Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

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

Ah, the different things are different argument.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

The problem people have with Biden’s age is the color of the VPs skin.

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

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

So many bastards, so little time.

“Joe Biden deserved better than he got from some folks in his own party.”

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself. We’re allowed to grow past that.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Good lord, these people are nuts.

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

There’s always a light at the end of the frog.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

Republicans in disarray!

FFS people, this was a good thing. take the win.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

You are here: Home / Nature & Respite / Respite Open Thread: A Strong & Slow Boring of Hard… Trees

Respite Open Thread: A Strong & Slow Boring of Hard… Trees

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These days, everything feels political!

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231Comments

  5. 5.

    NotMax

    Bravo! Banzai!

    After spending six years in space, a Japanese spacecraft just landed in the desert of southern Australia, bringing a small cache of asteroid rocks to the surface of Earth. It’s only the second time in history that materials from an asteroid have been returned to our planet. Eventually, scientists will open the spacecraft up, uncovering the precious rocks within to learn more about the asteroids that permeate our Solar System. Source

  6. 6.

    HumboldtBlue

    Just read a suggested title for Melania’s reported book.

    FLOTUS: Flesh light of the United States

  7. 7.

    sab

    A phucking red tail hawk nailed a squirrel at our birdfeeder ( bastard!) The squirrel’s adolescent relative saw it all. Now the poor little guy has PTSD and is afraid to come eat except at dusk. I hope he/she makes it through the winter.

    Red tail hawks look really big when they are dining on squirrels in you tiny urban yard.

  13. 13.

    MagdaInBlack

    @sab:  I saw a hawk sail past my 3rd floor balcony last weekend. Pearl the Squirrel, who dines here regularly, was under a chair giving the squirrel alarm call.

  15. 15.

    Goku (Amerikan Baka)

    Awhile back people here suggested Popeye’s as a better alternative to Chick-Fil-A. Did not disappoint! Popeye’s chicken sandwich blows Chick-Fil-A’s out of the water, especially the spicy version

  18. 18.

    jl

    My humble contribution to bird respite.

    A clip of the late great Disco the parakeet, who had a irresistible drive to repeat and experiment with everything he heard. I can’t figure out the extent to which Disco understood what s/he was saying. Disco liked to tease the house canine by saying he was cat, followed by ‘meow meow’ to get a rise out of it. Seems to me that Disco never says complete nonsense, rather, the variations make grammatical sense. I’ve read parakeets have the intelligence of a one year old. Apparently ‘bird brains’ of parrots and corvids are structured very differently than those of mammals, but they manage to have same neural connections as primates, similar links between speech, hearing and higher mental executive functions, and have as many neurons as primates, but much more densely packed.

    Hey, always fair and balanced, I  report, you decide.

    Talk Birdy to Me

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NitT42-4ChM

  21. 21.

    Jeffro

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka): I may make that a goal over winter break – try out all the spicy fried chicken sandwiches in the area, re-test for quality control, go to a ‘final four’, championships, Super (Chicken) Bowl.

    And THEN – say it with me people – go on a diet in the new year!  =)

    *Funny note: there is a ‘Raising Canes’ fried chicken place in town that’s next to a Popeye’s that’s next to a KFC.  (Our family calls it ‘heart attack alley’).  ‘Canes’ drive-through is often so backed up that the traffic spills out onto the main road, while Popeye’s usually has a couple of cars and KFC is just…sad.  So I’ll probably seed Canes at #1 ;)

  25. 25.

    BC in Illinois

    A comment from somewhere on Twitter:

    “I just realized that I’m so old,
         there was a smoking section in my high school.”

    Yup.  (Wheaton High School, Wheaton MD)

  26. 26.

    Nutmeg again

    I love woodpeckers. Max Weber, not so much (once upon a time I did a doctorate in Sociology, entailing years and years of reading social theory.) Pace Dorothy Windsor. I’ve spotted many cardinals, and heard owls, and seen raptors–lovely raptors!–where I live now. But no woodpeckers, so far. I live in hope.

  27. 27.

    Goku (Amerikan Baka)

    @Jeffro:

    Funny you should mention Cane’s. One opened up in my town last year and it was so busy at first police were needed to direct traffic. Now, not so much. I used to like it, but now I think it’s overrated. The Texas Toast is the best part.

    It’s Chick-Fil-A that’s always crazy busy, even with two drive-thru lines. It helps that it’s near an Interstate exit, I guess, but then so is the Popeye’s and it’s not anywhere close to the same volume

  31. 31.

    Benw

    I tried taking a pic of a cardinal in my yard but I had to have my phone cam at full zoom so it’s kinda blurry.

  34. 34.

    Bill Arnold

    Trail camera in Russian Far East caught a male Amur leopard Leo 104M leaving a scent mark by rolling in the snow- and v soon a female Leo 181F coming to ‘read’ the message. Amur leopards r the world’s rarest big cats; less than a 100 of them live in the wild. Video @Leopard_land pic.twitter.com/jnjgTuU0BZ— The Siberian Times (@siberian_times) December 4, 2020

    The cat in the house was interested in this video.

  35. 35.

    MagdaInBlack

    @trollhattan: OMG thats funny. Our teachers lounge was same way. I still maintain the reason I did so poorly in Algebra was because my teachers breath reeked of coffee and cigarettes so I would not ask for help =-)

  36. 36.

    RSA

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka): I have southern friends who swear by Bojangles, claiming that Popeye’s is just a pale substitute. I have no opinion myself.

    If you’re ever in the mid-Atlantic (I’m in Maryland) and you pass by a Royal Farms gas station, stop in the convenience store and try their fried chicken. Surprisingly—given the reputation of gas station food, right?—it’s as good as any fast food place.

  37. 37.

    Ohio Mom

    Goku:

    the Popeye’s around here are in various states of disrepair and that probably scares some people away. Especially the type who are attracted to Chik-Fil-a.

    Ohio Son used to have a standing late Friday afternoon appointment, the route to which took us past a Popeye’s. Stopping there became a routine. Or was that a tradition?

  38. 38.

    Jeffro

    @BC in Illinois: 

    We had a smoker’s court back in our high school in NoVA…my kids couldn’t believe it.

    They asked us if the teachers smoked there too: we told them “no…judging by the smell of it, they just smoked in the teachers’ lounge just off the main hall”. LOL

    (Then again, my kids can’t begin to imagine that airplane seats used to have little ashtrays in the armrests…which on balance is good, I think!)

  40. 40.

    Wapiti

    @sab: when we lived in Mountain View, CA, we had a Sharp-Shinned Hawk crash through the branches to nail a squirrel. They normally prey on birds up to robin-size and I’ve seen a Sharp-Shinned chase a Robin into a tree and out the other side. They make a racket going through.

  41. 41.

    Yutsano

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka):  I will take Popeye’s over Chik-Fil-A every day and twice on Sundays. And no it has nothing to do with their politics. I have tried Chick-Fil-A several times, and it’s just mediocre to me. But Popeye’s…let’s just say one of the highlights of going to the wet side* of Washington is that there are Popeye’s franchises. Give me three spicy wings with mac and green beans and I’m a happy duck.

    *local joke as I live on the very northern edge of an arid area that starts in southern Arizona.

  42. 42.

    RandomMonster

    @sab: In my backyard I’d probably be rooting for the hawk. A**hole squirrels keep digging up planters on the deck.

  45. 45.

    Rob

    @jl: The Disco clip was quite amusing. Especially the Spanish Inquisition part and the “I love you” in Turkish.

  46. 46.

    Jeffro

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka): Yes, Chick-Fil-A is almost always nuts here too but at least you know the line’s going to move.

    (and for the Texas toast thing: Zaxby’s does that too but on a recent visit my son was like, “what is this?”  All those buttered carbs were getting in the way of his 6-tender meal or something, I guess ;)

    Chick-Fil-A with two 10-car lanes is still going to get everyone fed faster than if you’re third in line at Wendy’s.  Wendy’s is the WORST when it comes to their drive through.

    The local bagel chain here has a Chick-Fil-A-ish double-drive through model going since the pandemic, and it appears to be going gangbusters.  Good for them!

  47. 47.

    zhena gogolia

    @Jeffro:

    I don’t remember our having a smoking room in high school (very un-posh inner city high school), but I do vividly remember the little green, blue, and red metal ashtrays on the tables in college.

  49. 49.

    BC in Illinois

    @MagdaInBlack:

    Well, now that you mention the teacher’s lounge . . .

    The WHS smoking court was:

    • for seniors only
    • and only those who had permission from their parents
    • and usable only during lunch hour.

    There were, however, other smoking areas conveniently located on each floor.  Marked “Boys” and “Girls,” as I remember.

  52. 52.

    raven

    @BC in Illinois: Willowbrook in Villa Park after I left in 66. Speaking of Wheaton, IL we watched the Showtime Belushi doc last night. His partners in the West Compass Trio both went to Willowbrook and I knew them pretty well. Unfortunately they are all dead.

  54. 54.

    Gary K

    I learned yellow-bellied sapsucker from my in-law (we have a grandson in common) while searching in Columbus’s Green Lawn Cemetery for the grave of James Thurber. Cemeteries are good birding spots. We did eventually find the grave, rather inconspicuous except for a pile of pennies deposited by visitors.

    Our town (small town northward of Col’s) has a Church’s Fried Chicken, right next to a church.

  56. 56.

    NotMax

    @Jeffro

    Yeah, but do the non-KFC places produce logs?

    :)

    Dunno where the remaining KFC here gets their midget size chicken pieces. May as as well be called Kentucky Fried Squab.

    Locally there’s a chain called Minit Stop. Quality of their fried chicken varies dependent on which one you go to and who is doing the cooking that day, from “gosh, that’s tasty” to “a starving goat wouldn’t eat it.”

  58. 58.

    RSA

    @Jeffro: Excellent. This made me laugh:

    “In order to win the [Republican] Party nomination, you’ve got to appeal to the Trumpian right — but in order to win the general, you can’t lose Fairfax [County] by 36 points,” said Jared Leopold, a strategist for one of three Democrats officially running for governor, state Sen. Jennifer L. McClellan (Richmond).

  60. 60.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Jeffro:

    I think it was three Sundays ago I finally went to the new In-N-Out on Sunday morning about 11:30. Eight cars in line when by noon there would 50.

    It was really meh. I like In-N-Out but it was just meh.

    Speaking of meh takeout, the local pizza joint makes a very good NY style thin crust and it’s my go-to. I tried the meatball sub thinking they should nail it. They used Costco fucking meatball. What a total letdown.

  61. 61.

    RandomMonster

    @sab: Hmm, maybe I’ll try the chickenwire! So far we tried cayenne sprinkled in the soil, which works for awhile until it rains.

  62. 62.

    RSA

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka): And speaking of chicken, if anyone is in Singapore or plans to visit, it would be great to hear a report on whether laboratory-grown chicken is any good.

    Researchers all over the world have been chasing that dream, of “lab-grown” or “cultured” meat, for years. Today, lab-grown meat took one step closer to reality as the Singapore Food Agency approved the sale of cultured chicken meat grown in bioreactors, becoming the first agency in the world to issue such an approval. Their sign-off means that chicken bites from the US company Eat Just will be available to consumers in Singapore.

  64. 64.

    cain

    @MagdaInBlack:

    Had a hawk show up – two different reactions – the humans came out and were taking videos and what not (including me) it was perched on the roof with its wings out and just hanging out. We all ooohhd and aaaahhd and it drank in our acclaim.

    Then the other birds started to harass the hawk, clearly pissed it was around – it had to chase some of the more aggressive birds away but it never took flight just ran at them. It was around spring time so I reckon these birds all had kids on the way and did not appreciate a predator amongst them.

  65. 65.

    VeniceRiley

    I always liked Rally’s/Checkers because of the double drive thru and awesome burger specials.

    Democrats: Je suis SAPSUCKERS.

  70. 70.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Goku (Amerikan Baka):

    Awhile back people here suggested Popeye’s as a better alternative to Chick-Fil-A. Did not disappoint! Popeye’s chicken sandwich blows Chick-Fil-A’s out of the water, especially the spicy version 

    Are you talking about the chicken sandwich everyone was fighting about last year?  (Two years ago?)

    If so, Homophobe-Fil-A’s must suck donkey balls, because Popeyes’ was nothing special.

  71. 71.

    cain

    @Jeffro:

    I get my fried chicken at my local gyro place – they have some good stuff, with a spicy dipping sauce. Good pizza too. Hmmm.. maybe I should order some now…

  74. 74.

    BC in Illinois

    @raven:

    Speaking of Wheaton, IL . . .

    Ah, but I went to WHS, Wheaton, Maryland. In Junior College (in Michigan), I would compare “Wheatons” with a cute, tiny, red-headed girl from Wheaton IL, who was a year behind me.

    I assume that she is now a cute, tiny, 70-year-old woman.

  81. 81.

    MagdaInBlack

    @cain: I’ve seen small bird in a group chase off hawks. Wouldn’t you love to know what they’re yelling at it, in bird cursing =-)

  84. 84.

    cain

    @sab:  lol – going out anywhere that is fast food is gonna be a sodium and carb hit. I just make em at home :D

    I think the last time I had a fast food chicken sandwich I think it was at Wendys.

  86. 86.

    Keith P.

    @HumboldtBlue: I’ve still never had In-n-Out…they opened a few in Houston, but the lines have been unreal.  There was one afternoon where cars were circling the restaurant and spilling out onto the feeder road for I-10.

    But the thing is, there are so many other options in Houston that I won’t wait in a line like that for anything – much less a fast food burger.  I mean, hell, I could just as easily drive to Shake Shack if I wanted to spend my afternoon on it.

  87. 87.

    Miki

    The neighbor’s giant maple has become a home for all kinds of wood peckers which, sadly, speaks to its soon-to-come doom. I love that tree – not only is it beautiful but it shades my house all summer long. But I’ve started to fear it more than love it ‘cus it’s gonna come down on either my house or garage or both, hopefully missing me. The neighbors had several bids to take it down but, for now, it still stands.

    Love this pic I took last summer of a Downy Woodpecker feeding its kids.

  90. 90.

    cain

    @trollhattan:

    Have a gander at stellar’s jay v. bald eagle. (Not my pics)

    We definitely have jays, and I think it was jays and robins that put up a cacophony.

    The last time I heard that much noise – my cat was out having a mexican standoff with a fledgling on our lawn. The fledgling was rock still (as it was taught) and our cat was looking very confused because fledgling’s parents were seriously making noise, dive bombing – enough noise that neighbors were coming out to see what the commotion was.

    Poor cat, got grabbed, and thrown in the house and he was still confused on what he did wrong :D The fledgling was fine, took it to the audobon society to get it checked out – and then put it in a bush in my yard so that the fledgling can continue as before.

  91. 91.

    sab

    Well. One stepson just tested positive for Covid. He has symptoms, so he is pretty sure it isn’t false. Probably caught it from his fiance who works with autistic pre-schoolers. She is also symptomatic.

    Affianced people should probably jump in and get married. If either of them ends up hospitalized they have absolutely no standing with hospitals, doctors, caretakers, or the probate court. They just bought a condo together, but the law does not care.

    Not saying either is likely to die. But they are tied financially. Their legal status should reflect that.

  95. 95.

    mrmoshpotato

    @trollhattan:

    It will always be the case that squirrels outnumber hawks. 

    And the rabbits will rule them all!

    (Cemetery coyotes hopefully find good eating up north)

  96. 96.

    debbie

    @Bill Arnold:

    Did you see the clip on Twitter a day or two ago about a snow leopard chasing prey and tumbling over a cliff and down the mountain , cartwheeling, and still ending up the victor?

  97. 97.

    jl

    @sab: In a country that had competent epidemic control, it should make do difference. Infected and exposed get their covid related disease stuff paid for. Period.

  98. 98.

    Jeffro

    @HumboldtBlue: they should make some of those into rugby shirts

    WinkAndANod Rugby Shirts, ltd.

    All sold out of the J, K, S, T, U, and especially Z varieties within 48 hours, I bet  ;)

  100. 100.

    NotMax

    Damn. Now want to finish up work on that blasted time machine.

    To go back for for a Top’s/Gino’s Sir Loiner.

    :)

    On the chicken front, memory reminds that the chicken sammich (billed as Gold Rush Chicken?) at the Roy Rogers fast food outlets was quite edible.

  101. 101.

    Jeffro

    @RSA: square THAT circle, GOP!  LOLOLOLOL

    “I’d like to offer conservative solutions and governance to Virginians…however…our party seems to be more interested in Molotov cocktail recipes at the moment…”

    Whenever you’re ready to give up gerrymandering, Republicans.

    Whenever you’re ready to rediscover the joys of actual policy making instead of shit-stirring, Republicans

  103. 103.

    Obvious Russian Troll

    @BC in Illinois: We had a new principal when I was a junior who got rid of our smoking area. He was a tough, no-nonsense kind of guy, and of fucking course he got run off a few years later for ignoring the fact that his chemistry teacher was making passes at students.

    Last I heard he was principal in a school in Colorado, but this was many years ago.

  104. 104.

    Jeffro

    @HumboldtBlue: If they’re making good pizza, they don’t have time to make their own meatballs ;)

    (lame excuse, I know!)

    On the burger front, I don’t know how people really differentiate much between an In-And-Out, Five Guys, etc.  I mean, there are different varieties of awful in the McDonalds/BK/etc chains but if it’s a fresh-cooked burger chain, what are we really talking about here?

    (ducks)

  105. 105.

    sab

    I made home made pizza yesterday. Joy of Cooking dough recipe. Yeast with one rising. Pizza sauce from a can (it came highly seasoned. My husband thinks he doesn’t like basil but he loves every iteration of basil in a can.) Sausage everywhere. Ditto onions (pan fried ahead)  and green peppers. Pepperonis on his side, black olives on mine.

    It was really good.

  106. 106.

    mrmoshpotato

    @raven:

    the HOT chicken sammy. JFC it was blazing. 

    I hope so!  Because the sammich I got after they brought it back was MEH.

  107. 107.

    John Revolta

    @mrmoshpotato: Nein!

    So, I’m confoozed. What was the legal smoking age in all these places where you could smoke in high school? If it was 18 like in my state, then how many 18 year old high schoolers were there?

  110. 110.

    Dan B

    @BC in Illinois: Chicago Gay Liberation had a speakers bureau.  I led a group of 6, 5 guys one woman to Wheaton College, the “Harvard of Evangelical colleges.  We did our life stories and opened for questions.  Silence.  The instructor aske some questions then announced we should leave before the Wheaton police arrived.  He thanked the “Six fine young men.”  At that point the young woman, who had been silent, rose up and screamed that she was a woman.  The students seemed to shrink into the back wall.  Memorable – as was driving past the blindingly lit national headquarters of the John Birch Society.

  111. 111.

    Quiltingfool

    @BC in Illinois: My high school, too — Oak Park HS, Kansas City, Mo.

    My students were amazed when I told them high school kids could smoke at school.  I told them when I was a kid it seemed like EVERY adult smoked.  That really didn’t faze them, though…in my rural Mo neck of the woods, many adults smoke (but fewer than in the past).

  112. 112.

    sab

    @sab: If you love somebody enough to tie your life to theirs then you should probably get yourselves made next of kin.

  113. 113.

    Jeffro

    @mrmoshpotato: Really?

    We joke about it (not having been there, but having looked at the menu):

    • Chicken fingers?  We’ve got ’em!
    • Chicken sandwich?  We put chicken fingers on a bun!
    • Chicken salad?  We put chicken fingers on lettuce!
    • Steak and baked potato?  We’ll compress chicken fingers into a steak-looking thingy, and do the same with some fries until they look like a potato!
    • Shrimp scampi?  We’ll…

    (you get the picture)

  116. 116.

    TomatoQueen

    @sab: If they’re in the hospital at the same time, the chaplain can officiate. Now is not the time for long engagements.

  117. 117.

    frosty

    AL, where do you find all these interesting tweets? This was great!

    Also, how do you find the time? Perhaps you don’t spend all day reading every post and comment in B-J. It’s enjoyable, but it tends to eat up the day.

  120. 120.

    Jeffro

    @John Revolta: I think it was 16 at the time here in Virginia (not hard to understand, given VA’s historical legacy with tobacco)

    I remember cigarettes being less than $2/pack in college

  121. 121.

    Quiltingfool

    @MagdaInBlack: Hey!  I’m a ‘76 graduate too!  But my class had 610, big school.  Say, did all your graduation “swag” reflect the Bicentennial?  Everything was red, white and blue, and our mortarboard tassel had a tiny metal Liberty Bell attached.  Good times…lol!

  123. 123.

    Delk

    There’s a Popeye’s at the end of the brown line L. It’s next to a blood bank. People actually  sell their blood for Popeye’s.

  124. 124.

    sab

    @sab: Medical personnel cannot even contact their partner because they have no legal status. HIPA  doesn’t care if you are in love and live together.

  128. 128.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Quiltingfool: Oh god yes. Even the theme of the damn prom (which I did not attend yuk proms)

    Eta : Theme : “A Night at The White House” or some lame bs.

  131. 131.

    NotMax

    @Jeffro

    Much grousing across the quad when the cigarette machines on campus at college raised the price to 60 cents.

    (Also much searching for an extra dime.)

  133. 133.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Jeffro:

    • Chicken sandwich?  We put chicken fingers on a bun!

    LOL!  Can confirm!

    Their sauce is good (as debbie said) but their chicken alone just tastes bland to me.

  138. 138.

    Ken

    @RSA: I understand you can now get cultured-meat kits where you use a scraping of your own cheek cells.  Cannibalism, technically, but kind of a grey area.

  140. 140.

    Aleta

    @frosty: I used to get the sides of red beans and mashed potatoes (made there) and biscuits and gravy at a Popeyes on Rt 2 in Newport on the way to go skiing.   It was real food.

  141. 141.

    Obvious Russian Troll

    @John Revolta: I think it was 16 in Michigan in the early eighties.

    I honestly don’t know if they did anything to check age; I’m not sure they did. I don’t remember it from the few times I went in there.

    Which of course might have been part of the reason it got shut down.

  142. 142.

    Amir Khalid

    I find myself getting tearful  when I least expect it. Anything that remind me of happiness reminds me of Bianca.

  143. 143.

    BC in Illinois

    @Quiltingfool:

     I told them when I was a kid it seemed like EVERY adult smoked.

    Yup. My doctor, my pastor, my parents.

    I remember my father asking the pastor, if — with all the new studies showing the harmful effects of smoking — it would be their christian duty not to smoke. He responded, “Well, if, so, we’re both in trouble, Joe.”

    They both had cigarettes in their hand. In church. It was a different time.

  145. 145.

    MagdaInBlack

    @John Revolta:  I have no idea what it was in Illinois in the mid 70’s, but whatever it was, it was not enforced

    We also used to drive around all night drinking beer.  Times were very different. And it was wide open farm country, very little traffic.

  146. 146.

    raven

    @Amir Khalid:  “The time will come when [her] memory will bring a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes.”

    ― Joe Biden, Promise Me, Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose

  151. 151.

    JMG

    Several years ago, a hawk came down and killed a rabbit in our backyard. Then it could barely take off and get to the trees with its prey. Pretty vivid experience. Then, the next March in the middle of a windstorm, a hawk came and sat on the railing of our deck on top of our screened porch. It has a sliding window off our bedroom. It sat there for 10 minutes while I watched it on the other side of the slider. Now I’m no woodsman, I’m sure I made noise. It did not care. Just kept a-watchin’. Up close, even with thermopane between us, it was a scary animal.

  155. 155.

    NotMax

    Happy camper after finding these on Amazon, which arrived today. Haven’t seen them on a store shelf here since the gourmet food shoppe in town closed up late last century.

    Beats olives or onions in martinis by eight furlongs, easy.

  157. 157.

    sab

    @Amir Khalid: So her life was well lived. We can all start over while living. But it would be terrible to live a life and have no one care. You cared about her a lot.

    ETA and she was happy with you.

  160. 160.

    Dan B

    @Amir Khalid: So sorry to hear about your loss.  Talkative kitties are the greatest.

    We lost three last year.  It was rough but my Mike guy has a feral cat colony at his rental house.  He picked out the two most sociable and we had fun socializing them.  Now they’re training us.  We only had a week without housecats, except for the week hiding under the bed.

    It was healing for us to bring safe shelter and give love to two kittens.

  161. 161.

    frosty

    @raven: We were there in 2015. It was a lot of fun. Towards the end of the red beans they dropped in a brick of butter and one of lard. A gasp from the audience. The cook: “Are you the Californians? Get over it!”

  163. 163.

    planetjanet

    @sab: I just did that with a whole bunch of tulips I planted last week.  I am eager to see what comes up in the spring.  Tried the pepper flakes as well.  I really want these tulips.

  164. 164.

    trollhattan

    @JMG:

    Have mentioned before that one evening last October we were eating on the patio of an open-door restaurant when whoosh something flies past us into the restaurant, followed quickly by the sound of crashing, breaking glass.

    A human goes inside soon after, then brings out a falcon on her arm. It was the falcon they hire downtown to drive away crows overnight, and evidently really wanted a drink, damnit!

  166. 166.

    Redshift

    @BC in Illinois: Hmm, we just had a “smoking court” outside. If I remember right, the kids who smoked were the only ones who were allowed to go outside on their own, which seems pretty odd now, since they were also the least likely to behave responsibly in general.

  167. 167.

    HumboldtBlue

    Welp, once more fuck 2020.

    We just officially canceled our annual trucker’s parade party held each year at my tiny downtown apartment that sits 100 feet from the parade route and where the kids get as much pizza  and chocolate gelt as they want and the adults get adult beverages and the corniest fun of the year.

    We also canceled the annual Xmas eve party, a beautiful night that is filled with all the best memories I (unmarried and un-childrened) have of Xmas as a kid. Wonderful food, amazing people and music with gifts wrapped in beautiful paper strewn literally everywhere. The squeal of the girls as they drag poor, young, single, handsome Shomik to the back bedroom because “he’s been acting very suspiciously” and the sheer joy of being together to share it all together.

    Fuck.

  171. 171.

    RSA

    @Ken: I understand you can now get cultured-meat kits where you use a scraping of your own cheek cells.

    OMG. Thanks for that information… I guess.

  172. 172.

    Gravenstone

    @Jeffro: Working in a gas station in 1981, I remember the cigarettes were $1.85/pack. Odd how little things like that stick in your mind decades later.

  173. 173.

    John Revolta

    @MagdaInBlack: I’m pretty sure it was 18 when I was in HS, Chicago suburbs c. 1970. We never could’ve gotten away with it inside, but there were those who went out among the bushes out front to do it. They were usually unmolested by faculty. Although a couple of my friends got caught smoking hash out there and were suspended.

  174. 174.

    Aleta

    @frosty:  I forgot about the deep fried okra.  When they had it I got that too.

    Come to think of it, I never got the chicken either.

  176. 176.

    trollhattan

    @HumboldtBlue:

    Sorry. We’re simply going to have to put this turducken of a year on a shelf to not be remembered or dwelt on, other than “how can we not do this again?*” discussions.

    *Try not electing a proud rapist president, for starters.

  177. 177.

    raven

    @frosty: The founder and chef I was there was Joe Cahn. He held up the Escoffier Cookbook and said “This is the bible of classical French Cooking”. Then he dropped it on the floor and kicked it across the room”! “This is what I think of classical French Cooking”. He sold the place and became the “Commissioner  of Taligating., About 5 years ago he made an appearance at, of all thinks, a Quick Trip gas station giving away a set of tickets to the Auburn-Georgia game. I went to see him and told him I went to his school and had cooked jambalaya for 1000 people. I don’t know if he really was but he pretended to really be happy I came to see him! Fun dude.

  178. 178.

    raven

    @John Revolta: When I went in the Army in 66 they would make the girls kneel and if their skirt didn’t touch the floor they would send them home. No jeans, no long hair nuttin. When I got out three years later the place was a free-for-all complete with the smoking lounge. That was in Villa Park.

  179. 179.

    NotMax

    @trollhattan

    Anyone remember the Falcon Twist segment of The Joe Schmo Show?

    Trained falcon supposed to zoom in and land on the host’s wrist. Which it did, excepting one episode when the bird overshot and smacked – WHAM! – into the glass of the patio door behind the host.

    They did include a disclaimer in the closing credits along the lines of “No falcons were injured in the making of this program.”

  180. 180.

    frosty

    @Gravenstone: And gas was $0.29 a gallon when everyone on the intersection was having a price war.

    Oops, did I just give away that I am An Old?

    ETA: Equivalent to roughly $1.75 with inflation. But I didn’t do the math.

  181. 181.

    RSA

    @frosty: Royal Farms fried chicken is better than any fast food place.

    For better or worse (both, actually) there’s a Royal Farms within walking distance of my apartment, so when I’m not happy with what I have for lunch in the fridge, I can order my favorite, a chicken club sandwich. Surprisingly, in terms of calories, sodium, and so forth, it’s not even that unhealthy. So I tell myself. :-)

  184. 184.

    frosty

    @raven: Jambalaya for 1000 people?? We are not worthy! We are not worthy!

    Dude, you have a lot of great stories. Sit down and write for an hour a day. Just get something on paper and worry about organizing it later … then when you’re done, sort through the pictures, too!

    Otherwise we’ll have to comb the B-J comments and do it for you.

  186. 186.

    raven

    @SFBayAreaGal:

    n 1945, the accessory pack was modified. Per the order of the Surgeon General, the halazone tablets were removed and salt tablets were added. Also, feedback from the field revealed that some soldiers opened up accessory packs just to get the cigarettes and threw away the rest of the items. To reduce waste, the accessory pack was now divided into the “short” pack with cigarettes and matches, and the “long” pack containing the other accessories.[citation needed]

    Cigarette brands issued included Camel, Chelsea, Chesterfield, Craven A, Lucky Strike, Old Gold, Philip Morris, Player’s, Raleigh, and Wings

     

  187. 187.

    frosty

    @raven: …they would make the girls kneel and if their skirt didn’t touch the floor they would send them home.

    They did the same thing in my high school, late 60s. The girls found something, I think called a “tent dress”(?) that hit the floor kneeling but was above the knee sitting and standing. You fight ’em any way you can!

  188. 188.

    Aleta

    @Amir Khalid:  I think I wept every day for over a month one time I lost a cat.

    Teach me your mood,
    O patient stars!
    Who climb each night the ancient sky,
    Leaving on space no shade, no scars,
    No trace of age, no fear to die.

    RW Emerson

    If you wish, set to music

  193. 193.

    raven

    @Aleta: When Raven died I lit a votive candle on his grave every day for a year. Lil Bit is buried next to him and I used nice solar lights for her.

  195. 195.

    Bill Arnold

    @Ken:

    Cannibalism, technically, but kind of a grey area.

    Specifically, a variant of what is often called autocannibalism, but with bio-prosthetic self-flesh. [1] Is a diet of oneself complete, nutritionally? Probably not with flesh grown from just cheek cells. Probably should sample multiple parts of the body, or mumble mumble stem cells …
    Will be interesting to see how acceptance (and/or not) radiates through various societies.

    [1] Reading of a period piece: Mondo Boloko – Arthur C Clarke’s The Food of the Gods. Youtube, 11:12 [2]
    [2] I have not found an online copy of “The Savage Mouth”, Sakyo Komatsu; one of the more disturbing short stories ever written, for some people. (I read it in “The Best Japanese Science Fiction Stories.”)

  197. 197.

    Origuy

    @NotMax: Ever tried pickled okra? It’s pretty good.

    I missed the fried chicken thread earlier. I’ve been on keto since July. I got a hankering for Chick-Fil-A’s spicy chicken sandwich yesterday and decided to cheat. It wasn’t as good as I remembered; I left part of the bun and half of the fries.

    I envy those of you in the DC and Chicago areas, you have Nando’s. None here in the Bay Area, although we have a few Port of Peri-Peri places.

  202. 202.

    nclurker

    vonnegut refered to smoking as “ethical suicide”.

    got my first pack at a drug store for ,no shit,17 cents.

    circa 1966.

    shared them with the lads on a garage roof one summer while reading purloined

    Playboy mags,stolen from someones dad.

    strange what you remember

  203. 203.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Origuy:

    I envy those of you in the DC and Chicago areas, you have Nando’s 

    I looked at Nando’s site a few weeks back, and damn is it expensive!

  206. 206.

    J R in WV

    @MagdaInBlack:

    @sab:  I saw a hawk sail past my 3rd floor balcony last weekend. Pearl the Squirrel, who dines here regularly, was under a chair giving the squirrel alarm call.

    Friends out in Pueblo, CO had indoor cats they let out onto their balcony. One day one of their beloved kitties disappeared right off the balcony — probably a Barred Owl that inhabited the neighborhood.

    What can you do?

    The balance of life runs without our interference!

  207. 207.

    NotMax

    So, trying out Sling (went for their ‘get the 2nd month free’ special). TCM picture coming in crisper than it does on cable. Oddly, if I switch back and forth between the two, TCM is consistently on a lag of about 15 seconds from the cable feed.

  208. 208.

    Gvg

    One time when I was on the roof of my first house cleaning it, I suddenly heard horrible screams and turned to see a hawk fly by with a still living squirrel. The shrieking went on for awhile, and I had a better view than I wanted. Nature red of tooth and all that.

  210. 210.

    John Revolta

    @raven: I had a bunch of girl cousins in Villa Park. They would’ve been in HS in the early ’70s. They were pretty straight though…..or so I assume. I never saw much of them after my teens, except once……………one time I was at a Cubs game. I lived with my band in a loft about three blocks from Wrigley so we used to go a lot. I was standing there minding my own business, hair down to there and so on, and a cute blonde girl came up and gave me a beer. Said I looked thirsty and wandered off. I just took it in stride (weird stuff used to happen to freaky looking people as you may recall). Months later, I was talking to my Grandmother on the phone and I mentioned that I was at a ballgame and she said “Do strange girls ever bring you things at the ballpark?” ?????? Well, turned out it was my cousin Janet, there with the family. They had sent her over and I never recognized her (and I was glad she hadn’t hung around because I met girls at the park more than once!)

  213. 213.

    raven

    @John Revolta:  Cool, I left in 66 and aside from one quarter at Dupe U I never went back. My former SIL lived in the apartments right over the left field wall and said the organ drove her nuts

     

    ETA, I once got so hammered at a game that I went to Ray’s Bleachers after and tore the pay phone off the wall (not being aware that it was used for gambling)!!!

  214. 214.

    Jeffro

    @JMG: we have some red-tailed hawks in and around our neighborhood, and I’m pretty darned near certain that’s why I rarely see rabbits and have yet to see an adult snake.

    to which I say, GO HAWKS!!  (Sorry rabbits, that was just because of the snakes)

  215. 215.

    barbequebob

    @sab: Sorry if it upsets you, but it is a food chain and when we feed the herbivores, the carnivores also benefit. They are all part of the ecosystem and that’s how nature is.

    FWIW, populations of both grey squirrels and red tailed hawks are both doing very well on human altered landscapes. As a conservation biologist, I worry most about protecting the natural habitats that have long supported populations of our native wildlife species. I belong to and support a local land trust that focuses on preserving native habitat so that our local, native species can live off the land, and each other, as they always have.

    I hope you can consider your experience from this perspective.

  216. 216.

    Jeffro

    @RSA: It’s hard to make a sandwich too crazy-bad for you (unless it’s a double-patty, triple-cheese, quadruple-bacon monstrosity)

    It’s the fries that’ll kill ya!

  217. 217.

    Jeffro

    @Origuy: How’s the keto going?  I tried it about a year and a half ago and it worked well until I added carbs into the mix. ;)

    I think post-holidays I’m just going to bite the bullet and either go back to keto or go vegetarian.  Or come up with my own no-BBPPRCC*diet and see how that goes

    *bread, beer, pizza, pasta, rice, cheese, chips!

    *I kind of like this acronym…sounds like a burp!

  219. 219.

    WaterGirl

    @Amir Khalid: I was inconsolable when I lost my first kitty, my kitty soulmate.  These words brought me comfort, I am hoping they might do the same for you.

    There is a sacredness in tears.
    They are not the mark of weakness, but of power.
    They are messengers of overwhelming grief,
    and of unspeakable love.

    – Washington Irving

    ❤️

  222. 222.

    Nutmeg again

    @pluky: Dog would go bananas!  and, being an elderly pup, she’s starting to fart when she barks, ahem. (Too many treats? possible.)  Dilemmas, always.

  228. 228.

    Chris T.

    @sab: In-N-Out is no longer California-specific; they’d expanded to Vegas more than a decade ago, for instance.

    On a related tangent (not @sab but elsewhere in this thread): I grew up in Maryland (not far from Wheaton actually) and before I left for other states, Popeyes chicken did expand to MD (I think there was one in Silver Spring or White Oak or somewhere like that). We went there pretty often, and I thought their fried chicken was decent, but nothing special.

    Then I moved away and had no Popeyes anywhere near me for decades. Then they opened some in CA, NV, and UT (not sure in what order). The UT one, which is kind of halfway between SLC and Provo, the fried chicken was so good we’d go out of our way to get it. One in NV just outside Reno was pretty good too and I went there a few times in traveling to CA. Living in CA for years after that, I tried a few Popeyes-es there: anywhere from “meh” to “yuck”. Not sure if it’s something about California, or just a lot of bad franchisees in that area.

    In-N-Out then came to the Bay Area and was pretty good, although I actually preferred Habit Burger. Now I live north of Seattle, almost to Canada, and I just learned there’s a couple of Popeyes-es in driving distance, so I might have to check them out again.

  230. 230.

    The Fat White Duchess

    @BC in Illinois: In my junior high, they called the cops on a pair of sixth-graders caught smoking in the lavatory.

    @MagdaInBlack:  I’m class of ’78, and there was certainly no official smoking section–at least not for tobacco.  But I remember passing one of the lavs as the door opened, and the amount of marijuana smoke that issued forth was remarkable.

    (Of course, this was a HS notorious in the ’60s for kids synthesizing LSD in the chem lab.)

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