Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

The words do not have to be perfect.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

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

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

Come on, man.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

You are here: Home / Garden Chats / Sunday Morning Open Thread

Sunday Morning Open Thread

by | 105 Comments

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Courtney Barnett is Australian, where it’s gardening season (insofar as that’s ever true in Australia). From the lyrics:

… The yard is full of hard rubbish it’s a mess and
I guess the neighbors must think we run a meth lab
We should amend that
I pull the sheets back
It’s 40 degrees
And i feel like I’m dying.
Life’s getting hard in here
So i do some gardening
Anything to take my mind away from where it’s supposed to be.
The nice lady next door talks of green beds
And all the nice things that she wants to plant in them
I wanna grow tomatoes on the front steps.
Sunflowers, bean sprouts, sweet corn and radishes.
I feel pro-active
I pull out weeds
All of a sudden
I’m having trouble breathing in…

***********
In our yard, it’s now 50F and raining, in late December. Which means you can see the hard rubbish. And also, everybody’s cringing under the suspicion we’ll get blasted with another ten-feet-of-snow January/February, as payback.

What’s going on in your neighborhood(s), garden-related or otherwise?

Reader Interactions

105Comments

  3. 3.

    Debbie(aussie)

    Front yard needs a mow, badly, grass is mid shin high. Backyard was mown a week ago ,but really needs to be done again. We have had about 18mm of rain in past two weeks. Keeps the grass humming along nicely (rats). Have been given a number of hanging baskets that I am hanging from a tree that provides shade about centrally in the backyard. I am also growing a passionfruit vine from the base of this tree, so far it looks great, more than tripling in size with lush green leaves. Hoping the ‘hanging gardens of Cullen St’ will be a success, aesthetically as well as staying alive(I have a bad rep for killing everything green that comes into my garden).
    Was very warm and muggy here today-32° with humidity jumping around from about 58-99%. Pleasant now.

  4. 4.

    Origuy

    It’s 55F at 6am here at my dad’s in Indiana with a thunderstorm going full blast. Back home in San Jose, it’s 30F and there are freeze warnings. This is backwards from normal.

  5. 5.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    We’ve got snow, though it’s still above the average temps for the end of December.

    We’ve set a date of February 1 for the official release of Becoming Phoebe. It may actually be ready before then, in which case the Kickstarter subscribers will get it early.

    At this point, I’m mostly just waiting for the Kirkus review to come back, at which point we can finalize the cover. I think I’m also going with a $16 price for the paperback. The ebooks will be $9.99, mostly because I’m not allowed to choose anything else by Apple or Amazon.

  6. 6.

    J R in WV

    It’s 56 degrees F here at 6:30 am. Supposed to hit over 70 today, with thunderstorms off and on.

    So strange, this weather. Last winter was somewhat harsh here in WV, we bought a set of Blizzac snow tires for the all wheel drive car, and I had them put on the car in early December. We have had one snow, which was about 15mm deep, but turned into black ice around 8 pm, which ruined many people’s day.

    But the moss on the boulders around our home is emerald green right now, and the ferns that are usually bitten by hard frost are still lush and green too. Very odd for these short days of the year.

  7. 7.

    OzarkHillbilly

    This is what NOAA says we have in store:

    Overnight:
    Rain and possibly a thunderstorm. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. Low around 40. North wind around 11 mph, with gusts as high as 20 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%.
    Sunday:
    Rain and possibly a thunderstorm. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. High near 41. North wind 10 to 13 mph, with gusts as high as 23 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%.
    Sunday Night:
    Rain and possibly a thunderstorm. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. Low around 38. Northeast wind 13 to 16 mph, with gusts as high as 28 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%.
    Monday:
    Rain and thunderstorms before noon, then showers after noon. Some of the storms could produce heavy rainfall. High near 49. Northeast wind 10 to 16 mph becoming south in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 28 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%.

    Started Friday night. Flood warnings up everywhere. So, “Glub glub glub…”

  8. 8.

    NotMax

    First time in 30 or so years that our usual group will not be getting together for New Year’s Eve. On the plus side that means less fretting, planning, shopping, cooking and transporting food for me.

    It’s as if TCM knew before we did – 7 Marx Bros. flicks followed by 6 Thin Man movies on the 31st and into the wee hours of the 1st.

  10. 10.

    Raven

    I got sick in the middle of the night xmas, couldn’t eat or do much of anything yesterday. My bride got everything in order to pack up and drive home this morning and then she got hit in the middle of the night! I just want to go home and get in our bed but we’ll have to see.

  12. 12.

    Zinsky

    Recovering from the holidays and putting away Christmas paraphernalia. It gets more pointless every year now that our kids are grown….

  16. 16.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    I’ve moved from Detroit to Tuscaloosa for a week of work. Arrived Saturday. Just making idle conversation I asked how the weather had been. As it happens the person I was speaking to was in his storm shelter the day before as a tornado passed over. This was not considered remarkable. More are expected.

    Oddly, Michigan got its only recorded December tornado on Wednesday. I was 2.5 miles away while it was happening and had no indication anything unusual was going on. It was a bit gusty and cloudy.

    Have a happy Sunday, people. I’ve gotta roll out to work.

  20. 20.

    Schlemazel

    @NotMax: THANKS for alerting me
    That will be a nice variation for out New Years Eve viewing. I introduced my MIL to really bad horror movies. We watch the original Little Shop Of Horrors and Comedy of Terrors and the like. She loved them & a good time is had by all.

    I can’t recommend those 2 films highly enough. Both are hilarious & a complete waste of time, no message of artistic value just plain fun.

  22. 22.

    donnah

    Sixty-one degrees and POURING rain in SW Ohio, with much more on the way. My sis and her family left for home yesterday and my middle son leaves in a few hours, so this depressing rain suits my mood. I could probably drown myself in the back yard, there’s so much rain.

    On a positive note, the holdays were good for all of my family and friends, even though my niece from Florida was disappointed that we had no snow.

  23. 23.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Raven: I’ve had food poisoning twice, both times from road food, and both times I thought I was going to die. I would not wish that on anyone.

  25. 25.

    JPL

    @Raven: Not necessarily. One time I ate at a Greek restaurant with three others and it took 30 hours before it finally hit the last person.

  26. 26.

    Schlemazel

    @Raven:
    Nothing worse than being sick on the road. When I traveled all the time I had 2 different bouts. One was food poisoning I am pretty sure – 2 exits not waiting but was better by morning, the other was a bug as I ran a high fever, that was much worse. I hope you both recover quickly.

  27. 27.

    Raven

    @OzarkHillbilly: JPL, Huh, well, I guess it doesn’t really matter. The only thing is that it was never really bad. I mean I hurled a bunch and stayed in the rack most of the day but it could have been worse (I think). The girl just said she wanted to go home but wanted to stay in bed for another hour or so.

  32. 32.

    Baud

    @JPL:

    One time I ate at a Greek restaurant with three others and it took 30 hours before it finally hit the last person.

    That type of inefficiency was the root cause of the Greek financial crisis.

  33. 33.

    Schlemazel

    We are in Chicago today, weather is gray but dry, highs will be in the 40’s – the real kind, not those fake C ones :) decent enough for walking the city.

    Probably see Shedds today & MingHin for dim sum. we have a couple of places in Minneapolis but none that are as good as what we have found in Chicago or NYC. With 2.5 million people in the least densly populated big city in the US we just don’t have the customer base to support as many resturants

  35. 35.

    geg6

    Going to watch the Steeler game and finish up the Christmas leftovers today. Weather guy tells me winter is finally coming this week, which is good because the grass needs cut and neither of us want to do that the last week of December. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate this balmy weather but it’s just too weird. 65 degrees right now in Pittsburgh. Freaks me out a little.

  36. 36.

    Satby

    @Schlemazel: Enjoy my hometown! I still miss living there.
    It rained most of yesterday, all night, and looks like more today. In the 40s, but dropping overnight so that the predicted rain becomes sleet and there are already icy travel warnings for tomorrow’s morning commute.
    I hate driving in icy weather.

  41. 41.

    Schlemazel

    @Satby:
    One of the positives of a Minnesota winter is we don’t generally get a lot of ice, it’s too cold so we just get snow. But I agree, ice is the worst – drive carefully & don’t be afraid to pull off if it is dangerous.

  42. 42.

    Elmo

    @Schlemazel:
    The only time I’m sure I’ve had food poisoning, it started in coach on the redeye from SFO to DC. I had the window seat.
    I had eaten lunch at a Mexican place and had a chicken enchilada. Almost exactly 10 hours later, boom.
    I travel a great deal, often fly coast to coast, and I have never been able to bring myself to take the redeye since.

  45. 45.

    debbie

    @Satby:

    Icy weather is the worst way to break into winter driving. I can’t imagine the number of accidents there will be there if there is ice.

  47. 47.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    It’s nice that he’s looking out for his compatriots who may not be able to afford to stock up on weaponry, but why wait until the Saturday after July 4th? How many innocents could be needlessly slaughtered by thugs in the meantime? There’s a conspiracy in there somewhere.

  48. 48.

    Joel

    Has anyone mentioned the Al-Jazeera doping documentary, yet? The headlines have Peyton Manning being named, but you’ve also got James Harrison, Mike Neal, Julius Peppers, Ryan Howard, Ryan Zimmerman… This is definitely BALCO-scale.

  49. 49.

    debbie

    @Raven:

    Good luck getting past this. I’ve had food poisoning 7 or 8 times in the past few years (damn farmer’s markets!), and after the worst of it, nothing makes the road back easier than a bottle or two of vitamin water. Whatever is in it really kills the fog that dehydration brings on.

  51. 51.

    Satby

    @Schlemazel: I do, or just tell folks I’m not driving. They don’t salt the roads out here, too far in the country.

    My last winter as a commuter in Chicago a guy on 294 started to spin out on black ice next to me. I tried to move into the right lane from the middle, hit my own patch of black ice and started spinning too. I wasn’t sure which was going to kill me first, the wildly swerving semis behind us or the wall under the overpass that the Hinsdale Oasis was built on, which I was heading straight for. I remember thinking “this is gonna really hurt”, braced myself for impact, and scrunched up my eyes. The car gave a big jerk and stopped moving; no impact. I opened my eyes to find I was on the right hand shoulder of the road, clear outside the overpass. The automatic stabilizer thing had kicked in. I took the shoulder to the next exit which was 1/2 a mile away, got to work in Oak Brook, and spent the day a bit shaken. My son called after about 15 minutes, worried because there was a 21 car pileup at the same spot about 10 minutes after I passed it. But I still am a very tense driver in slippery conditions now. I doubt I would have luck that good again.

  53. 53.

    JPL

    @Joel: Peyton hired Ari Fleischer as his spokesman. Interesting that the NFL hasn’t issued a statement yet. I guess they are still focused on deflated balls. What about ESPN, surely they as the spokesperson for Roger, must have said something.

  54. 54.

    Joel

    @JPL: The documentary makes a pretty convincing case for widespread abuse (especially among the Green Bay Packers). I’ve been operating under the assumption that steroid (and GH) abuse is widespread around the NFL, so it doesn’t surprise me at all.

    Taylor Teagarden, at least, is totally busted.

  55. 55.

    Satby

    You know, a lot of us were in Chicago over the last few days: me, Watergirl, Schlemazel; plus rikyrah, Eric S, and a couple other folks live there too.
    We blew the chance for a meet up!
    Edited to add: I think Iowa old lady and or BellaQ may have been too.

  57. 57.

    Gvg

    Around 80F here in north Florida. Warmer than most years but not unheard of. I picked oranges for my sister to take to work last night with a flashlight. Need to finish today in light. Lots has already fallen to the ground wasted because I haven’t had time. Most years I end up doing the dark flashlight thing because a freeze is finally expected and I don’t get home in daylight so this is a nice change. Trees are producing a lot more than we can eat so I will be taking some in for New Years to co workers. Dad is coming over to help fix mower. I busted the blade a couple of weeks ago hit a large branch on the ground when I was ducking to fit under heavy drooping orange tree branches and didn’t see where I was going well enough. Grass really needs mowing.
    The last time we had this warm a winter the summer following was really brutal because it seemed like the heat never let up so I am rather concerned. Mid 80’s.

  58. 58.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Satby: Ever since I rolled my van full of tools after hitting some black ice, I refuse to go anywhere when the forecast is ugly. Should’a killed me but all I got was a broken thumb nail.

  63. 63.

    L&DinSLT

    It was 12* here in South Lake Tahoe when I got up at 6AM. Heavenly is within 7″ of having twice the snow it had this time last year but we need it to continue if the lake is to come up. It’s down almost three feet and, unless we get more snow and a good melt the lake will be unreachable for many people who make their living on it during boating months. Need a 1987-1998 El Nino!

  64. 64.

    pamelabrown53

    @Gvg:
    Hi! I, too live in N. FL.(just north of St. Augustine on a barrier island. Are we almost neighbors? BTW, it’s way too warm for this time of year.

  65. 65.

    Baud

    @Amir Khalid:

    The world clock on my phone says you are only 13 hours ahead of East coast time in the U.S. I guessed a lot more. Damn, the Pacific Ocean is huge.

  66. 66.

    Germy

    John McAfee is running for president.

    In September, McAfee announced his run for the highest office in the land as a third-party candidate. On Christmas Eve, he upped the ante, claiming in an interview with USA Today that the Libertarian party has asked that he run on their ticket. (Gary Johnson notably ran on the same ticket in 2012 after exiting from the Republican primary.) This is not a deal-sealed, 110-percent sure thing—they have ten other candidates who’ve expressed interest. But, according to McAfee, “none of whom have personality.”

  67. 67.

    Germy

    I confess I haven’t been following the saga of John McAfee. Last I heard, he was a fugitive from justice. I guess all those problems just went away?

  69. 69.

    Amir Khalid

    @Baud:
    13 hours ahead of you guys puts me pretty much on the far side of the planet from you.

    @Germy:
    Apparently so. The cops in Belize don’t seem to be after him anymore, according to the story.

  71. 71.

    ThresherK

    @Satby: Oof. My most-skid-induced near-incident was in much the same road conditions, and started on an overpass. Bridge really does freeze before pavement!

    I was able to correct it myself. Phew! Also helped to be in an old-school rear-drive Volvo for the handling and (if that failed) a collision.

  72. 72.

    Baud

    Bloomberg via Atrios

    Webb Attacks Clinton With Eye on Independent Run
    When Jim Webb quit the Democratic presidential race on Oct. 20 amid low poll numbers and a minimal debate presence, the former Virginia senator left open the possibility he’d return for a White House run in a different political guise. Now he appears to be edging closer to making good on it.

    On Saturday morning, Webb used Twitter and his Facebook page to attack Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton for her handling of Libya during her time as secretary of state.

    What gets me is this?

    His public statements, meanwhile, have focused economic populism and breaking the monopoly of the two-party system.

    Nothing about appealing to Appalachian racial identity, which is what caused his early departure from the primary.

  74. 74.

    Germy

    @Amir Khalid:

    Apparently so. The cops in Belize don’t seem to be after him anymore,

    I have unpleasant memories of his anti-virus software clogging up all the PCs at a horrible job I worked at in the early ’90s.

  75. 75.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Germy: Still is as far as I know, just people stopped caring as he is relatively harmless anyway. Besides, isn’t a Fugitive from Justice the perfect Libertarian candidate anyway?

  76. 76.

    Germy

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Besides, isn’t a Fugitive from Justice the perfect Libertarian candidate?

    Most certainly. Can’t beat that sort of street cred with the Libertarian base…

  77. 77.

    GregB

    Fareed Zakaria is doing a documentary piece on the Iraq war. Now at the point when L. Paul Bremer decreed the abolition of the political class and the military.

    I had forgotten how smug a man Rumsfeld was. Also remembering that Dough Feith was the stupidest fuicking man on the planet.

  79. 79.

    danielx

    ‘Twas 60 degrees at five o’clock, now down to 43 annnnnnd….more rain in the forecast. Was roused at eight this morning to bake for a gathering of the spousal unit and some of her BFFs; naturaly she stayed in bed after prying me out of my sarcophagus. Get down some coffee, start assembling ingredients and we are out of eggs. Off to the grocery, back to the kitchen and “how come you haven’t got started?” “Because you asked me to do this at eleven last night and we didn’t have any eggs because you used them all yesterday, that’s why!” Etc etc….not a promising start to the day, but nothing else on the agenda except solving a couple of computer issues, taking naps and noshing, not necessarily in that order.

  80. 80.

    Elmo

    @L&DinSLT: I moved from San Diego to Mammoth in March 1996. My first winter there was the year of the Walker flood, when we got eight feet of snow over Christmas and then eight inches of rain over New Years.
    Then my next winter was the 97-98 Nino, with fifty feet of snow.
    The longtime locals were telling me I could never leave, cuz I was obviously a talisman of Ullr.
    I left in 2003. Sorry about the drought…

  81. 81.

    Shell

    50 degrees here in NJ. The teeny-tiny chance of snow flurries on Monday night practically sent our weather people into giddy giggles.

  82. 82.

    Schlemazel

    Heard sirens all night long & they always seemed stop right by our hotel, made me wonder about the neighborhood. When we got out & about this morning we discovered there is a hospital right across the street. That made me feel better.

    Big news is the cops shot a couple more folks yesterday.

  83. 83.

    BruceFromOhio

    Echoing danielx, who must be somewhere near my neck o’ the woods – almost sixty until the thunder and lightning scared the hell out of everyone at 5am, now the thermometer on the patio post says its 42.And the grass in my backyard continues to grow. Not planting anything today, though.

    We may try to see the new Star Wars movie, and then I can read comment threads again, yay!

    Browns play KC in a pretty much meaningless game for Cleveland, now its just a matter of the wildcards getting settled and the playoffs begin.

  85. 85.

    ruemara

    Happy post- boxing day. It’s somewhere in the 30s here in NorCal. I’m too cold to leave bed. I could finish all the titling work left to be done today, or hit the gym and go see Star Wars/Hateful 8. Then I have to prep for an abbreviated work week.

    I hate going to the movies alone though. Half the fun is comparing thoughts on the good & the bad.

  89. 89.

    BD of MN

    It’s looking like winter might just be coming to MN after all. 17F now and NWS is predicting 6-12″ starting Monday afternoon into Tuesday… This means the local teevee nooz will be all DOOOOOOOOOM! for the next 48 hours. I’m gonna go with the usual “take the low end of the prediction and cut it in half”, so 3″, which will still be enough to completely screw up rush hour on Monday night and Tuesday morning…

  90. 90.

    srv

    Clearly, Sander’s bros and Trump supporters have nothing in common:

    Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Sunday made an appeal to supporters of Donald Trump to back his candidacy for president instead.

    The Vermont senator said he and Trump followers are mad about the same issues, but he – unlike Trump – has a plan to solve those problems.

    “Look, many of Trump’s supporters are working-class people, and they’re angry,” Sanders said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “And they’re angry because they’re working longer hours for lower wages. They’re angry because their jobs have left this country and gone to China or other low-wage countries.”

  91. 91.

    bemused

    Christmas Eve moon looked gigantic and red-orange as it appeared late afternoon. Absolutely gorgeous. Later that night, it almost looked like a moon dog, but not, with a yellow glow around it, also beautiful.

  93. 93.

    Exurban Mom

    @Schlemazel: I watched the original Little Shop of Horrors when I was on a sleepover at age 10, and it put me off horror films forever. Sooooo creepy.

  94. 94.

    Scapegoat

    Nanny goat has her baby shower today and I’ll be soaking up the Stillers game—both of us spending time with old friends. Nice to be back in (rainy, but warm for now) Pittsburgh.

    Another plus is I got to meet two very helpful police officers yesterday when filing a police report for our stolen mountain bikes. I debated whether or not to tell them that the last time I met some of the fine officers from their precinct, it was when I was hauled into the back of their patrol car on Halloween while in college three decades ago. I made the mistake of asking why a dozen cars and paddy wagons showed up at a party where I’d just arrived. Was told because of people “blocking traffic”.

    My response? “You mean, like what you’re doing now?”

    What’s that old saw about questioning authority? I shoulda learned then!

  95. 95.

    L&DinSLT

    @Elmo: Thanks. We’re optimistic. We like to say we endure the winters so we can enjoy the summers, but the last four winters we haven’t even had to endure. Don’t want this coming summer to be the one where we find out what it’s like to live in Tahoe without a boat because it’s still sitting winterized in our side yard!

  96. 96.

    Steeplejack

    The desktop site (Win10, Firefox here) is doing an interminable chat with syndication.twitter.com (2½ minutes before I stop it) on every page load. No likey. This has been happening since sometime yesterday. I put a note in the most recent site maintenance thread.

  97. 97.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Raven: Have a safe trip home, mind the high waters on the way. I hope you’re both feeling better soon.

  98. 98.

    L&DinSLT

    @Elmo: ETA We’ve been here since ’94, and remember when we had ten foot berms, the auger had to come though to widen residential streets to two lanes, and you were using the snow blower on the yard in March so your grass would have a chance of growing. IOW, the good ole’ days!

  99. 99.

    Brachiator

    My sinuses are acting up, which led me to cut short some holiday visits. I slept a lot and didn’t watch much news or look at the Internets, so I feel like a bear emerging from hibernation. Stocked up on a few movies for New Year’s Eve and added a boatload of Beatles albums to my Amazon Prime music thingy.

    Got a few errands to run, and some prep for a short but busy work week to finish out the year.

    Hope everyone had a mellow holiday.

  100. 100.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @srv:
    One of the reasons I don’t support Sanders is that he is willfully blind that race hate is not a side effect of economic insecurity. That he believes there are enough potential crossover voters between Trump and himself to have any effect on any election is sad.

  101. 101.

    a different chris

    Fox News-addicted neighbor just explained to me that the screwy weather is because all those new windmills & solar panels have disrupted the planet’s normal weather patterns.

  104. 104.

    Brachiator

    @a different chris:

    Fox News-addicted neighbor just explained to me that the screwy weather is because all those new windmills & solar panels have disrupted the planet’s normal weather patterns.

    So let’s see, now. Humans can affect the weather. But I’ll bet that your friend believes that climate change is not real.

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