Whoa, my butter lamb killed the blog! Sorry about that!
The moon is so bright this morning! A neighbor’s barking dog woke me up a little while ago, and the moonlight made me think it was almost dawn…until I saw the clock. Shut up, dog!
So, it’s Easter and April Fool’s Day. That kind of sneaked up on me. Got any pranks planned? I think I’ll just be a victim this year.
Open thread!
John Revolta
That’s not really the moon! Where are the stars??!!?!?! Nice try LIB!1!!!!1!
P.S. First
Major Major Major Major
Samwise had quite the afternoon today. I sorta did the same thing, went to the park and read for a while. I finished the beta draft of my novel this morning, so the rest of the day was for resting.
I was reading Borges and found a fun quote. In describing a man who is wrong about something, but very emphatic about his incorrect opinion, Borges wrote, “his information was deficitient, or rather, excessive.”
NotMax
Working my way through the chilly Icelandic series Trapped on Amazon Prime. Slow to build but once it gets up to speed would rank it right up there with the better of the noirish British police dramas. One thing for sure, they’ve got the ‘end each episode on a cliffhanger’ thing down pat.
trailer
NotMax
@Major Major Major Major
Confoozled. Wasn’t it only the other day you mentioned you didn’t like Literature with a capital L?
John Revolta
@Major Major Major Major: Hey M4, how do you link your nym to your website?
sukabi
@John Revolta: put your web address in the space for ‘Website’ under your ‘Name’ and ‘Email’ above the comment field.
Major Major Major Major
@John Revolta: the ‘website’ field in your commenter info, between email and the comment input.
@NotMax: it’s the Iowa workshop contemporary literature that I don’t like.
John Revolta
@sukabi: @Major Major Major Major: One Weird Trick!
I’ve been auto-filled down there for so long I forgot that box was even there!
BellyCat
@NotMax:
What other British police dramas are you liking?
The cliffhanger thing should be outlawed in a world enabled by auto-play of the next episode. Insomnia inducing madness, by gum!
Just binge watched the latest season of “Better Call Saul” and wonder how they managed to combine campy innanity with fairly compelling background stories for “Breaking Bad”. Not seamless, but somehow it hooks ya’. The final episode lands it squarely in Greek Tragedy Land. Oooof!
Betty Cracker
@NotMax: Looks intriguing — I am a sucker for Nordic gloom. I like the deductive reasoning of the detective in the trailer: “The body hasn’t been in the water long. The shrimps would have got to it.” :-)
Brad the Impala
That is a killer butter lamb. I hadn’t planned on baking tomorrow, but now I’m thinking of making Russian black bread just so I can serve a butter lamb. I’m pretty sure I have everything but the shallots…
HeartlandLiberal
Had the great pleasure of being at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Indiana Saturday afternoon, to watch the women’s NIT final. The Indiana women’s Hoosiers won by an eight point margin. It was an exciting game, which the Hoosiers led by double digits, only to see that whittled away to a one point deficit with ten minutes remaining. But they came back and played strong and steady and won. Record crowd for women’s basketball at Assembly Hall, 13,007. And the sixth largest women’s NIT crowd, I think the stat was.
While the intro video was played before introducing the Indiana players, the lights went out so it was dark, and the crowd responded to earlier encouragement to use their flashlight apps on their cell phones to light up the dark hall. I was incredibly effective.
The Indiana fans, and the Assembly Hall venue, are famed in basketball lore as one of the hardest home courts for a visiting team to play at, and it was fascinating to watch the faces of the Virginia Tech team before the game started as all the lights and sounds and the crowd began to take effect. It is really an intimidating home court advantage.
Altogether one of the most satisfying basketball games and experiences I have seen in nearly 20 years of attending Hoosier basketball games.
After the game, while the setup in center court was going on for trophy presentations to both teams, Fred Glass, the Athletics director, was wandering around with his grand daughter on his shoulder or sitting on his shoulders behind his head. It was an incredibly effective thing to do at the end of season for women’s basketball. What was also wonderful was how many young children, boys and girls, were in the audience. The community support and the massive turnout to cheer the Hoosiers on was just amazing.
BellyCat
While killing time, I read the ‘Comment Instructions’ below the comment box. Chuckled over this part:
Cursing is allowed, being nasty can be almost obligatory…
Betty Cracker
@HeartlandLiberal: Glad they had such a great turnout. Women’s sports don’t get the support they deserve.
aj
All hail the Butter Lamb!
Work has dried up to nothing, and I’m in a lot of fear (and embarrassment) about not meeting my bills.
Depression stinks. Medicating with Warcraft and brownies. Do not recommend =/
If you have a salary, no matter how bad your job is, enjoy that the income comes regularly.
marilynD OR
@aj: Hang in there!! I will be rooting for you. If my daughter had been born a boy, her nickname/initials would have been AJ!!…Hugs from an old lady!
Sab
I love your butter lambs. I just dont understand how exactly you eat ithem.
Decades ago I spent a student year in England. They had (albeit rare) white chocolate baby jesuses.
We used to debate whether it was better to bite his head off first, or just nibble on his feet and work upwards.
Never occurred to us not to eat him at all .
Serious deficit in my religikus traini g. Also serious deficit in my own morals.
Viva BrisVegas
CNN reports that Ted Nugent has apologized to the MSD students for calling them “liars” and “soulless”.
He says, “I overstepped the mark and on reflection what I said was unfair and untrue. I apologize unreservedly for causing hurt to these fine kids”.
He added, “I only wish that we get together on the gun issue and work out the best way forward for all our generations”.
Finally he said, “Is it 12 o’clock yet?”.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Viva BrisVegas: Did he cause pain to his income stream? Have a State Fair appearance cancelled or something? Why else apologize?
Good morning, BJ. Up early for sunrise service. The Mrs loves those things. Hope the Bunny was good to you. Don’t eat too many jelly beans! And if you pick out the black ones, I’ll take them. I’m weird that way.
(I’m weird in many ways, but loving black jelly beans is my Easter quirk)
Aleta
I was sleeping peacefully for the first time in months, it seemed like, but my dog just barked in the next room for the last 40 min straight. He never gets up in the night that way. I think he’s getting a little dementia. Sometimes he barks a bit when he’s hungry, so I thought he’d wandered out but would get tired on his own. Instead he just got stuck on bark.
Maybe it’s the moon.
Really, really don’t want him to get older. It’s only been 4 years, and he’s still developing and learning things. In the last year, my partner’s taught him to communicate on his own initiative, to tell us what he wanted. I had a feeling it would backfire : ) aka “succeed.”
He’s 11 or so now. He has friends all over the neighborhood. There’s an older European couple who never talked with us before, but he made friends with them, and now they knock at our door with pie or cake twice a month. He rewards them with a huge greeting.
Aleta
@Viva BrisVegas: Yesterday Bayer dropped the LI show. Friday an ‘opinion contributor’ at the Hill (who ‘does not represent them’) wrote
“we’ve entered some dangerous territory here, if boycotts like this one succeed,” with an argument that blamed David H for everything. With the old ‘he chose to enter the arena so we have no choice but to tear him to pieces’ shtick.
Cermet
@aj: Can’t say anything useful but do hope things get better.
Viva BrisVegas
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
I was trying for a suitable post for the Day.
I thought the mention of 12 o’clock would be the giveaway.
Cermet
@aj: Can’t say anything useful but do hope things get better. @Major Major Major Major: Hope that needs to be your last and you don’t end up with finishing via a series of revisions until an omega! OK, bad humor.
satby
@Aleta: you could still have several years with him. My herd is mostly older, the youngest is 7. I’ve been prepping for my oldest Labrador to go into the final decline for months now, just based on her extreme age and chronic health issues, but she’s like the energizer bunny. And it occurred to me this week that my dear oldest boy, Hershey, is noticeably slowing down this year. For the first time I had to consider he might exit before she does. And it was a bit of a shock.
low-tech cyclist
Wouldn’t actually do this, but the wicked thought running through my mind goes like this:
Me: “The Lord is risen!”
Barely awake person: “Wha…?”
Me: “April fool!”
There needs to be a Monty Python-style sketch where this happens outside the empty tomb, maybe with Mary Magdalene and one of the disciples.
NotMax
@BellyCat
The (pardon the expression) usual suspects – Happy Valley, Broadchurch, Whitechapel, etc.
@Ceci n est pas mon nym
You (and I) cannot be the only ones. Black is the only color of jelly beans one can find sold separately by the bagful in the Easter candy aisle.
JeanneT
@satby: Dogs are like people – some age so quickly, some hit a level and seem to become ageless. I’ve been fretting over my decision to treat my now in-remission cancer-patient dog – average lifespan for his breed is 12-14 years, and he’ll be 11 this June. Am I putting him through all that stress and treatment for just an additional year? Then yesterday I saw a post about another lowchen who was celebrating his 17th birthday, and doing a nice job at keeping up with the rest of pack on a family walk! That reminded me that looking at the average is not all that useful unless you see the rest of the data. Everyone always says my boy looks and acts much younger than he is, so maybe he’ll be the ageless type, now that we’ve got him through one crisis….
bystander
The Firesign Theater page on Facebook has had a lot of April Fool’s/Easter jokes. The comments are irreverent, to say the least, so everytime I think I’ll join in, I realize I can’t associate my name with what some people I know would consider blasphemous. But I’m thinking blasphemy and laughing to myself.
Since Bothsidesdoit, I’m waiting to hear the equivalent Democratic version of shaming and trying to humiliate young repubs. Surely there’s a left wing Ted Nugent whose every word we all must hear and discuss. Gloria Steinem?
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Viva BrisVegas: I figured the last line was a joke but thought the rest of it was plausible. So you can take your April Fool bow.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@Aleta: LI has shown us who she is repeatedly. The difference is that this time people declared they didn’t like it. Why that didn’t happen before is the only real question.
debbie
@Betty Cracker:
The women’s Final Four is in Columbus and has been getting great support. There’s more than a little rancor in the family because the cousin who usually organizes Seder bagged it to go to the games. Her sisters were unamused.
debbie
@aj:
I was in your situation for a year and a half, and yes, the anxiety is pervasive. I dealt with it by obsessively reading, though I wish I’d thought of brownies. ;)
Dog Mom
@aj: I am out of work too, and this gig economy sucks. Do your best to find joy and hope. Reach out here. I don’t know where you are located, but I have found some networking groups are helpful. I am not the most social person, but forcing myself to get out there helps. Taking some brownies to share with the group might just get you to the right person with the right job for you. Best of luck to you.
PaulWartenberg
I am starting Camp NaNo this April. No Fooling.
RedDirtGirl
I just ended a 19-month relationship. It was the right thing to do, but it really sucks to hurt someone you care about.
RedDirtGirl
Possible dead thread. May repost later. Hope that doesn’t violate any commenting protocols.
BellyCat
@NotMax: Enjoyed Happy Valley. Deciphering the accents were half the fun.
Will have to check out the other two.
satby
@RedDirtGirl: sorry. That can be tough even if you know it’s right.
satby
@PaulWartenberg: ?
satby
@JeanneT: May he defy the odds and live many more happy years!
satby
@aj: aj, if you’re still around, hang in there. Take a crud job if you have to go keep body and soul together until something better comes along. The lousy times always pass, though sometimes it feels like they never will.
Let us know how you’re doing. You too @Dog Mom:!
ding7777
Amazon should float the idea of a $1.00 a month Trump Tax to Prime users offset any increase that the Trump Admin imposes.
90 million Prime users seeing a monthly Trump Tax would be great “propaganda”
mainmata
@Brad the Impala: You use shallots in Russian black bread? That’s really very surprising.
mainmata
@satby: We have a 20 year old cat that wandered into our house in Jakarta as a kitten a few days before the dictator Suharto was forced to resign. He (the cat that is) went through a dangerous systems-shutting-down episode about five years ago and then with a change of diet bounced back and is now 20 years old and though cranky and sleeping a lot is basically quite healthy. So, some things may depend upon just changing diet and maybe medicines too.
mainmata
@bystander: That was the point of Gingrich’s vocabulary: to drag down the level of political discourse into the gutter where the low information voters and ideologically right-oriented voters could be energized into hatred. This has been the main approach of the GOP for elections for many years. The problem is that Democrats don’t do scorched earth hate politics; that’s the whole point of being a Democrat and the whole point of being GOP is just the opposite.
Raoul
I was looking at some Colorado rockies cams last night, and around midnight there were at least a dozen cars up at Loveland Pass. And it looked like daytime (COdot’s webcams have excellent night rendition, though). But I think people were up enjoying the insane amount of light. Some folks might even ski by moonlight, something I’ve been keen to try.
Earlier this winter Breckenridge had a moonlight hike/dinner/ski event, but I wasn’t in the area at that time — they also skied down one of the easiest trails at Breck, which was probably smart from a safety standpoint … and a hike-up standpoint! Only about 630′ vertical climb.
Alexi
@low-tech cyclist: Romans and Pharisees: Phew, glad we got rid of that troublemaker.
Jesus: April Fools!
Though April Fools isn’t part of the Jewish tradition. I mean, Isaiah wasn’t proclaiming “Make straight a way for the one who comes in the name of dank lulz.”
artem1s
@BellyCat:
I am totally hooked on BCS. I think the writers are doing something pretty amazing. It has to be pretty fun to be in that writing room. And the way they have introduced some of these characters has been so much fun. Mike as parking lot attendant is absolutely the best. And they have brought that beautiful camera work, lighting, and framing over from BB. Jimmy’s loud wardrobe inspiration; Chuck’s episodes; Mike body hunting in the desert with a metal detector; the Cinnabon homage to The Man Who Wasn’t There… They are having more fun than TV usually brings to this kind of project. And it really shows.
I’m on episode 9. Been saving last for today. Those tragic twists are such a guilty pleasure.
Bumper
The kiddos are getting frozen cereal and milk for breakfast with a cup of apple juice (jello). Then baby carrot filled cheetoh bags in their Easter baskets along with chocolate covered brussels sprout “cake pops”. But the biggest joke is that all this is happening tomorrow becausein our house today is still Saturday. (The Seattle meetup was excellent but that and a birthday party pretty much took up the entire day for me. We’ll make the eggs and do other prep today)
No One You Know
@aj: Hang in there. You’re doing the best you can. You’ll get farther with self-compassion than with shame. Think about the good things you’ve done, and how much you’ll enjoy doing them again when your efforts and your luck coincide.
No One You Know
@debbie: I’m in the first year of being out. It’s soul-crushing, or would be if I didn’t have the novel to sustain me. Like someone else upthread, I’m cooing the camp NaNo for April. It at least gives me the illusion of like-minded associates.
Neldob
@Major Major Major Major: I once heard someone described as often wrong but never in doubt.
Neldob
Also, DH is just trying to keep the conversation civilized and on topic which is a good thing all around. That she had to quiet down to the point of silence is just a side benefit and shows she has nothing useful to contribute.
wmd
I conceived of good prank for this year on Thursday but didn’t execute it – logistics were tough.
Prank: announce that my cancer had returned… on Friday announce my death (graphic descriptions of suffering optional). And on April fools day return to life.
BellyCat
@artem1s: In case you check this dead thread, agreed with your comments. Mike is AMAZING. Whaddya think of the final episode of BCS?