Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

A last alliance of elves and men. also pet photos.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

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

Let’s finish the job.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Republicans in disarray!

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Bark louder, little dog.

I was promised a recession.

You are here: Home / Balloon Juice / Meetups and social events / Open Thread: Seattle Mini-Meetup?

Open Thread: Seattle Mini-Meetup?

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Email from ever-popular commentor Yatsuno / Yutsano:

So the Big Chop has happened. Things went very well and I was moved over to the rehab facility the 29th of May. This now means that most of my evenings will be pretty boring! I am completely open to some local BJers popping over after 5ish about any day. I don’t have a release date yet but that’s in in the future!

I have an email (and a room address). Leave a comment if you’re interested, or email me (click on my name in the right-hand column, or annelaurie at verizon dot net) and I’ll forward your message to Josh.

Reader Interactions

85Comments

  2. 2.

    Valdivia

    glad to hear you are ok and recovering. wish I were out west to be able to visit you. sends hugs and love from swampy dc.

  6. 6.

    NotMax

    @Baud

    Ditto. No idea as to what it refers.

    And no sooner post below than a fresh open thread appears, so repeating.

    Summarizing a piece in The American Conservative:

    Lindsey Graham is a fibber.

  7. 7.

    The Dangerman

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Hip replacement.

    Whew!

    I’ve seen far, FAR too many Bruce Jenner (the former) stories today.

    ETA: …actually, any number of stories greater than zero would be too many. I couldn’t give less of a shit if he wants to be a she but it’s not a news story. Ditto with Kimmy being preggers.

  8. 8.

    Brachiator

    Glad to hear that the Big Chop went well. Here’s wishing for a speedy and healthful recovery.

  12. 12.

    Brachiator

    Whenever I read someone complain about the mainstream media, I wonder whether the person clearly understands the sea change brought on by the Internet, where the algorithm rules. According to a new study, those born between 1981 and 1996 get a majority of their news from Facebook. They also claim that they often see opinions that differ from their own. The study involves a lot of self reporting, but still is informative. Highlights:

    Millennials and Baby Boomers: A Generational Divide in Sources Relied on for Political News When it comes to where younger Americans get news about politics and government, social media look to be the local TV of the Millennial generation. About six-in-ten online Millennials (61%) report getting political news on Facebook in a given week, a much larger percentage than turn to any other news source, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis. This stands in stark contrast to internet-using Baby Boomers, for whom local TV tops the list of sources for political news at nearly the same reach (60%).

    The Generations DefinedAt the same time, Millennials’ relatively low reliance on local TV for political news (37% see news there in a given week) almost mirrors Baby Boomers’ comparatively low reliance on Facebook (39%).

    Gen Xers, who bridge the age gap between Millennials (ages 18-33 at the time of the 2014 survey) and Baby Boomers (ages 50-68), also bridge the gap between these news sources. Roughly half (51%) of online Gen Xers get political and government news on Facebook in a given week and about half (46%) do so on local TV.

  14. 14.

    Mike in NC

    Never been to Seattle. We’re thinking about a Pacific NW trip in late July or early August which would take in Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver in about 5-7 days. Looking for an affordable travel agency.

  15. 15.

    NotMax

    Dang these old eyes. Bad coding. If someone could delete the crappy code-visible version, pretty please.

    So the Big Chop has happened.

                  The Big Hurt

  18. 18.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Baud:

    So now one of his hips is female???

    My doll is as dainty as a sparrow,
    Her figure is somethin’ to applaud.
    Where she’s narrow she’s as narrow an arrow,
    And she’s broad where a broad should be broad.

    A hundred and one pounds of fun,
    That’s my little honey bun!
    Get a load of honey bun tonight.

    I’m speakin’ of my Sweetie Pie,
    Only sixty inches high,
    Ev’ry inch is packed with dynamite!

    Her hair is blond and curly,
    Her curls are hurly-burly.
    Her lips are pips!
    I call her hips ‘Twirly’ and ‘Whirly.’

    She’s my baby, I’m her pap!
    I’m her booby, she’s my trap!
    I am caught and I don’t wanna run,
    ‘Cause I’m havin’ so much fun with honey bun!

    I am caught and I don’t wanna run,
    ‘Cause I’m havin’ so much fun with honey bun!

    Believe me sonny!
    She a cookie who can cook you ’till you’re done,
    Ain’t bein’ funny!
    Sonny, put your money on my honey bun!

  19. 19.

    Goblue72

    @Omnes Omnibus: Vancouver is where you go to visit. Seattle is where you go to work. Portland is where you go to retire (at age 25).

    At least that was my experience when I lived in the PNW.

  26. 26.

    Jim, Foolish LIteralist

    @Mike in NC: someone was telling me the train between Seattle and Vancouver is a great way to make the trip. I hope to do it someday but haven’t looked into it yet, so I don’t know any details

  28. 28.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Jim, Foolish LIteralist: I took boats from Seattle to Victoria and then Vancouver. I took the train on the way back from Vancouver to Seattle – highly recommended.

    @mdblanche: Rural Austria can be quite appalling. Although the skiing is good.

  30. 30.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Valdivia: At its best, skiing is like dancing with the mountain. It doesn’t happen every time on every slope, but when it does it is magical and it makes all the falls and cold feet worthwhile.

  32. 32.

    Jane2

    Yutsano, It only gets better from here! Last weekend, I got to see my sister-in-law walk without pain for the first time in ten or more years…bent her knees and everything. Here’s to lots of BJ visits and progress.

  35. 35.

    Mnemosyne

    @Brachiator:

    What about those of us who don’t watch local news but also aren’t on Facebook? Are we really such a minuscule percentage of the population, or is “Facebook” being used as a catch-all for “internet”?

    Also, newspapers probably wouldn’t be in as much trouble if they could figure out their fucking basic function of delivering a newspaper when people pay for it. The LA Times has charged my boss’s credit card three times and yet claims she doesn’t have an account. WTF?

  37. 37.

    NotMax

    @Mnemosyne

    Facebook a news source? (Let’s not even get into whether it is reliable.)

    Gilbert & Sullivan were right. Skim milk masquerades as cream.

  38. 38.

    Brachiator

    @Valdivia: Who retires at 25? Do you know the movie “Holiday?” Cary Grant’s character has made a small pile and wants to travel and be free before settling down. His fiancee and prospective father in law wants him to join the family business and become a pillar of society. Katherine Hepburn, the fiancee’s sister, comes along and helps save him.

    I knew a woman who was one of the early Google employees. She cashed in a substantial pile and has been traveling and figuring out what she wants to do next. Granted, she is a little older than 25, and had even had a career as a rocket scientist at JPL before joining Google. Still, if she is frugal, or maybe even not so frugal, she will be able to have a very lengthy holiday herself if she chooses.

  43. 43.

    Yatsuno

    @Mike in NC:

    We’re thinking about a Pacific NW trip in late July or early August which would take in Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver in about 5-7 days.

    Enough time to do 2 but not all three. They all have way too much stuff to see and explore that each city needs least a week. On their own.

    The hospital is more than amenable to both visitors and bringing in foodstuffs. There are even DVD players available although i haven’t checked the logistics of that yet. The good news is I’m not hooked up to anything that can’t be taken off temporarily, so i COULD possibly go on an evening voyage. That can be discussed more.

  44. 44.

    Brachiator

    @Mnemosyne: No, when asked, Facebook was specifically mentioned as the place people go for news. But note here that the source of the stories is not Facebook, but that Facebook curates the stories. I have found that friends who use Facebook often will not follow the stories to their original links. But these people are not often doing wider internet searches.

    Newspapers are dying for a lot of reasons. I used to work for the LA Times, and still know some people there. There was a time when the paper knew that it was essential to get the paper to the customer. I am not surprised to see that home delivery has suffered. And I often see news racks in the morning with no papers or with yesterdays papers still in them. The paper is asking to be put out of its misery.

    Also, I have noted that in my office no one under 30 reads the Times. Not even the online version. And only 1 person in the entire office subscribes. Even though there is still some good reporting done, the Times is largely irrelevant to most people.

  45. 45.

    Mnemosyne

    @Brachiator:

    My internship at the LA Times inspired me to abandon journalism altogether right before the newspaper business collapsed, so I guess it wasn’t all bad. Also the only workplace where I’ve ever had to pee in a cup to get the job (as an intern), and that was in the mid-90s.

    The cafeteria wasn’t bad, at least.

  46. 46.

    Steeplejack

    I had a moderately productive day today. Took the car in for a major maintenance appointment, was ferried home and back by the dealer’s courtesy car. Very convenient. The doughty Kia got maintained and received a clean bill of health—plus I was told I won’t need new tires until the fall at the earliest—so everything’s go for a quick trip to Cape May, New Jersey, at the end of this week.

    The last time I had dinner with my playwright friend she was bitching about how she has to be at a conference in Philadelphia at the end of the week but has to nip over to Cape May on Friday night for a performance of her play and some attendant activities, then get back to Philadelphia by 11:00 a.m. on Saturday. Confusing logistical talk about Amtrak, livery cabs, buses, I don’t know what all.

    I have been wanting to get out on the road and also have been wanting to see Cape May, so I said, Screw it, I’ll drive to Philadelphia, pick you up and take you to Cape May and back. (It’s about two hours from Philadelphia.) I told her I was taking my car in and that my offer was contingent on no problems being found. So now I need to let her know we’re on, and I need to make a room reservation for myself for Friday night. She gave me the names of a couple of places, but anybody here an expert on Cape May? Also, restaurants.

  47. 47.

    east is east

    Good for Bruce being himself. Best of luck for Caitlyn. Invecitive doubleplus on the hate sites.

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    @Mnemosyne:

    I am so thankful that in my 40-year career I never had to take a drug test. I never had anything to fear from one, but I really think it would have been a deal-breaker if some employer had told me I had to have one. I’m thankful it never came up, and I realize that a lot of people these days don’t have the luxury of making the choice. Ugh.

  52. 52.

    piratedan

    @NotMax: good choice… always digged that spacy effect coupled with her voice…. does harken to feelings of emotional disconnect

  53. 53.

    Brachiator

    @Mnemosyne: The Times, and most newspapers, used to be among the hardest drinking and hardest drugging occupations in the world. The extension for the Redwood Room, a bar up the street, was listed in the Times Company phone book. Pressmen and others would go to the Code 7 and drink with the cops. Some reporters, editors and admen would keep their booze in a drawer. Easier to get to.

    The 10th floor cafeteria was great. You used to be able to go up to the roof. Once when they sent someone up to do some cleaning, they found an inches thick carpet of marijuana cigarettes and remnants of other drugs. I think formal drug testing came later.

    I loved the Times when it was fun to work there. The Lou Grant tv show got quite a few details right. The Herald Examiner was equally crazy.

  55. 55.

    Tree With Water

    Has anyone else picked up on a KKK vibe in that new Kentucky Fried Chicken commercial?

    The new “colonel” looks as if he’s only grudgingly taken off his klan’s white hood to film it, and its lily white cast of characters, in a lily white setting, all dumbly leering into the camera with a palpable menace, has creeped me out for that reason every time I’ve seen it.

  56. 56.

    Punchy

    “Seattle mini-meetup” sounds like a gathering of grungy chicks in short skirts. And I’m OK wit dat.

  57. 57.

    Steeplejack

    @Tree With Water:

    I don’t get a KKK vibe, but the new colonel definitely creeps me out.

    On the other hand, I find the young dude in the McDonald’s sirloin burgers commercial who talks about a “gosh darn shame” oddly appealing. Go figure.

  60. 60.

    Tree With Water

    @Steeplejack: I wish Budweiser would bring back Louie The Wise Ass Frog as its pitchman. The final line spoken in that series of commercials (a staple of NFL broadcasts) was his frog buddy saying, “Ah, Louie, you’re bucking for a pink slip”. Turned out his buddy was right.

  62. 62.

    Brachiator

    By the way, the PEW study on Internet use for news kicks a cohort of seniors to the curb.

    Because this is a survey of online adults, data is not reported on those in the Silent generation, ages 69 to 86 at the time of survey. This age cohort is considerably less likely to use the internet and, as a result, those who are online may not be representative of the generation as a whole.

    And to think that this is a group the GOP is most desperate to reach out to.

  65. 65.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @Steeplejack: You’d be surprised how many think they mom and dad won’t find out about their “career”. Admittedly, some do it part time while going to college; so it’s a bit easier to hide.

  69. 69.

    Brachiator

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Makes sense. The last time I was in that area was for jury duty. They had a farmers market on Thursdays I think on the lawn at city hall.

  70. 70.

    lamh36

    so getting away from the more celeb obsessed aspect of Caitlyn Jenner, I have a good friend who is a Lesbian and who is an LGBT activist. She has been discussing the idea about Transgender identity and adhering to the same “standards of beauty” that cis-woman do.

    In other words what she has been saying is, so what if like a number of Transgender woman and men Caitlyn wasn’t “beautiful” or didn’t adhere to the “standards of beauty” that so many cis female try to adhere to….would the reactions be the same?

    I suspect not. she was encouraged that Caitlyn found her truth, but she also hoped it would lead to real discussion past just saying “oh she’s beautiful”. My friends supposition was ok, supposed Caitlyn had chosen to do a more “true to life” shoot than the soft lighting and airbrush aspect of so much of Annie Leibowitz fashion photography.

    I mean, not all transgender people have the resources of someone like a Caitlyn Jenner or the “glam squad” that is afforded a rich celeb.

    @IjeomaOluo: I’m very happy for Caitlyn Jenner & wish her the best. I also wish for visibility & respect for trans people who do not have the resources..

    @IjeomaOluo: I really wish that people in marginalized groups didn’t have to be “beautiful” for people to realize that they ARE beautiful.

  71. 71.

    Brachiator

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Also, too, isn’t there a Commuter Express bus that goes from Glendale to near the courthouse? It’s been a while since I had to go down to that area, so I might be thinking of another transit line.

  73. 73.

    Brachiator

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Oh. South of downtown. I used to go to that building years ago to pay minor traffic tickets or to try to get into traffic school. I don’t know what the commuting options from there might be.

  74. 74.

    lamh36

    oh and note…in her interview with Dianae Sawyer she identified as a Republican and doesn’t consider Obama that good a prez. yet and still, this happened

    @eonline: President Barack Obama shows his support for Caitlyn Jenner: http://t.co/2bniSQwlpQ

    have we seen/heard any Republican sending support Caitlyn’s way? nope and ya won’t. in fact TPM has a post or two up about the ridiculous reactions on Faux News.

  75. 75.

    Brachiator

    @lamh36: Life is complicated. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that there are a number of transgender Republicans. On the other hand, I’m also sure that conservative morons look at the publicity that Jenner is getting as another sign that Hollywood libruls are dragging America closer to Satan.

  77. 77.

    lamh36

    @Brachiator: of course there are, but I remember when the Diane sawyer interview came out, even the likes of Rick Santorum had non-“batshit” crazy rhings to say, but today…silence even from the like of the Log Cabin Republicans

  79. 79.

    opiejeanne

    @srv: We were trying to watch a baseball game on MLBtv when ComCast was down. It appeared to be functioning but we couldn’t get online. Really annoying.

  81. 81.

    Valdivia

    @Brachiator: I remember that movie, of course.
    Of course someone with tech money gets to retire at 25 (and good for her!) I was just struck that that was the saying, assuming lots of retired 25 year olds make it to Portland.

    @BillinGlendaleCA: best answer, sorry I missed it last night.

    @Steeplejack: have a lovely trip to Cape May.

  82. 82.

    Bystander

    Of course Obummer is being nice to “Caitlyn”. He wants to perform surgery on her tax bracket. At least she can trust other repubs to let her keep her capital gains to herself even if they would also like to burn her at the stake in the gated community town square.

    As for Caitlin’s “beauty”….well, remember what they say about the eye of the beholder. You might as well remind me of how sexy Ann Coulter is or how beautiful Peggy Noonan was in their day.

  83. 83.

    Riley's enabler

    Sending lots of healing vibes to Yutsy, hope the rehab portion of events goes smoothly. Cheers from Texas!

  84. 84.

    GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)

    @Mike in NC:

    That’s enough time for ONE of those cities. I could spend 5 days dicking around in the gorge.

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