Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

Biden: Oh no. We’ve upset Big Pharma again.

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

Never forget that he train is barreling down on Trump, even as he dances on the tracks.

American History and Black History can not be separated.

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

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

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

It’s not hopeless, and we’re not helpless.

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

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

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95Comments

  4. 4.

    thruppence

    Katla on Netflix is interesting if you go for that bleakish Euro mystery stuff. Under the shadow and ash fall of a years long Icelandic volcanic eruption a few people emerge where no one should be. Are they who they say they are or are they something Else?

  7. 7.

    StringOnAStick

    I’m a little freaked out that it’s going to be 107 here in Bend tomorrow. With the half of normal water yield into the reservoirs this spring, and that I’ve never seen anything this hot for the years I monitored the weather before we moved here last fall, I am trying not to fall into a doom spiral.  I had hoped going further North would help with AGW effects, so I’m facing that there’s nowhere to hide.

  8. 8.

    NotMax

    Heard today that someone whom I know was supposed to fly from NYC to Seattle this week to attend a wedding. Flight boarding took place and then 40 passengers refused to mask, causing enough of a commotion that the flight ended up being canceled. Next flight he managed to get bumped to was 12 hours later.

    40 people who at a minimum will not be seeing the inside of an airplane in the foreseeable future, one fervently hopes.

  10. 10.

    jl

    OK, interesting word facts I found out today.

    The word ‘man’ is Anglo-Saxon Old English and originally meant ‘person’, ‘they’, ‘one’ (as in German), human being. A male man was ‘werman’, and a female man was a ‘wifman’. the ‘wer’ was dropped from ‘man’ to mean ‘guy’ around 1000.

    The use of ‘man’ informally, as in ‘Well, that’s your just your opinion,.. myaaann…” started around 1400, not the 1960s with those damn hippies.

  11. 11.

    Kayla Rudbek

    One quarter of the way through radiation treatment as of yesterday. And I rode the tandem yesterday as well. Tomorrow maybe another tandem ride over to my sibling’s place to drop off birthday presents for my nephew

    And my knitting muse wants to start working on making cotton tops for myself. Which rationally I shouldn’t do because I may change sizes further from the radiation treatment. I probably should just find an easy project to work on until things are done. I can tell that my concentration is already shot to hell, so it needs to be low difficulty mode easy.

  15. 15.

    HumboldtBlue

    I just finished The Irishman and I was wholly underwhelmed.

    Watching an 80-year-old DeNiro pretend he’s 40 years younger and curb-stomping a guy was laughable. It was an interesting history lesson, but man, was that meh.

  16. 16.

    lurker

    @Yutsano: have not spent much time in wenatchee, despite having spent lots of time near there.  the apples are good.  the speed trap near cle elum not so much.

    Hope they run the fans on the orchards well, so the apples are not scorched – think they normally have those on some fruit orchards to help with frost, so this should be interesting.  Also the fans might melt.

    That temperature looks more suited to the drier parts of the columbia basin, maybe the central valley, or really venus.

  17. 17.

    James E Powell

    The thing on my phone says tomorrow’s high will be 107. That’s hot, but not totally unheard of hot here in the southwest corner of Riverside County. I am going to want a lot of lemonade. And probably some watermelon.

  18. 18.

    lurker

    on an unrelated note – managed to do a bit of a hike with the family.  Man I am out of shape pretty well sums it up, but it was good to be out.  Especially if the meteor watergirl serves up turns out to be big enough.

  24. 24.

    Keith P.

    @HumboldtBlue: Right!  I found DeNiro’s “reverse aging” to be a complete distraction.  Check out “irishman deepfake” on Youtube, and you can see they went with the wrong technology.

  27. 27.

    Ken

    @lurker: There are a couple of showers coming up. The Perseids (late July to late August, peaking August 12-13) are generally pretty good.

  28. 28.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Keith P.: ​ 
    They decided to use the same old heads is the biggest problem. There must be hundreds of young actors who could have filled the youthful roles interspersed with the same old heads we’ve seen since Scorsese decided to be brilliant.

    And if I may, 107 degrees in dry-ass Riverside County is a bit different from 107 degrees in an Oregon temperate region.

  30. 30.

    Delk

    My Seattle friend will be visiting me in Chicago for a week of rain ?. Last year was the first time in 36 years that he was not able to visit.

  32. 32.

    Major Major Major Major

    Was a beautiful day here. High of 81, light afternoon shower.

    Here’s a good thread about how to interpret news like “half the new infections were among the vaccinated” when thinking about vaccine efficacy. The mRNA vaccines are very effective against the delta variant!

  33. 33.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Delk: 

    My Seattle friend will be visiting me in Chicago for a week of rain ?.

    So same weather, different locale?

  34. 34.

    Kent

    @StringOnAStick: Camas WA (Portland Suburb) is supposed to hit 115 tomorrow.  That’s getting into Phoenix territory.  Lots of older homes around here don’t have AC.  Today was only 108 and that was the hottest day in the 150 year history of Portland.  Tomorrow will shatter that record.  And we aren’t even into July yet.

  37. 37.

    laura

    Enjoying the Giants v A’s game and wishing Sergio Romo was still a Giant.

    Kayla Rudbeck – you keep on keeping on with your treatment plan and recovery!

  40. 40.

    MagdaInBlack

    @mrmoshpotato: My experiences with State Fair (or any county fair) lemonade usually involved a generous splash of vodka*. ?

    * which could be found among friends in the livestock barns

  43. 43.

    Sister Golden Bear

    The good: The stone and refrigerator I ordered back in February finally arrived.

    The bad: I’m switching from gas to induction, but the 220v line hasn’t been installed yet, so I can’t use the range. (Not the end of the world, since I bought a countertop induction burner to use during the upcoming kitchen remodel, and I’ve also got a countertop oven.)

    The ugly: I forgot the new fridge is an inch too tall to fit under the existing wall cabinet. Will have to see if can get it down myself tomorrow. Otherwise, I’ll have the contractor take it down when they start the other work in a week or two.

  44. 44.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    We’ve seen some excellent stuff lately.

    1. Tonight my wife stumbled across a Joni Mitchell documentary that apparently was originally a PBS American Masters production. That particular YouTube is subtitled in Spanish; not sure where else to find it. I have to confess we’re kind of stuck on 60s Joni and didn’t realize just how much she grew and changed musically over the decades.
    2. The new Kevin Hart film Fatherhood (Netflix) is really excellent. It has its humorous moments but mostly it’s a fairly serious film that will rip your heart out if you’re a dad, especially a dad of daughters. I’m not crying, you’re crying.
    3. We didn’t realize till we were watching the closing credits of Fatherhood that Hart’s boss was played by Paul Reiser. That started us watching Mad About You: First we watched the pilot episode from 1992, then we discovered there was a revival season in 2019 and we watched the first episode of that. The show, both versions of the show, absolutely hilarious. I think we found the show, both shows, on Amazon Prime.
    4. Try to find the documentary Woman In Motion about Nichelle Nichols and what she did for the NASA Shuttle program. She recruited a big chunk of the Shuttle crews. Amazing multi-talented lady. Also we get to hear her sing, which is the original career she thought she was going to have before Star Trek came along.
  45. 45.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Old Dan and Little Ann: ​ 
    Hilarious, because I stopped several times and checked in here, ESPN, Twitter, my cat, but powered through to the end.

    It’s gonna be hot inland up thisaway tomorrow as well. Just like Medford and every other inland community, record high temps. Our fires season is gonna be fucking massive.

  46. 46.

    Steeplejack

    We had a very mild spring here in NoVA. Many days in the 70s, some in the 80s, only a few that hit 90°. And low humidity, which is equally important in our usually muggy summer.

    It’s 75° now (humidity only 49%), supposed to hit 90° on Sunday, and then this coming week will be the first with highs consistently above 90°. Predicted to hit 96° on Wednesday. But, hey, we’re almost to July, so I’m not complaining.

    I have been monitoring the weather in Las Vegas, where I have family and friends, and it has been unusually hot even for them. (Currently 101° at 10:09 p.m.) But they are (somewhat) used to it. I feel for the people in the Northwest for whom this is unprecedented. Stay frosty, everyone!

  47. 47.

    SectionH

    @Yutsano: Moving? OMG. I will be thinking, worrying about you. I don’t know if we’re distantly related (well, beyond the obvious) but I have so many horrible memories of moving on the hottest day of several different years in very different places. Including 100º+…

    As Adam says, Hydrate! And good luck!

  49. 49.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    We’ve been invited to a friend’s house for dinner Sunday night. It’s our first socializing since lockdown and theirs as well.

    I’m not sure I remember anything about human customs.

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    @Sister Golden Bear:

    I will be interested to hear about your experience with the induction range. As I design and revise my imaginary dream house, I think I would like induction. And, as I get older, I think it makes sense to lessen the chance of accidental fires.

    Which countertop induction burner do you have?

  51. 51.

    Peale

    @HumboldtBlue: I wanted to watch it. I really did. It was shot in my town. Was an amazing thing, the way they transformed downtown into the Bronx of the 50s on one block. Then the 1970s on a different block. They did it so throughly and quickly, then put everything back. But for a week, it was fun to go get my morning Diet Coke at the convenience store that from the outside had suddenly started selling fine furs. And the hardware store that became a luncheonette selling coffee for ten cents.

    but then I no one whose watched it has raved about it.

  53. 53.

    joel hanes

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    didn’t realize just how much [Joni Mitchell] grew and changed musically over the decades

    Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter is amazing.

    “Dreamland” gets me through a lot of summer weather.

  54. 54.

    Wapiti

    Movies: We saw In the Heights this afternoon, in the theater. We saw the stage version two years ago and loved it; there are some small changes but it’s still a good story with snappy songs.

    Theater had rules posted: don’t sit directly in front of or in-front-diagonal of another patron, so people were spread out. Masks required in the lobby.

    eta: And there was air conditioning.

  56. 56.

    Steeplejack

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    I haven’t seen the Joni Mitchell one, but in general the American Masters docs are very well done. One that really struck me was the one on David Geffen, of all people. Didn’t sugarcoat anything but really went into depth on why he was important. And it had intelligent, informed assessments by people like Tom Hanks and Don Henley. Very well done.

    A favorite Joni Mitchell song of mine: “Song for Sharon.”

  57. 57.

    Steeplejack

    @HumboldtBlue, @Peale:

    I saw The Irishman when it was released and was similarly underwhelmed. Looking back, the word that comes to mind is indulgent. “Mr. Scorsese, you’re a big-time director now. Here’s a shitload of money. Just tell us whatever story you want at whatever length.” It felt like watching an interview with Orson Welles about how he made Citizen Kane, but the interview is longer than Citizen Kane.

  58. 58.

    Jackie

    @Yutsano: Dang! And I thought our Tri-Cities has it bad! Sun 111. Mon 115. Tue 117. We’re praying to the gods our AC and power holds up!??

  64. 64.

    VeniceRiley

    Just watching the CNN 60’s and 70’s specials and …. Meh. It’s everything the media and music was paying attention to back then.
    I did laugh at Dylan singing about Medgar Evars to an all white youngster audience in tha park in New York! Shots like that look like a klan meeting to me today. If I want to, I can go weeks without seeing another white face.

    As for the climate, I hope the weather and water situations wake magaland  up, but I think they may actually want apocalypse for Jesus return or some such.

    I keep returning to the feeling of the women’s March…. You know, when we showed up all cultures and races and there was no violence and everyone cleaned up and it should be a societal model.

  67. 67.

    Lacuna Synecdoche

    @SectionH:

    It’s only the heat index that’s 1104 – the actual temp is gonna be 1009. See, feels cooler already…

    See? It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity. And when it gets really hot, all the humidity boils off into space, so, paradoxically, really hot air makes everything cooler. QED.

    (GOP logic. Also, contrarian centrist logic.)

  68. 68.

    opiejeanne

    @HumboldtBlue: Yes, the dry heat of … Corona, I’m guessing? is very different from the wringing wet 77% humidity at 102, which we had today in Woodinville, WA. I spent 23 years in the city of Riverside, and learned that when it’s above 105 it’s just too damned hot, even if the humidity is low.

    We do not have AC. They’re projecting 102 tomorrow, but today we were 10 degrees above the projected temp, so it’s probably going to be higher. Monday is going to be the worst; they’ve been projecting up to 110, but now they’re saying it will only be 109. I think we’ll be sleeping downstairs with the windows all open and fans running.

    Our poor cats are suffering and I’ve been taking “bird baths” all day, and trying to put enough water on the gardens so that we don’t lose our plants. .

  69. 69.

    opiejeanne

    @Jackie: OW! I am not driving over that way for a visit. I hope your AC holds up and you don’t suffer a power outage.

    We had a little brownout this evening, lights low and flickering., but we never lost power. I suspect Sunday and Monday the power may just shut down.

  70. 70.

    Brachiator

    The joys of getting older. I badly strained my knee doing practically nothing. Reduced to gingerly hobbling around my apartment and taking Tylenol for moderate pain relief.

    Oh well. I have an excuse for doing nothing for a while.

  72. 72.

    Steeplejack

    @Brachiator:

    Inorite? How does that stuff happen? The thing I have noticed in my dotage is that when I suffer some minor injury it seems to take way longer to heal than it did when I was young(er).

  73. 73.

    WereBear

    Here in the NE mountains we’ve had hurricanes coming through and cooling everything lately. If all else fails we have a/c in the living room and I will get an air mattress

    Managed to not turn it on all last summer…

  74. 74.

    Steeplejack

    @WereBear:

    Here in NoVA I’ve been keeping the thermostat at 76°, and in the mild spring the A.C. was rarely coming on. I had the windows open a fair amount to let in the breezes and fresh air. Occasionally I cranked it down to 72° and let it blow for a bit to dispel the humidity. My brick building (three stories, six units) is good at retaining the ambient temperature, and that helps a lot.

  76. 76.

    Jackie

    @opiejeanne: When we lived in Tukwila some 30 yrs ago, we had abnormal heat wave for a couple of weeks and, of course no AC. I put ice blocks in plastic wash basins in front of portable fans and that helped cool the bedrooms enough for decent sleeping.

  79. 79.

    satby

    I had to bail on a highly sought after fundraiser dinner I had won at auction because the weather (torrential rain plus tornado warning) had them push back the start time to too late for me last night. I get up at 4 am for the market on Saturday. So I had a bologna sandwich and chocolate milk and went to bed about 9, and woke up again at 4 ?. With no internet ? so I’m using my phone. At least I have power, so ☕. Small blessings.

  83. 83.

    satby

    @WereBear: yeah, I think people were a bit stunned I said I was taking a pass. But I was pretty wiped out by work in the cloying humidity at the glorified pole barn and the dinner would basically end at the 20 hour mark of my day, and I can’t safely drive at night under good weather conditions. I wasn’t even that sorry tbh.

  86. 86.

    prostratedragon

    I’ll be very happy when the sky is no longer visibly getting lighter at 4:30, e.g. now (central time). Cuts into my night shift.

  90. 90.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Major Major Major Major: It’s a good explanation of the base rate fallacy, but actually Israel is only about 56% fully vaccinated (vs. 46% for the US), so the numbers aren’t that extreme. They hit a pretty hard ceiling of vaccine reluctance after being the first country to really get the percentages high, and of course they’re not vaccinating children either.

  92. 92.

    What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?

    @Steeplejack: My dad has been eating Swedish Meatballs for more than three quarters of a century and Chef John’s recipe is the one he uses these days.

  95. 95.

    J R in WV

    Here in SW WVa the temps have been low enough at night that I have opened windows to let the house cool down into the 60s, mostly. Couple of days ago the A/C set in the mid70s didn’t come on all day. So far we haven’t suffered from Global Climate Change in terms of temps, just in terms of severe weather, rain, flash floods, high wind dropping trees on power lines.

    Early spring we woke up to unbelievable roaring sounds, the power company had a helicopter with a dangling saw tool, bobbing up and down along the power line right of way. Tool was saw blades for the bottom 15 or 20 feet, spinning like mad. A ground crew was in a truck, they picked up the branches out of the roads, threw them into the woods, where they will be a fire hazard later on. No way anyone could sleep through that noise!

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