Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

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

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

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

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

No one could have predicted…

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Sunday Night Open Thread: A Little Feel Good To Go Into The Week

Sunday Night Open Thread: A Little Feel Good To Go Into The Week

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Just a couple of nice little tidbits to send you into the new week with all the feelz:

I believe HumboldtBlue tagged me in this one:

At my house, things are still humming along smooth-ish, LOL.  Though there was this:

Me: Jasper is making so much progress on not surfing the kitchen counters.
Also me: Jasper, why are you carrying a package of crackers around the living room?
🤦‍♀️

ETA: I forgot I wanted to share this. Someone near me found this in her patio umbrella. She put him in the shade and once he recovered he flew off, hopefully to quieter sleeping quarters.

Sunday Night Open Thread: A Little Feel Good To Go Into The Week

This is an open thread.

 

Reader Interactions

66Comments

  2. 2.

    ALurkSupreme

    I believe Ichirō means “first son,” if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

    [flees]

    ETA:  Damn it, Baud.

  3. 3.

    Ken

    By coincidence*, I was asked to remove a bat from church this morning. It was snoozing on the ceiling. I and a friend got it into a wastebasket, and took it outside. After that it’s up to the bat.

    * Or was it?

  4. 4.

    NutmegAgain

    Love bats! and they eat so many annoying critters. Please do tell, how did this little sweetie come up purple?

  8. 8.

    CarolPW

    I had a giant patio umbrella that I had to get inside when it was down to get the leverage to raise it, and once as I got in there and grabbed the ropes I looked in front of my face and there was a bat clinging to the fabric about 6 inches away looking straight into my eyes. I quietly and slowly ducked down and out of the umbrella, and was very proud of myself for not making any screaming noises until I was well away.

    I love bats, but at a bit more distance than that.

  9. 9.

    Wanderer

    That bat looks like s/he has been working overtime.  Bats are great.  I have hummingbirds which come to my flower boxes and every end of summer after eating they hover in front of the patio door looking in. I know they are getting ready to leave and will miss them every day until next spring.

  13. 13.

    Suzanne

    Spawn the Elder is a great kid…. But holy shit he is the most emotionally exhausting person I have ever met.

  14. 14.

    Lyrebird

    The bat is beautiful, but the drummer and the kindness of the band is what totally got me.

    WOW.

  15. 15.

    bcw

    Had a bat in the patio umbrella also, they must be perfect bat-caves with narrow slots to craw up into from the folds.  Took to leaving it slightly open so as not to tempt bats.

  16. 16.

    geg6

    This should be another nice gift for Subaru Diane.  She loves bats.

    Myself, I hate them.  Yes, I know all about all the wonderful things they do but I have been plagued by them on my homes all my life and I probably have a form of PTSD when it comes to bats.  Twice I had a bat in my room when I lived with my parents after college and I was the only remaining child at home.  Never had a bat there before or since.  Then my ex and I bought a house that we gutted and remodeled.  We found mummified bats in the attic rafters and were , at least four times, had live bats flying around until we got them out.  Then when we broke up and I moved into my own place, I twice had bars in the apartment.  Thankfully (and crossing my fingers, we have had no bats in my and my John’s house in the 14 years I’ve lived here.  We see them outside in the evening, but none have gotten in.  Yet.

  18. 18.

    chrome agnomen

    these feel good clips are just icing on the recent feel good to be a democrat wave that we’ve been riding ever since the left decided no more Mr nice guy might be an advantageous position going into the midterms.

     

    good on my peeps!  let’s keep the senate and the damned house too!

  21. 21.

    Feathers

    My parents house had a set of vents in the attic that turned into a bat roosting spot. They stayed on the outside of the screen. It was fun to go to the attic and see them all hanging there, with their folded wings and little bat faces. We did try to leave them alone. The attic was for storage and we left that side emptyish.

  22. 22.

    Old Dan and Little Ann

    I love me some baseball.  I was reading about the Ichiro love on Twitter this weekend and nearly forgot he played with the Yankees for 2 1/2 seasons.

  23. 23.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

     Clark recalled the moment from her point of view. “I remember Iris brushing her hair, which still cracks me up. Then the crack of the bat, and then Ichiro being in Iris’ lap.”

    Skinner laughed, adding, “I was brushing my hair. Don’t judge me, I was [17] or whatever, you know!”

    “I couldn’t see where the ball was going and I was scared it was going to hit me so that’s why I was kind of leaning away. Because of that I had no idea that Ichiro was coming towards me since I was looking the other way.”

    Leaning away may have worked for Skinner in that she wasn’t hit by the ball she was trying to avoid, but she was hit by the right fielder trying to snag an out just over the wall.

    “We just hit each other pretty hard. I look over and I see Ichiro and and I also remember the sun was behind his head. I thought he was an angel, I thought I died.”

    “So I just saw this like, this silhouette and then he asked me if I was OK and I said yes. Then, you know, he ran off and that’s when I had a meltdown.”

    In the immediate aftermath, Skinner found herself at #1 on SportsCenters Not Top Play. At the end of the season she won 2010 Mariners Fan Moment of the Year and months later she took home an even bigger honor: the #1 MLB Fan Moment of the Year.

    I actually saw that game when it happened, it was on one of the sports channels.

  24. 24.

    MagdaInBlack

    @geg6: My “bats in the house” experience is nowhere near as traumatic as yours, thank god. We would get them occasionally in the little cabin my parents had in Ontario. My dad would turn out the lights and open the door and they found their way out pretty quickly.

  25. 25.

    lowtechcyclist

    Awww, the cute little bat! Never seen a purple bat before!

    Having crawled around a lot of muddy underground passages in my younger days, being face-to-face with a bat is just something that happens, you know?

    My favorite bat memory was coming out of Hellhole in Pendleton County, WV.  It’s got a 160-foot entry drop from its massive sinkhole entrance, and rappelling down is a breeze, but coming back up is quite a climb, climbing a rope using Gibbs ascenders.  (State of the art back in the 1970s; no idea what they use now.)  So I get to the top of the rope and out of the cave, and collapse, exhausted, on one side of the sinkhole.  And as the sun was setting, this incredible cloud of bats came out of the cave and flew all around in the cone of the sinkhole.  Must’ve been thousands of them, and it was awesome.  I just sat and stared at them while waiting for my buddies to finish climbing out of the cave.

  27. 27.

    Felanius Kootea

    Damn, the guy at the Killers concert played the hell out of those drums! Whoo!

    I hope he beats cancer. That must have been such a thrilling moment!

  28. 28.

    MagdaInBlack

    @raven: I am familiar with the series, but I have not watched it. Did a bat allegedly scare her and cause the fall?

  31. 31.

    James E Powell

    @geg6:

    Yes, I know all about all the wonderful things they do but I have been plagued by them on my homes all my life and I probably have a form of PTSD when it comes to bats.

    You are not alone. Waking up in a completely dark room wondering what the hell is that sound hitting the lights and seeing two of those things rapidly circling trying to figure out how to get out. I screamed like a teenage girl at a Beatles concert.

  33. 33.

    brendancalling

    Tomorrow, I start at my new high school with my first classroom.

    I still need to print out my student survey, shave, and shower so I have more time to drink coffee at 5:30 AM, which is an ungodly time to be awake. And I still have to finish watching a show with my kid.

    Like the bats, I prefer to stay up all night.

  35. 35.

    HumboldtBlue

    @brendancalling:

    Here’s a toast to the teacher!

    May those little brats actually learn something and may you keep your sanity in the process. And may you be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you’re dead!

    @raven:

    So that’s how Ivana Trump died. Bats. (not the gangster kind, but the animal kind)

  36. 36.

    MomSense

    Just dropped kid off at the airport.  He was sure TSA would pay him down but it was smooth . The TSA agent looked him up and down, gave him a stern look and then smiled and said “you’re just a child”

    The other agent liked his hat. Now mom and the GF will eat our McDs ice cream and make the trek home.

  39. 39.

    Steve in the ATL

    Has anyone seen the bats flying out from under the bridge in downtown Austin?  Pretty awesome.  Or terrifying, apparently.

  44. 44.

    Kelly

    We usually have a bat living behind our “Welcome” sign. Moved it from over the front door to a spot where we don’t mind a little bat poop.

  47. 47.

    CaseyL

    @Steve in the ATL: Speaking as someone who was in Maine about a year and a half ago, my favorites were Bar Harbor/Acadia (of course), the river and Little Bad Falls park in Machias, and the port towns Eastport and Lubec.

    Be aware that Maine drivers love to tailgate, particularly the areas away from the coast.

  48. 48.

    MomSense

    @Steve in the ATL:

    There is a lot to do in Portland – great restaurants, waterfront trails, and shopping,  It’s a foodie paradise.
    Go to Fort Williams / Portland Head Light in Cape Elizabeth.  The lighthouse is beautiful.
    I would drive up to Rockland,Rockport and Camden. Rockland is known for the art galleries and Farnsworth Museum. You can also walk the harbor trail which my dad helped to create. Rockport is so picturesque and Camden has a beautiful harbor and ocean views from Mt Battie. It’s in the Camnden Hills State Park. You can drive to the top or hike Mt. Megunticook.  The first and last stanzas of the Millay poem Renassence are a description of the view from the top.

    Primo in Rockland is an amazing restaurant.  The lighthouses in Rockland and Owls Head are really nice.

    There are ferry tours out of Portland Rockland and Lincolnville. The best beaches are at the state parks – Popham, Reid, and Pemaquid.  Popham has white sand and a Revolutionary war fort. Pemaquid has a beautiful lighthouse.  Reid is my favorite because I went there as a kid. Sandy beach, lovely trails, and lots of tide pools and ledges to walk on.

    If Five Islands lobster is open – go!  It’s just down the road from Reid. You need to byob but it’s a perfect place for seafood.  There are three shacks on a wharf. One has fried seafood, the second has lobster steamers and corn, and the third has ice cream. Views are beautiful.

  52. 52.

    MomSense

    @CaseyL:

    If he goes that far north he can check out Jasper Beach in Cutler and I think Eastport’s pirate festival is coming up

  55. 55.

    MomSense

    @Steve in the ATL:

    If you decide to go to Acadia you may want to check their website before you leave because they switched to a reservation system this season.  I’m not sure how it works.

  57. 57.

    FastEdD

    @brendancalling: I taught high school for 34 years before I retired. Many many fond memories of the kids, and I’m still in touch with a few many years later. Not one of us teachers got any sleep the night before the first day back. I don’t know why that is, but even the grizzled old veterans were nervous. Go get ‘em!

  58. 58.

    CaseyL

    @MomSense: Pirate festival?? Oh, man, I wish I’d been there for that.

    Speaking of bats: I had one fly into my house a couple years after I first moved in.  Came in through the open sliding glass door to the deck, across the living room, and straight upstairs.  I was on the phone, saw all this, hastily ended the call, and trotted upstairs. I found the bat in the spare room, hanging upside down from a wall molding.

    Conundrum: I adore bats, and would have been happy to let the little guy stay, but I also at the time had two cats who would have thought the bat was the best toy ever.  So for everyone’s sake, the bat had to be detached from the wall and put outside.

    Second conundrum: How do I do that, exactly?

    I called a friend who told me how to gently get a bat off the wall and outside, and I’m sharing this with you all, just in case:

    What you do when a bat is in your house, hopefully peacefully asleep within reach:

    1. Open the door you want the bat to exit from.

    2. Get a cardboard tube, like from inside a toilet paper or paper towel roll.

    2. Crumple up newspaper and stuff it into one end of the tube.

    3. Put the open end of the tube directly under the bat.

    4. Using a spatula – ideally, a wooden one – and not your bare hands, gently detach the bat from its perch, using the spatula to lift its feet off whatever they’re clinging to.

    5. The bat will fall into the tube, and be stopped by the crumpled paper.  You now have a few seconds before the bat wakes up fully.

    6. Take the tube-with-bat outside, and turn the tube so the open end is pointing down.

    7. Bat will awaken, slide down tube into mid air, and fly away.

    That is exactly what I did, exactly what the bat did, and all was well.

  59. 59.

    HumboldtBlue

    @CaseyL:

    I did not expect, on a late summer Sunday evening, to learn about how to corral and then release a bat. In fact, all these bat stories have been interesting, it’s as if we have created a mini bat-ch of anecdotes about bats.

    (yes, I’ve been drinking)

  61. 61.

    CaseyL

    @HumboldtBlue: It’s like Hints From Heloise, but for dealing with wildlife in your house😊

    We could put together a book, or another BJ calendar: Bats I Have Encountered.

  62. 62.

    James E Powell

    @brendancalling:

    Tomorrow, I start at my new high school with my first classroom.

    From one teacher to another, I wish you way more than good luck.

    First classroom at this new school or first classroom ever?

  63. 63.

    NutmegAgain

    @geg6: My folks were friends with [famous American poet of 20th c. & his wife]. They used to go up to their summer place near Mt Chocorua in NH. At some point they stopped using the upstairs–bats had gotten into the house and lodged up there, and they just stopped using the upstairs… like, for years.

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