.

    Roger Moore

    @Baud:

    I haven’t followed it closely, but I hope an innocent guy doesn’t get railroaded if he was actually engaging in self-defense.

    If he followed her back to her home, he wasn’t engaged in self defense.

  113. 113.

    Anne Laurie

    @FlyingToaster:

    Why does Weather Underground think that Watertown’s weather is the same as Bedford’s (Hanscom Field)? We’re on the wrong side of the ridge, weather people. Take route 2 from Storrow to Concord, see for yourselves. Topography, who’da thunk?

    Heck, our house is literally yards from the Rt93/95 interchange — just an exit overpass ‘outside 128’ as opposed to ‘inside 128’ — and in some storms (not this year’s) that’s meant a difference in snowfall totals of several inches. Truly, New England puts the ‘micro’ in ‘microclime’!

  114. 114.

    Anne Laurie

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Honest to god, where does this man think babies come out?

    Maybe when he very young, somebody told him that babies grew in ‘Mommy’s tummy’… and he never bothered to update his memory files. (“Hey, hippy, are you calling my mother a liar!?!“)

  115. 115.

    Roger Moore

    @FlyingToaster:

    Why does Weather Underground think that Watertown’s weather is the same Bedford’s (Hanscom Field)?

    As I understand it, they’re only relaying what the NWS forecasts, so they’re stuck with a fairly coarse-grained forecast model. They’re going to stick you with some NWS forecast location, and it’s entirely possible that none of them are quite right. As far as current conditions, it’s up to you to find the PWS that’s closest to you weatherwise.

  116. 116.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Anne Laurie: Maybe when he very young, somebody told him that babies grew in ‘Mommy’s tummy’… and he never bothered to update his memory files. (“Hey, hippy, are you calling my mother a liar!?!“)

    Heh. That was exactly Rachel Maddow’s riff.

  117. 117.

    Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)

    @Roger Moore:

    I don’t think anyone knows what the hell happened — the family’s story seems to have changed again:

    http://news.yahoo.com/defense-attorney-fatal-shooting-vegas-mom-not-road-164811147.html

    Also, I have no idea if Nevada has a “stand your ground” law, but in Florida you can chase the other person down, kill them, and still claim self-defense. The case I read about was a guy who chased down another guy who was stealing car radios and stabbed him to death. He got immunity from prosecution under Florida’s SYG law because the thief allegedly swung the bag of radios at the guy’s head, which made him fear for his life and made it a legal killing. So if Nevada’s law is similar to Florida’s, it may well have been legal for him to chase her down.

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