Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

Humiliatingly small and eclipsed by the derision of millions.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

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

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

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

T R E 4 5 O N

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

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

Giving up is unforgivable.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

You are here: Home / Nature & Respite / Birdwatching / Rainy Tuesday Open Thread

Reader Interactions

96Comments

  2. 2.

    donnah

    Great shot, Betty! You’re getting to be quite good with a camera.

    How’s your thumb? It hurt just to read about it.

    I’m working on a new hooked rug project, a portrait of my mom holding me when I was six months old. It’s turning out well and I’m happy with it. I need cheerful work to take my mind off the news of Trump’s latest nonsense.

  3. 3.

    Laura

    There’s hardly a lovlier seaside sight than a troop of pelicans flying low across the water.
    BC, how’s the digit? Did you figure out what bit or stung you?

  4. 4.

    schrodingers_cat

    This is what I am listening to right now. Katrina Kaif is beautiful.. and the song catchy. I haven’t seen the movie so I can’t give any more context.

    Afghan Jalebi*
    Jalebi is a sweet circular funnel cake like thingy dipped in syrup. Too sweet for my taste, but a popular wedding snack/dessert.

  5. 5.

    Gravie

    Florida native here, and I learned to love the “Pelikings” more than any other bird. They are magnificent on the wing and loveably dorky at all other times. Thanks for sharing the photo. We live in Oregon now and on our drive out here saw white pelicans in South Dakota, just hanging out in a small retaining pond by the side of the road. Who knew? (Apparently Lewis & Clark, since they reported seeing them on THEIR westward expedition, but I had no idea.)

  7. 7.

    SFAW

    @donnah:

    Great shot, Betty! You’re getting to be quite good with a camera.

    Credit where credit is due: it was actually cope who took the shot.

    I think Betty leans more towards gators and snakes. (‘Cause it reminds her of FL politics, I imagine).

  8. 8.

    trollhattan

    JoeScar does journalism. Or grows a pair. Or something.

    Joe Scarborough interrupted an interview with EPA chief Scott Pruitt until he would answer whether President Donald Trump still believed climate change was a Chinese hoax.

    Trump tweeted in November 2012 that “global warming” was schemed by the Chinese to harm U.S. manufacturing capabilities, and the “Morning Joe” host wanted to know whether that belief shaped the president’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement.

    “It’s a simple question. Mr. Pruitt, it’s a simple question,” Scarborough said. “Have you ever talked to the president about whether he believes climate change is real? Does he still believe it was a hoax launched in china?”

    Pruitt dismissed the question as unimportant, and said Trump made environmental decisions that “put America’s interests first.”

    “I understand that, and I agree with that,” Scarborough said. “I agree with that (but) we’re just trying to get an answer from you. I agree, we should always put America first, (but) I disagree with getting out of Paris because it’s voluntary. The goals set were voluntary. But I just want — it’s important for Americans to know — it’s important for Americans to know whether their president believes that global warming was hatched as a conspiracy theory in China. Doesn’t that matter to you?”
    Report Advertisement

    Pruitt said the Paris agreement would require the agency he oversees to impose new regulations on energy production, which he said would hurt American industry — but Scarborough cut him off.

    “I’m sorry, I’m sorry — I’ve got to stop,” Scarborough said. “I want to stop it. This interview has to stop in its tracks until I just get a yes (or) no answer from you on whether you believe it’s important that Americans find out whether their president believes that climate change is a conspiracy theory based out of China.”

    Of all of Trump’s hired liars Pruitt is the smarmiest lyingest liar of all, and the prick is hellbent on sending the environment back to 1950.

  9. 9.

    catpal

    I am just catching upon the latest Russian hacking news and as I am always worried about voting systems/software – I found this about VR Systems of Tallahassee, FL in 2016

    An employee of a vendor for the elections office inadvertently made a preview of the elections results live to the public, according to Mindy Perkins, CEO of VR Systems, the vendor in question.

    So fi they are “accidentally” releasing election results early – they were probably easily hacked by Putin/Russia. Is their hackable software in more states than FL? Any more info about hacked VR Systems?

  10. 10.

    patrick II

    Before I saw pelicans in flight underestimated their beauty. But they are remarkably graceful fliers. I have seen them fly in formation and then peel off and dive bomb a school of fish like WWII dive bombers. It was just beautiful to watch.

  11. 11.

    rikyrah

    I know that I can be flip at times. And, snarky.
    But, I am worried about what’s happening in the Middle East.
    Saudi Arabia is NOT, nor has ever been our friend. Neither is Qatar, but we have Soldiers and their families in Qatar.
    We have an ignoramous in the WH, who hasn’t a clue about any phucking thing.
    And, he has surrounded himself with ignorant azz muthaphuckas without a clue about anything but kissing his azz and grifting.
    Shrub was Shrub, but he did surround himself with professionals. They were evil as phuck, but there was a basic professionalism about them. WE KNEW when he lied about Iraq, what was going on. We didn’t know the end result, but we knew what was going on.
    Dolt45 doesn’t know what’s going on, and folks best not sleep on Iran.
    The.Persians.Are.NOT.Iraq.
    Those itching for war with Iran are even stupider than those who wanted to go to war in Iraq.

  12. 12.

    Major Major Major Major

    @trollhattan:

    This interview has to stop in its tracks until I just get a yes (or) no answer from you on whether you believe it’s important that Americans find out whether their president believes that climate change is a conspiracy theory based out of China.

    They really should’ve canceled America last year. The midseason finale was completely ridiculous, all the critics said it was going to go completely off the rails into utter unbelievability, and they were right.

  14. 14.

    rikyrah

    Trump’s radical budget director sees himself as a great success
    06/06/17 11:20 AM
    By Steve Benen

    Donald Trump’s far-right budget director, Mick Mulvaney, sat down with the New York Times the other day and expressed confidence that he’s doing a great job.

    Mick Mulvaney, the White House budget director, may be one of the most maligned men in Washington because he is the bearer of budget cuts. He has been accused of everything from ethnic cleansing to wanting to kill a million people. He gets “fan mail” with fake business cards tucked in that give his job title as a “starver of hungry children and elderly.”

    To Mr. Mulvaney, this is evidence of a job well done.

    “In our business that’s usually seen as a sign that the other side doesn’t know what to say substantively,” Mr. Mulvaney said during an interview Friday in his office at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

    Aside from the president himself, if there’s one person in the Trump administration who should avoid boasts about “substantive” debates, it’s the Republican leading the White House’s Office of Management and Budget.

    It was just last week, for example, that Mulvaney told the Washington Examiner, in reference to his budget plan and the administration’s tax-reform ambitions, ”I wouldn’t take what’s in the budget as indicative of what our proposals are.”

    That, of course, didn’t make any sense. A budget is, practically by definition, a document intended to reflect proposals.

    But the comment offered a mere peek into a deeply radical perspective that makes Mulvaney one of the most extreme and indefensible members of Team Trump.

  15. 15.

    trollhattan

    The path is now clear for Ambassador to China, Barron Trump. Tiffany gets skipped over yet again.

    President Trump’s decision last week to withdraw from the Paris climate accord was met with widespread condemnation, and two top CEOs — Tesla’s Elon Musk and Disney’s Robert Iger — resigned from White House advisory councils in protest.

    Now the United States’ top diplomat in China, charge d’affaires officer David Rank, has joined them. The acting U.S. ambassador to China said on Monday that he is resigning from his post in Beijing over Trump’s plan to ditch the climate agreement. According to NBC News, Rank said in a speech to embassy staff that over the weekend he was asked to do something supporting a policy that as a “parent, patriot and a Christian” he could not do.

  17. 17.

    rikyrah

    Why No Lawyers Will Represent Trump
    by Martin Longman
    June 6, 2017 12:19 PM

    President Trump can’t find a top law firm that wants to represent him. He and his top aides have tried. They’ve looked around. They’ve had conference calls. But they got zip, nada, bupkis. The top litigators and their firms have various reasons why they won’t agree to represent the president of the United States. Here are some of them:

    1. They won’t get paid.
    2. Their client wouldn’t follow their advice.
    3. They represent clients who have been or might be subpoenaed in money laundering aspects of the case.
    4. It would destroy the image and reputation of their firm.
    5. It would ‘kill’ efforts to recruit top lawyers to their firm.
    6. They’ll be washing their hair that year (“I’m too busy to represent the POTUS.”)
    7. He can’t be saved.

    To me, that’s a damning list. Under ordinary circumstances, I can’t think of anything more prestigious for a law firm than to be able to say that when the shit hits the fan, they’re the ones who take the call from the president. But, with this president, they’re not even confident that the client won’t stiff them on their bill. They’re also savvy enough to realize that the Trump Organization is up to its ears in money laundering and that this will create a conflict with the large banking institutions they represent. And Trump is so toxic, guilty, and unsympathetic that simply advocating on his behalf would cause people to shun and disdain their whole organization. Plus, they’d lose the case anyway in part because their advice wouldn’t be followed.

  18. 18.

    catpal

    hacked VR Systems caused voting problems in NC last November

    “Number one: We demand that they fix this glitch,” Rev. Dr. William Barber, president of North Carolina NAACP, said in a statement obtained by CNN. “There were no glitches in early voting. Why now and why in a heavy black voting area?” … The county signed a new contract last year to use a new e-voting system designed by VR Systems. A spokeswoman for VR Systems declined comment about the problems in Durham County.

    I hope now NC gets rid of hacked VR Systems.

  19. 19.

    Jeffro

    It’s been very weird this past week in NoVA (in a good way) – “San Diego” weather. I’ve never been there, but if this is what it’s like all the time, S.D.’s going on The List.

  20. 20.

    trollhattan

    @rikyrah:
    Yeah, but Persians did the 9/11 and have completely escaped our attention so, it’s their time now!

    Its weird. Obama did quite a bit to defuse the Iran animus, helping support the somewhat moderate president and get the nuclear deal done. Iran is also objectively anti-Daesh. And now we’re back to the damn axis of evil.

  21. 21.

    Brachiator

    Some harmless celebrity gossip:

    Amal Clooney Gives Birth to Twins With Beautiful, Average Names

    George and Amal Clooney have welcomed their highly anticipated and now officially Gemini twins, according to reports from People and the Associated Press. Bucking celebrity tradition, the couple gave their first babies sweet, popular names: Ella and Alexander.

    The headline caught my eye in part because of a discussion here yesterday about a couple who wanted to name their daughter (I think) Indiana Jones because they were such big fans of the movie.

    This also brought to mind one of the best descriptions I read about Clooney, man among men, at the height of his naughtiness and fame:

    George Clooney, 40. Clooney’s wearing a suit and white shirt, and looks as if he’s either stayed up all night being bad or is about to stay up all night being bad.

    Congrats to the happy parents.

  23. 23.

    germy

    Wife brought home a bottle of kefir. Unsweetened. I actually find it thirst quenching.

  25. 25.

    Corner Stone

    @trollhattan:

    Of all of Trump’s hired liars Pruitt is the smarmiest lyingest liar of all

    Woah, woah, woah. Prick Mulvaney, he of the Top Five Most Punchable Faces in DC would like to have a word with you. STAT!

  26. 26.

    TenguPhule

    @trollhattan:

    And now we’re back to the damn axis of evil.

    With less allies, less military forces available and no competent leadership.

    I’m going to bet on Iran.

  27. 27.

    jacy

    Raining here too — cats are not thrilled.

    I had a minor miracle occur. My car has been out of commission since November. I figure it’ll take about $700 to repair, but have not been able to put that aside. Yesterday in the mail I got a letter that stated that two years I had overpaid for chemotherapy. Included was a check for….$700. Huzzah! So looking forward to having my car back.

  28. 28.

    Shell

    Well, it’s raining where I live, anyway.

    Ugh, here in NJ its starting to feel Shakespearian…”For the rain it raineth every day.” At least your photo has a nice blue sky.

  29. 29.

    amygdala

    Interesting study out of Stanford, published in PNAS, using body cam data from a month of traffic stops by the Oakland PD. Not surprisingly, compared with white drivers, AA drivers were on the receiving end of less respectful language. The dataset was large, and the transcript ratings were done by evaluators blinded to race.

    I wonder if departments ever use body cam footage as a feedback mechanism for officers.

  30. 30.

    trollhattan

    Ladies and gemmins, Robert Costa.

    I’m told by two WH sources that Pres. Trump does not plan to put down Twitter on Thursday. May live tweet if he feels the need to respond.

    What could possibly go wrong?

  31. 31.

    Uncle Cosmo

    “Rainy Tuesday?” Not here in Bawlmer, Merlin, hon: Scattered clouds, low humidity & 77 degrees with a breeze. I’d sign up for another 3 months of this in a New York nanosecond.

  32. 32.

    TenguPhule

    @rikyrah:

    But, I am worried about what’s happening in the Middle East.
    Saudi Arabia is NOT, nor has ever been our friend. Neither is Qatar, but we have Soldiers and their families in Qatar.

    And now Qatar is under blockade. And Trump just tweeted support for it.

    While the people there are stocking up on food and water in preparation for siege or war.

    So many kegs of dynamite with fuses lying around and Donnie Darko is juggling flaming torches for fun.

  33. 33.

    Felonius Monk

    @Oatler.:

    Stupid pelican
    Mouth holds more than his belican

    He can take in his beak
    Enough food for a week
    But I’m damned if I see how the helican!

  34. 34.

    Spanky

    @Jeffro: Today is definitely San Diego weather. Or at least the San Diego I regularly visited in the early 90s.

    And pelicans. Used to be they were kind of rare to be sighted as far north as the Outer Banks of NC. Now they’re commonly found in the Chesapeake Bay, as far north as Maryland. (Reputedly. I haven’t seen them.)

  35. 35.

    JeanneT

    I’m excited to announce that my son Jeff Thomas is running for Congress in Michigan’s Third district, hoping to win the Democratic Party’s blessing to face off against Justin Amash. The last Democratic candidate against Amash ran a very low visibility campaign; Jeff hopes to be VERY visible in a person-to-person grass-roots mode. Check out his website!

  36. 36.

    Brachiator

    The upcoming solar eclipse in August will have a significant impact on energy production.

    Solar power is common enough that interruptions due to cosmic events can have a predictable impact. Fortunately, power companies don’t live in a Trump ignorance bubble and have a handle on this. From the Financial Times.

    The first total solar eclipse to darken US skies in a generation has forced utilities to draw up contingency plans for an electric grid increasingly powered by the sun.

    A giant shadow moving west to east on August 21 will temporarily remove “a large amount of photovoltaic resources” from the country, a regulatory body concluded last week. California’s grid operator on Monday estimated the eclipse would boost its net demand by 6,000 megawatts, enough power for the city of Los Angeles, as solar output nosedives. …

    Falling costs and government mandates have fostered a rapid expansion in US solar power capacity. Last year almost 10 per cent of California’s net generation came from solar, up from 0.4 per cent in 2011, according to the Energy Information Administration. ..

    The California Independent System Operator said the grid would lose 70 megawatts a minute as the moon covered the sun, then regain 90 megawatts a minute. That is two to three times the average “ramp rate”.

    Amber Motley, Caiso manager, told the grid operator’s board that it would reserve extra supplies of electricity from sources including gas-fired power plants. She called robust hydroelectric capacity left by heavy snows in the mountains “a blessing”.

    So, natural gas to the rescue.

  40. 40.

    Major Major Major Major

    @TenguPhule: I heard it noted the other day that May was actually Home Secretary (in charge of, among other things, MI5) when MI5 decided to ignore the most recent attacker.

    Whether or not they should have ignored him notwithstanding, I should hope she’s being beaten about the head with this.

  42. 42.

    germy

    WASHINGTON (AP) – Trump on fired FBI Director James Comey's upcoming congressional testimony: 'I wish him luck'— Josh Lederman (@joshledermanAP) June 6, 2017

  43. 43.

    Shell

    Woah, woah, woah. Prick Mulvaney, he of the Top Five Most Punchable Faces in DC

    I protest. The first time I saw Sebastian Gorka, some adviser to Trump, on CNN, the impulse to recoil was immediate. Are we sure he really isn’t a cyborg ?

  45. 45.

    Jeffro

    J-Rubs on GOP disappointment with Trumpov:

    They might have thought they’d get an earthier version of House Speaker Paul Ryan (who kept promising they shared an agenda). Instead, they got Archie Bunker (who, like Trump, came from Queens).

    Who…with two good eyes, or even just one…or hell, a blind person…didn’t see well in advance that Trumpov was most certainly not an ‘earthier version of House Speaker Paul Ryan’??!?

    I like J-Rubs, but that line should have started off, “They deluded themselves into thinking they’d get a less articulate version of…”

  46. 46.

    amygdala

    @Brachiator: This is interesting. I’ve always wondered if, in addition to carbon emissions, part of the problem with fossil fuel dependence was the monotony of it. I mean, it’s a truism that a financial portfolio should be diversified. Shouldn’t the same principle apply to something as important as energy? This way, if something major happens to threaten one source, there’s less of a gap to bridge. And it also means being able to tailor things by downside risk, like, say, trying to minimize windmills in and around critical bird flyways, because maybe geothermal or wave or whatever would be options.

  47. 47.

    Alain the site fixer

    @Aleta: Walking along the C&O Canal just outside Washington, D.C. one afternoon in spring 1995, I heard a loud splash and saw what could only have been an iguana (I’d hoped it was was a Hellbender, a large salamander in these parts). The way it swam at the surface was amazing, so effortless.

  48. 48.

    Brachiator

    @germy: A response to a note you made in a previous thread.

    David Edelstein had to explain his Wonder Woman review.

    It’s a hoot. Ultimately, he spends a long time explaining why those who got upset were wrong and he was right, if only a little indelicate. In the end he tries to wriggle out from censure by saying that he understands that Wonder Woman is important culturally, but is still a shitty movie that he can freely bash.

    Edelstein is quite a character. I often enjoy listening to him and three or four other colleagues talking about movies on the highly recommended “Fighting in the War Room” podcast. At his best, he can be illuminating about films, film history and film culture. But at his worst, he sees himself as the High Priest of Film criticism, who foolishly believes that he can use his criticism to shape how we think about movies and how we should think about movies,. And when he is most insufferable, he seems to actually believe that he can help determine what kind of movies, according to his standards, should be made.

    Fortunately, Wonder Woman is a perfectly enjoyable film that does not depend on David Edelstein’s approval or condemnation

  49. 49.

    Spanky

    And a Happy D-Day, especially to all the survivors, for which today is hopefully a happy day, indeed.

  51. 51.

    trollhattan

    @Shell:
    Gorka wins punchable face contest and oddly, WH seems to have noticed as he’s never on the teebee machine now.

    Pruitt is a smiling mortician, always happy for new business.

  52. 52.

    cope

    HEE HEE, Betty, I didn’t see that bird rump until I had sent you the pic.

    Oatler: I’ll bite, “I don’t know how in hell he can.”

    Gravie: I agree about their grace when on the wing. Somewhere in the archives, I have a pic of one at the instant its head hit the water. Unfortunately, I know it is from a few cameras ago and, therefore, pretty low resolution.

    Invasive species news: I took this pic on a recent trip to Sanibel Island and saw a green iguana wandering around behind our favorite sports bar with Chicago beef sandwiches. No camera at the time, but they’re coming, they’re coming, be they pythons, iguanas, walking catfish, brown anoles, Cuban tree frogs (sorry to bring up bad memories Betty), lionfish or nutria.

  53. 53.

    JeanneT

    @rikyrah: Running a political race strikes ME as something like torture, but he’s going in with enthusiasm even though the prospects for a Democrat to win this district are very slim. I’ll be a booster behind the scenes!

  55. 55.

    Aleta

    One of the many things that pisses me off about the Intercept’s handling of the document:
    I suspect Greenwald was unwilling to admit that he was wrong and (some time ago) had learned that Russia interfered in our election. A splashy leak that brought credit to him would be his way to pretend he discovered the story and avoid attention on his fuckeduppedness. While getting clicks. (It was not even new info, they say.). Then he really fucked up the handling. And I doubt he will take responsibility for that. Unknown if his self-centered need and ambition contributed to the sad result.

  56. 56.

    raven

    @jacy: Had the natural gas company call me Friday and tell me I had overpaid by $1400 and would I like a refund!!!!

  57. 57.

    germy

    @Brachiator: Edelstein reminds me of film critics I used to read in the 1970s. I agree, his apology and the original review were hoots.

  59. 59.

    Brachiator

    @amygdala:

    This is interesting. I’ve always wondered if, in addition to carbon emissions, part of the problem with fossil fuel dependence was the monotony of it. I mean, it’s a truism that a financial portfolio should be diversified. Shouldn’t the same principle apply to something as important as energy?

    To oversimplify and get way beyond my comfort zone, I think no matter what the sources of energy, some of the main issues are generation, transmission (and potential disruptions), and storage (batteries). So even if you have diverse sources, you still have to make sure you get energy to people when they need it, and at an effective cost.

    I heard the solar eclipse story this morning and it was the first time I had ever heard anything about the potential impact on solar power resources. It’s amazing how far we’ve come, and that solar power is a reality. Too bad that the Trump Administration hasn’t quite got the message.

  63. 63.

    germy

    @zhena gogolia:

    Best thing you could get to drink in 1990s Moscow.

    I’d never had kefir until yesterday. Makes a nice breakfast drink and bedtime snack.

  64. 64.

    Aleta

    @cope: Was the “green iguana wandering around behind our favorite sports bar with Chicago beef sandwiches” ? (That would be a great picture.)

  66. 66.

    TenguPhule

    @Major Major Major Major:

    I heard it noted the other day that May was actually Home Secretary (in charge of, among other things, MI5) when MI5 decided to ignore the most recent attacker.

    Its even worse then that.

    She cut the police force for the UK by 20,000.

    No, I did not misplace any zeros there.

    And when the police warned that this was not a good idea, she accused them of “crying wolf” because she claimed falling crime meant they didn’t need as many police.

    As it played out, crime is still now reported less often to the police, because they can’t do much about it.

    And so while the communities warned about the bomber and the trucker, lack of people to look into those warnings meant nothing was done about it.

    Epic fail doesn’t begin to describe it.

  67. 67.

    Brachiator

    @TenguPhule:

    So, natural gas to the rescue.

    Why the hell does Trump get credit for it?

    Not from me or anyone connected with the story, as far as I can tell. And if we had not got relief from the drought, reacting to the eclipse might be more of a problem.

  68. 68.

    germy

    @Aleta: I don’t think GG had anything to do with the story. His byline isn’t on it. And he’s been on twitter trying to downplay it.

    I don’t think he would have published it, if she’d sent the documents to him.

  70. 70.

    TenguPhule

    @Aleta:

    Unknown if his self-centered need and ambition contributed to the sad result.

    Consensus with Adam is that it was deliberate. The Intercept is a Russian backed operation.

  71. 71.

    hovercraft

    @Shell:
    Tell me about it, I know the last couple of years it’s been pretty dry, but this is ridiculous, it’s frigging June and it’s pretty cool out side! Enough with the rain, we’ve had April, May and now June showers, bring on the summer heat so I can come here and bitch about the heat and humidity!

  72. 72.

    TenguPhule

    @Brachiator:

    Not from me or anyone connected with the story, as far as I can tell.

    Tune your snarkometer to “blindingly obvious punchline”, Katie.

  74. 74.

    ? Martin

    @Brachiator: For now. The CA Senate voted on a plan to hit 33% renewable energy by 2020 ramping to 100% renewable energy by 2045. Also, $1.4B in rebates for residential power storage.

    We have fuel cells here for failover and for peaking. They run on biofuel or hydrogen. Hydrogen generation from biomass is looking increasingly attractive because it can be solar powered when there is a surplus, and because its carbon negative (it consumes CO2). The resulting hydrogen is relatively easy to store. We have a hydrogen pipeline in SoCal which is being expanded. In effect, hydrogen is an energy battery, so fuel cells (when all the pieces are in place end-end) can also be renewable, peaked, and allow energy storage.

  76. 76.

    TenguPhule

    @germy:

    Trump on fired FBI Director James Comey’s upcoming congressional testimony: ‘I wish him luck’

    Comey better be wearing a vest and avoiding any offers of tea.

    Or am I the only one who felt an ominous vibe from that?

  77. 77.

    amygdala

    @Brachiator: Yeah, especially for the grid, there must be a last mile that’s vulnerable.

    And you just know this administration will cite the eclipse and go all hair on fire against sustainable energy. Bah.

  78. 78.

    hovercraft

    @Jeffro:

    Instead, they got Archie Bunker (who, like Trump, came from Queens).

    That’s an insult to Archie Bunker! At the end of the day there was something about him that made you not completely hate him, Twitler not so much.

  80. 80.

    ? Martin

    @Brachiator: Well, the 70s OPEC crisis should make clear that energy diversification is indeed important. But your points are entirely correct – energy delivery needs to be reliable, above all else. There’s a mountain of considerations how you get there in terms of energy type, distance from production to consumer (50% of energy production is lost in transmission), load balancing, disruptions, market effects, small and large scale environmental impact, and so on.

    Ultimately, the greater the ability to move from marginal to fixed costs becomes overwhelming. That’s as much the driving factor for renewables as anything else. You gotta pay that coal miner – you don’t need to pay the sun or the wind.

  81. 81.

    Gravenstone

    @trollhattan:

    the prick is hellbent on sending the environment back to 1950.

    Not quite all the way back, unless you can point me to gas stations nationwide carrying leaded fuel again. Not that I should be giving them ideas, I suppose …

  82. 82.

    Keith P.

    I had a massive crane flying into my yard this time last year. It would show up every morning for a few hours to sit by my spa, looking for fish. Last year, I just had mosquito larvae and tadpoles. This year, the “pond” is packed with goldfish of all sizes, so I’m hoping it shows up again for a little population control.

  83. 83.

    The Moar You Know

    “San Diego” weather. I’ve never been there, but if this is what it’s like all the time, S.D.’s going on The List.

    @Jeffro: Pre-climate change weather is what we’ve had this year. Overcast, 65 degrees. Since April. It’s been fantastic. The strong La Nina I think is what’s responsible, the water is still bitterly cold.

    It normally goes sunny here in fall, some rain in November and then sunshine starting Christmas week until late March/early April.

    Of course, the climate changed starting back in 1995, when for the first time ever we started getting horribly hot and humid summers. And with very few exceptions (this year has been one of them) the difference between summer here and in, say, Charleston is about ten degrees, tops. Humid, nasty, wretched. At this point I’m one of the last holdouts, but next year we’re going to have to get central A/C. Blows my mind. When I was a kid here nobody had A/C. You simply didn’t need it.

    This is coastal San Diego weather, mind you. Anything more than 7-10 miles inland has always been uninhabitable here. Yeah, it’s sunny all the time there, but then again, so is Phoenix.

  86. 86.

    cope

    @Aleta: HEE HEE, and me, almost an English major. I edited that phrase twice and still mangled it. No more vodka martinis for me until after dinner. ;)

  88. 88.

    Brachiator

    @TenguPhule:

    Tune your snarkometer to “blindingly obvious punchline”, Katie.

    I try to practice snarkour with the best of them, but still sometimes the snark sneaks by unsnark-detected.

  89. 89.

    ? Martin

    @The Moar You Know: More broadly speaking, along the pacific coast we have this thing called June Gloom. Marine layer comes in overnight, cools the place down with fog/misty rain (below 1000′), and then the marine layer burns off and the afternoons are often sunny. How close to the beach you are determines how pronounced the effect. More than 5-10 miles inland and you never even see it happen, right at the beach and it may never burn off that day. Not uncommon to see a 20-30 degree temp difference from the beach to 15 miles inland.

    June Gloom seemed to hit early this year up here in OC and seems to be a bit heavier than usual.

  90. 90.

    The Moar You Know

    June Gloom seemed to hit early this year up here in OC and seems to be a bit heavier than usual.

    @? Martin: San Diego has both “May Gray” and “June Gloom” – always been heavier down here than up north for some reason – and I’m very happy with the phenomena this year. Haven’t seen more than an hour of sunlight for almost two months. I work about two miles from the coast and live far closer than that.

    Santee native says not uninhabitable, just not for the weak! You must be strong like bull to live in East County!

    @Elmo: You have my profound sympathies. I worked out there for five fucking years, commuting from North County just to make it worse, but out of respect to you will withhold my opinion of the place. As you said, it’s not for the weak!

  91. 91.

    planetpundit

    Betty: I once came a cross a small lake in Minnesota coverd with migrating pelicans; ove 200 of them what an amazing sight!

  92. 92.

    Mnemosyne

    @? Martin:

    We get June Gloom in the San Fernando Valley that usually burns off by lunchtime.

    I have not lived in this area long enough to know if that’s unusual.

  93. 93.

    J R in WV

    @Brachiator:

    Having looked at the map of the eclipse with some interest, in order to plan a short trip to attempt to see this wonder of the ages with my own eyes, it doesn’t look to me like it can cut down power production more than a tiny per cent.

    At any given point the whole event is only about 2 hours, and major darkness is only part of that time. Also the track as shown is where totality will occur, and there will be substantial shade outside that path. Note that times shown on this map are Universal Time at Greenwich Mean, and in the Eastern Time zone our time will be UTM-4, in Central time zone, UTM-5, etc.

    There’s a ton of good information out there. And if you want to try to see this, GET EYE PROTECTION or GO BLIND, no other options. I’ve ordered filters for the camera and a pair of binoculars, and two pairs of plastic sun filter glasses, which came with 2 pairs of paper filter glasses sort of like old 3-D glasses only more opaque.

    Welder’s glass will only work at the highest possible density, much darker than common welding shields. BE CAREFUL!!!

    All that said, I’m totally excited, will be staying in a hotel in western KY just north of the path of totality, planning to drive early in the morning south with a picnic lunch to watch. Hoping the weather cooperates. I know of a couple of museums in the area as well. It’s very rural, Amish farmers and such. Out west where clouds are the exception, the hotels near the path of totality are sold out, booked up, and have been for months already.

  94. 94.

    Mnemosyne

    @J R in WV:

    Don’t forget the pinhole camera option — it’s low tech, but it works better than you’d think. Directions easily found online.

  95. 95.

    J R in WV

    @Aleta:

    The ballad of John Henry was about the C&O railroad, specifically near Talcott WV where a long RR tunnel was constructed in the late 1800s. Nothing to do with the C&O canal, though. There’s a statue (not a very good one, I’m afraid) on the mountain above the tunnel beside the highway.

Comments are closed.