Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Consistently wrong since 2002

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

No one could have predicted…

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

When we show up, we win.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

The willow is too close to the house.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

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

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

You are here: Home / John Cole Presents "This Fucking Old House" / 2020 Is Just So Weird

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129Comments

  2. 2.

    Another Scott

    Just wait until you (we) retire.  My dad said he needed to get a part-time job after he retired so that he would have some free time.

    ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  3. 3.

    zhena gogolia

    You’re not the only one. I basically have not left my living room since March 13 but I never have enough time for everything. Zoom meetings alone take up 20 out of 24 hours of every day.

  4. 4.

    Benw

    Don’t be so down on yourself, man. You just accomplished this here blog post, and I just accomplished this comment! We’re basically heroes

  6. 6.

    oldster

    Each morning I wake up with the sun
    –start a’hoppin, never stoppin —
    to find by night, no work has been done.

    At least George and Ira got a fascinatin’ rhythm out of it.
    All we get is more mountains of corruption, mountains of incompetence, and a death-toll that rises every day.

  7. 7.

    Anonymous At Work

    No, but for you, how much of that is the pets, official and unofficial (porch-based)?

  8. 8.

    Ken

    There are days when I have too much time, mostly because I’m no longer using two hours a day commuting.

  9. 9.

    The Moar You Know

    I’m working my ass off. Gone from a 5 day a week, 8 hours a day job with occasional work-related emergencies, plus one or two gigs a week, to a 24/7 job with no outside activities in sight. It fucking sucks. But I am getting a lot done.

    I am just not seeing the point, though.

  11. 11.

    opiejeanne

    I find it difficult to concentrate on anything more difficult than pulling weeds or shoving a seed into a pot. I’ve been trying to finish John Scalzi’s last book in The Last Emperox trilogy since it came out, and I like it but lack all interest in the job of actually reading, and I love to read.
    I keep myself busy snagging morning glory sprouts out of the raised beds, repotting seedlings into larger containers or the raised beds. Almost feels like busy-work.
    In the evenings, we’ve been working our way through the Gardening World Series, the Marvel movies, certain of the Star Wars movies, and dozing off to the mind-numbing froth, because mind numbing is what we need some days.

  12. 12.

    Rand Careaga

    I’ve felt that way since I retired almost three years ago. It’s remarkable, with an extra ten hours a day at my disposal, how little traction I’ve contrived to manage, how little I’ve accomplished.

     

    EDIT: I’ll add that I have got a great deal of reading done. Presently revisiting The Divine Comedy for the first time in half a century.

  17. 17.

    dr. bloor

    Gainful employment for me more or less vanished when the lockdown hit. After I spent the first two or three weeks cleaning out the basement and putting up some Dryloc and paint on the walls/floors, Wine O’Clock started earlier and earlier.  I’m going to be dead within two years of retirement.

  18. 18.

    dr. bloor

    @cynn:

    Those first dates when men have to keep reminding themselves to maintain eye contact rather than letting their gaze wander down and become preoccupied with what’s under the mask are going to be hell.

  19. 19.

    Redshift

    Yeah, there was all that stuff early on when isolation began about “people looking for things to do to keep busy.” WTF? I never had any spare time, and still don’t.

    And the people who say “I’ve binge watched all the things I had saved up”…

    I have managed to cross a few things off my list, but not many.

  20. 20.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I’m in a fog, not helped by the fact that these long days fuck with my internal clock, my sleeping and eating schedule is all out of whack, the heat sucks the life out of me, and my family’s in low key turmoil.

  24. 24.

    Mike in NC

    If you die and go to Hell, it’s exactly like being trapped in a Trump hate rally for eternity.

  25. 25.

    Arclite

    One thing I’ll say about Joe is that he looks great for his age. He also looks, dare I say it, presidential.

  28. 28.

    Roger Moore

    I feel like I am always out of time, always busy, yet never accomplish anything.

    This is a classic symptom of stress.  You’re probably accomplishing a ton, but it feels like nothing because it doesn’t shrink the mountain of work ahead of you.

  30. 30.

    HumboldtBlue

    Would anyone appreciate a write-up on just what it looks like at ground level battling the fire on the Bonhomme Richard?

    I’ve received some amazing photos and have been pressing my brother for details. He worked at 32nd St. station for years and they were first on scene considering they are located a block away. They’ve brough in mutual aid from afar afield and Ventura, the ship is starting to list, the fire has burned through bulkheads and has worked into the superstructure which has necessitated the absurd vision of helicopters dropping water on a ship as if it were a wildfire.

  31. 31.

    West of the Rockies

    @Mike in NC:

    Something about the way he said, “Slow the testing down, please!” makes me super stabby.  It’s all a big joke to him, fodder for a idiotic one-liner.

  32. 32.

    S. Cerevisiae

    Actually the Mayans were right and the world really did end in 2012…(cue Twilight Zone music)

  34. 34.

    Caphilldcne

    I had plenty to do and tasks that I could have done to fill my entire day. In reality I piddled around, barely accomplished anything and am going to bed soon feeling like I’m actually worse off now than when I started my day. Honestly I feel this every day and frankly have had to quit drinking For a bit after 1 too many six pack evenings. So yes, feeling very unfocused just now. I did have a fairly accomplished day yesterday so it’s not all like this. But today sure was.

  38. 38.

    JeanneT

    Last week every day felt like Sunday to me.  It was very weird.  I wonder if this week every day will feel like Monday.  Anyhow, it’s getting hard to keep track of the days.

  40. 40.

    frosty

    @Rand Careaga: I’ve felt that way since I retired almost three years ago. It’s remarkable, with an extra ten hours a day at my disposal, how little traction I’ve contrived to manage, how little I’ve accomplished.

    Whew, it’s not just me. I retired in January with a pretty long list of things I wanted to do (much of it involving decluttering the house and throwing shit away). I spend my days reading this blog, two newspapers, and COVID sites. I think I need to start setting myself some deadlines and at least trying to get something productive done for at least 4 hours a day.

  42. 42.

    seefleur

    FWIW, I’m working remotely – as a public servant I oftentimes forget to turn off my work cell phone, resulting in my taking calls at weird times of the day/night/weekend. Been doing this since April 1 – an appropriate date to start dealing with being “essential”. I wish I could feel like I’m actually being useful, but everything is a blur and I can’t really tell if what I’m doing is making any difference to anyone. On the high side, the dog and the two cats are pretty comfortable with having their minion at their beck and call 24/7… Also, I am really staying caught up on keeping the pet fur levels down, and my allergies have been quite mild as a result.

  44. 44.

    NotMax

    When people ask “What do you do all day?” the standard response has long been “Can’t rightly say but it takes me all day to do it.”

    ;)

  45. 45.

    Emma from FL

    I am working from home while taking care of my 85-year-old father. He’s still mostly compos mentis, but he cannot understand or accept the concept of healthy eating, so I cook three three times a day. In fact, as he keeps getting physically less capable I have to step up to take care of things. It breaks my day into completely uneven blocks of time, and it has sent me into a sort of jittery inability to concentrate for anything longer than 15 minutes at a time. On top of that, I am getting more and more depressed because my post-retirement plans have been fucked to hell and gone by this brave new world.

  46. 46.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @S. Cerevisiae:

    Actually the Mayans were right and the world really did end in 2012…(cue Twilight Zone music)

    The Mayans were off by eight years, but in the context of millennia, if not eons, that’s scarcely a rounding error.

  48. 48.

    HumboldtBlue

    @opiejeanne:

    I find it difficult to concentrate

    I had a conversation with my mom in my head while washing dishes and this was my chief complaint, my concentration has just turned to shit.

  49. 49.

    dmsilev

    So, remember last week’s catastrofuck from the Trump Administration, where they decided to either force a whole bunch of international college students to leave the country or force the schools into an in-person opening that is in no way safe? Well, as I’m sure you can guess, the lawsuits have flowed fast and furious. Here on the left coast, a bunch of schools (including my employer) filed a suit in Federal Court in Oregon, and because I’m a tad bored I read through the whole thing.  I was highly amused to note that, in support of the argument that ICE’s order was capricious and meant to coerce schools into opening rather than being a well-considered policy, the lawsuit actually quotes a couple of Trump’s tweets:

    Additionally, the President has repeatedly demanded that schools reopen in the Fall and has often accompanied such demands with threats to cut off federal funding. See, e.g., Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter (July 10, 2020, 7:41 AM) (. . . Schools must be open in the Fall. If not open, why would the Federal Government give Funding? It won’t!!!”); Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), Twitter (July 6, 2020, 2:40 PM) (“SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!”).

    (I am, perhaps, overly easily amused)

  51. 51.

    cope

    I retired in May of 2017 and thought I had the “nothing pressing to do” thing down.  It was good.  Then, this.  I sleep 8 to 9 hours each night, soundly, and feel worn out all day.  Completing the most minor task feels like summiting K2 without supplemental oxygen.  Lots of cooking and eating but, surprisingly, down 5 pounds.  I’m uncertain when/if it will ever get better.  I keep meaning to do so many things that I have the time and means to do and yet, I don’t do them.  Strange times indeed.

  52. 52.

    opiejeanne

    @James E Powell: Eating has become an issue.

    We rarely do take-out because who knows how careful other people are, so that means we cook*.

    I cook.

    I have had to shift gears completely and start planning out meals as many as 10 days in advance because we no longer have the luxury of running to the store if I run out of a thing. I try to keep ahead of running out of essentials by always having one spare of a thing we use all the time as backup, in case I need that peanut butter or vegetable oil and run out in the midst of making something. And it’s tiring to look at the list of stuff in the freezer and then imagine what I can do with the things that are not so straight-forward, like that whole chicken winking at me and telling me she needs to be thawed out now if we want to have her for supper tomorrow.

    *He is a pretty great sous chef, chops those onions and grates that cheese really well so I can get on with what I’m doing.

  53. 53.

    Kay

    Jamie Dupree
    @jamiedupree
    · 2h
    Q: Do you acknowledge there is community spread right now with the Coronavirus?
    A: “Biden and Obama stopped their testing; they just stopped it. You probably know that. I’m sure you don’t want to report it.”

    I’m sort of mildly curious where this lie was going when he lost interest in it and went on to the next lie. I always want them to slow down – “let’s circle back to that first crazy utterance. They ‘stopped the testing”. Then what happened?

  55. 55.

    A Ghost to Most

    Meh. I’m currently building a 40′ privacy fence in hot, sunny weather, to replace the hedge wiped out by the pipeline dig. Then a bunch of split rail fence to put back in. Summer’s awasting.

  57. 57.

    Gvg

    @seefleur: yes, I think my shy cat likes having me home. We went back to work about 3 weeks ago and all at once the 15 year old cat was always getting on the counters or table….acting out I think. Then I caught a cold and the new rules sent me back to home work till it’s cleared and she is behaving again. Unfortunately I will be going back soon, so I expect rebellion.

    Floridas cases really going up. I think my upper management is being foolish.Turned out most of us could work quite well from home.

  59. 59.

    opiejeanne

    @West of the Rockies: I think that’s the version we have. A neighbor gave it to us when I was a kid and I was fascinated by the engravings, especially the ones of the different levels of hell. I think that’s the only part I read all of, bits of the rest.

  60. 60.

    mali muso

    @dmsilev: yeah that nonsense has consumed my working life as I have to manage the immigration implications for our students. Waiting for Wednesday when supposedly we’ll find out if an injunction is in the cards. This timeline truly is the stupidest one.

  61. 61.

    Sab

    @cope: I have been home since March, but I only finished one of the three family tax returns today. They’re due Wednesday. The other two still to be done. I could do them in a couple of hours, and instead it has taken 4 months.

  62. 62.

    seefleur

    @Gvg:  I’ve been very fortunate in that Maine is onboard with remote working – the fact that I am not driving 67 miles round trip/day is helping to reduce the state’s carbon footprint bigly.  And having my critters behaving less like my kids when they were about 9 years old (and even then they were more mature than that asshole in the whitehouse – deliberately  not capitalized) has really been a bonus. Take care of your cold, and enjoy the time it’s giving you with your critter!

  64. 64.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kay: somebody on twitter a couple weeks ago posted Fran Liebowitz’s observation from I don’t know how many years ago: “You don’t know anyone as dumb as Donald Trump. You just don’t.” It’s been bouncing around my brain box ever since.

  66. 66.

    Mai naem mobile

    I kind of get my shit together at work and then slide behind. I don’t know how I am going to last like this for another year and a half. There was a blurb about an increased likelihood of the San Andreas fault cracking up in the next year. Oh, yes one more thing to look forward in this shitshow of a year. Somebody mentioned that its ~ 110 days to election day and to me mentally that sounded closer than saying November. Off topic, there is a shortage of change in stores around here – coins change. Apparently we can’t even produce money or transport money. WTF? That’s failed state shit. You would think there would be more change available because of people using plastic because of COVID19.

  69. 69.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Sab: we got an extension for my mom’s, and there are a couple of documents we need that between Covid and general stupidity I can’t get hold of, but there are still a couple of t’s to be crossed an i’s to be dotted that I tell myself I’m going to take care of every day, for the last month. Missed another day today.

  71. 71.

    Brachiator

    I was working at home before the pandemic and have been very busy this past week after a slow spell. I used to go out to the movies on Sunday as a treat, but that is gone now.

    I watch a lot of short videos, but find oddly that I cannot concentrate on long movies or read books. Just can’t do it.

    Not having to commute, I guess I sleep longer and sometimes have very vivid dreams, but I don’t always feel refreshed and have bouts of insomnia.

    I try to walk to the supermarket sometimes since it is close by and there are a few eateries I visit for takeout. And a couple of places with outdoor seating. I never go to these last places when they are crowded and love being able to sit outside when there is a breeze and eat.

    Amazon is my friend, even for ordering some grocery items.

    But yeah, it feels strange sometimes. It’s not just “oh, this is terrible,” but having a feeling that so much is being thrown at us. And it is odd to know that the entire world is having to deal with this.

  74. 74.

    Rand Careaga

    @Steeplejack: I’m reading John Ciardi’s translation in a one-volume edition (although I still have my three paperbacks from the sixties), with its extremely informative notes for each canto. I only got through Inferno back in the day, but I’m aiming for the stairway to heaven this time.

  82. 82.

    cope

    @Sab: Well, I got my taxes done and filed in April.  However, I noticed I neglected to credit myself for about $400 in withholding.  I started filling out an amended form so as to get the money credited to next year and then…shiny object or squirrel or something and I never finished.  $400 for a few minutes work and I can’t get motivated to finish it.  Sad.

  83. 83.

    Jay Noble

    @Mai naem mobile: There’s a big bunch of hoopla over places not accepting cash and the coin shortage conspiracy – the mark of the beast doncha know.

    The coin shortage is truly easy to explain – even with much lower numbers of people paying in cash, the coins usuall y go in one direction, store to customer. $18.39 bill paid for with a twenty. That $0.61 isn’t going back in the register very soon.

  85. 85.

    HumboldtBlue

    @The Moar You Know:

    I don’t know what’s on that fucking boat but tell your brother to be careful because it’s not anything compatible with life.

    He’s retired two years now I believe, so he’s OK. He said he could smell it in Spring Valley.

    It’s an extraordinary scene, however.

  86. 86.

    The Moar You Know

    Rules for sanity:

    I get up the same time I would get up for work – 6AM – every day.  I shower.  I SHAVE.  I get dressed for work.  I make coffee, feed the dog, take him out to poop, and sit down in my work area and get to work.  Only thing missing is the commute.  I don’t need that to stay sane, kind of the opposite.

    It really helps that our dog is super OCD.

    Helps to keep me from drifting off into a cloud of my own bullshit.  It would be really easy to do.

  89. 89.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Kay: I don’t even know what Trump is trying to say here. And I can usually figure something out, even if it is lying nonsense.

  91. 91.

    Tenar Arha

    @opiejeanne: I was talking about my late father, & how he never used up or even threw anything that he liked to eat away unless he had bought a new one. He was in grammar school during the midst of The Great Depression. Making it worse, my mother was born in the middle of the Depression, & was the firstborn, thus, as often is the case, both extremely responsible with explicitly detailed memories of eating her mother’s bad cooking, to set a good example to her younger siblings.

    My parents didn’t waste food like it was religion. And though they didn’t intend to pass on their trauma, I’ve found myself doing things that I saw them do & thought I’d broken myself of long ago because when you live alone & you want fresh food, you have to get used to throwing out stuff occasionally.

    I’ve been shaving off the mould on cheese or bread, scraping the burnt bits off toast  or hot dog buns, literally going through the bunch of potatoes, carrots, or flat parsley etc plucking out the last fresh looking bits/trimming the bad bits.

    Someone pointed out to me that that’s a normal trauma response. That is, to either revert to foodways from childhood &/or devise coping strategies like keeping your pantry doubly stocked up.

  92. 92.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @MisterForkbeard: he had probably just seen a tweet or a video that mocked him for calling for slowing the testing down, so he said Obama stopped testing all together.

    Didn’t one of the Project Lincoln ads use that video?

  93. 93.

    Miss Bianca

    Well, my taxes are done, but all that do-re-mi I was saving to pay them have gone towards vet bills taking care of my new horse, the acquisition of which seemed like *such* a great idea back in the beginning of March…sigh. So, they’re filed but I’ll have to pay a penalty for late payment…sigh again.

    Still, I am not sure I would have it any other way, as said horse is helping my mental health as well as my physical health right now. I am having to get up and ride her 5-6 mornings a week now that she is out of training (pro tip: she is NOT the kind of horse you can leave in the pasture for days or weeks at a time and then just jump on!). Just the self-imposed discipline of getting out and DOING IT, whether I feel like it or not, has given a kind of rhythm to my days that would be sorely lacking otherwise, and helps me feel a tad more productive the rest of the day.

  95. 95.

    opiejeanne

    @HumboldtBlue: My inability to concentrate is probably due to stress, and probably depression banging on my front door.

    I had to visit the doctor three weeks ago because I messed up my left thumb pretty badly, and the nurse ran through a bunch of questions about my mental state. I was fine, I was fine… If they asked me the same questions today I would answer quite a bit differently.

    I spend most of my days outside now, even when it’s raining because this is Western Washington, bending over seedlings, sifting the potting soil and stirring in perlite and small amounts of seedling fertilizer, willing the tiny seeds to sprout, waging war on slugs, and tying up cucumbers, tomatoes, and pumpkins. The minutia is a good distraction from the absolute horror, and there is a certain small amount of happiness in spending hours picking blueberries, the sum total of which can be purchased at the store for about $12. On the other hand, the salad we made with the radishes and small cukes, sugar snap peas, and lettuce, that salad was divine. We might be able to replicate it tomorrow, maybe.

  97. 97.

    frosty

    @cope: I keep meaning to do so many things that I have the time and means to do and yet, I don’t do them. Strange times indeed.

    Yes, this exactly.

  98. 98.

    satby

    When you know no one’s going to come visit, and you can’t really go anywhere you lose a lot of the motivation to get things done. Well, I do anyway. Why do it today when you have endless days stuck at home in your future and you can just read a book instead?

  99. 99.

    Mary G

    @HumboldtBlue: If you don’t feel like writing it up, just send the photos to Adam, WaterGirl or whoever to post and the jackals with knowledge will chime in. We have experts on every subject under the sun pop up here.

  100. 100.

    Kay

    The school funding fight is interesting and coming to a head, because they all know in Congress they have to do it, but the President is a nutjob and his employees are incompetent:

    In recent weeks, a divide has emerged within Trump’s orbit, with advisers both inside and outside the White House advocating for a robust plan to help campuses open this fall. They see it as vital to kick-starting the economy and also popular, potentially delivering a badly needed political win.
    Some of Trump’s advisers have urged the president to make a bold push to reopen schools and advocate for a massive amount of money — even potentially over the objections of some congressional Republicans, according to three campaign and White House officials not authorized to speak publicly about internal deliberations.
    But the White House has yet to show the ability to quickly mount a massive and effective mobilization during the pandemic. Congress is already working on legislation, hoping to pass the package by the end of July.
    Instead, Trump is bogged down in cultural issues, telling advisers that he can paint the Democrats as obstructions, though Democrats have already approved their school funding bill in the House while Republicans in the Senate consider next steps. The president has mused about threatening the funding of schools he believes promote a left-wing agenda and, connecting it to other flanks in the culture wars, particularly his defense of American monuments, the officials said.

    I’m pleased crazyface thinks the best approach is to attack schools and talk about statues.

  101. 101.

    opiejeanne

    @NotMax: Yeah, the one I got my son has become his household’s favorite toy for stuff like that, but that chicken is going to get cut into 8 pieces, possibly marinated overnight, before I brown the pieces and bake them in the oven. I’m not sure how the instant pot would help me do all of that. The chicken is in the fridge now, just thawing slowly, so something else will be on the dinner plates tomorrow.

  102. 102.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @NotMax:

    One of the great pleasures of Instant Potting is not needing to thaw out meat before plopping it into the pot.

    You just sold me. I’ve had to make a lot of trips to the grocery store because I forgot to take meat out of the freezer. Even before the covid fog crept into my brain, I’ve never been good at planning meals

  103. 103.

    James E Powell

    @Comrade Scrutinizer:

    I was just going to mention that I had not seen “Obamagate!!! Get ready for it libtards!” in my twitter timeline in a while.

    Is there going to be something new?

  106. 106.

    Origuy

    @prostratedragon:  “As Virgil guided Dante, so Dante will guide someone.”

    That was the theme of Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle’s Inferno. A suicidal science-fiction writer wakes up in the Vestibule of Hell, the domain of the Uncommitted. He meets a guide named Benny, who takes him down through the circles of Hell.

  108. 108.

    Aleta

    Same here and it’s making me crazy, surreal and sad.  I guess it’s the news, too much news,  so much of it bad and all the time.

    Also I’m afraid of the near future when I can’t do anything to help my dog.  He’s been happy and enthusiastic and healthy until now, but today I believe his head is in pain where his cancer is.   With older cats I had a set of things I used to decide if they were enjoying their life.   With him he’s  still enjoying everything he always has with great happiness, and is so loving, but I don’t know how to handle his pain, which is unbearable to think of.  He’s too good to suffer.  Ever since he came here six years ago I’ve prepared myself but I don’t know how I can handle him being in pain.  Feels like I can’t do this.

  109. 109.

    Mai naem mobile

    @Jay Noble: I didn’t know there is a conspiracy about change.  I just figured Mnuchin was too busy committing corruption to actually do things the Sec of Treasury is supposed to be doing. Also too, OT –  there is a conspiracy of Fauci being married to Ghislaine Maxwell’s sister(spoiler alert – not true.)  Twitter is absolutely toxic right now. There’s definitely more bots.

  110. 110.

    Sab

    @satby: Gave half of your soap to my granddaughters out front in the yard, and my husband was phucking furious that I came within 6 feet of them. Yelled at me for half an hour after we got inside.

    Oh well.

    They loved the soap. The oldest likes soap that smells edible, so that is what I gave her. The tea soap exactly matches her coloring wise, so that was a plus.

  111. 111.

    Mai naem mobile

    @Danielx: a lot of times when I go on(and i go very little) YouTube I get the Donny approval question and its run by Donny’s campaign. Makes me think the Google’s algo is either not working correctly or they’re intentionally wasting Donny’s money.

  112. 112.

    Steeplejack

    @SiubhanDuinne, @Rand Careaga:

    Thanks. Didn’t read the rest of the comments before I had to bustle off to my car-service job.

    I still kick myself because I can’t remember the version of Dante I browsed through about 10 years ago at Barnes & Noble. I liked the bits I read, and it had an excellent introduction by someone who made the case that because almost everything in Italian rhymes it’s a mug’s game to try to replicate Dante’s terza rima. Other good points as well, but that one stuck out.

    I think I can sort of remember the cover, but when I look on the Google I don’t see anything that strikes a chord.

  114. 114.

    Kattails

    Some days incredibly productive, others hopelessly stupefied. I had a ton of pent-up need to get to my own stuff for maybe 4 or 5 years. Spent the first month in lockdown doing nothing useful. However, it seems the once-and-done projects are good motivators.

    Lately I’ve pulled two shelves in the studio, painted them and set up in an unused closet to de-clutter, dragged in one of those wire shelf things to hold the boxes of stuff.  Gone through center hall inset shelves, pulled everything off, painted the whole thing, put everything back or donated– 3 boxes of books. I paint, cook, garden, and fantasize about crafts so large books. Garden is in better shape, an old  flower bed cleaned up and expanded, veggie beds coming along, peas any minute now with purple sugar snaps (Sugar Magnolia), beans have blossoms, green tomatoes, dahlias 2′ high, swiss chard for yummy pies.

    Rearranged taboret and painting studio shelves the other day, took inventory of everything and ordered some supplies. Have 2 small oils done, another larger one needs maybe a day, two more started. Need to get the flooring down. The ground floor is still subfloor.  Several years ago (may have mentioned this) I had to have a couple of large oaks and a black birch cut down. Had them sawn into random-width flooring which has been piled into one room for freaking ever. I want this DONE baby, and seeing the kitchen project the other day re-lit that fuse. There’s probably enough wood for three rooms. Knees are gonna love it.

    Two cords of firewood just landed in the driveway with two more coming. Wanted to get that in before the federal unemployment ran out…

  116. 116.

    dww44

    @Mai naem mobile: actually I read about this sometime ago. It seems that the shortages are real because of the lack of customers in retail spaces. Coins are just not moving through the economy at their pre pandemic  pace.
    I encountered this today at  Home Depot. Was able to pay with exact change as their sign requested of those paying with cash.

  117. 117.

    Steeplejack

    @Kay:

    Trump said, “Biden and Obama stopped their testing; they just stopped it.” I took it to mean that (Trump claims) they stopped testing on themselves (because coronavirus is a hoax, or whatever). But it’s always dangerous to get into exegesis of anything Trump says.

  120. 120.

    Kattails

    Not to mention the time available to wander around Twitter, where you can find biker-type guys who voted for Trump now making two minute videos like this, giving Donald the verbal and literal middle finger. Kind of fascinating to see; except of course he voted for Trump because he couldn’t stand Hillary because reasons. I’ve face-palmed so much in the last few years that if I were a guy I would not have to shave.

  123. 123.

    CarolDuhart2

    @Mai naem mobile: I just think its a side effect of all of those unused vending machines and slower than usual traffic at the 711s since March.  The machines are there, but once they are emptied of both product and money, the coins aren’t circulating as much.  And in real life, even the quickie marts aren’t doing as much business-and those are the places where you empty your pockets to buy things that are too cheap to use debit cards for.

    I’m writing a book now about covid-and hopefully I will get collaborators to add things I can’t add-plus be a backup just in case.

  126. 126.

    Auntie Big Mouth

    It’s a great end to the trilogy but took me forever to get through it for the same reasons. I just have lost my ability to sit and read for long periods the way I used to before COVID. I will go through little spurts of momentum but they are generally short lived. @opiejeanne:

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