Definitely not a slow news week.
Thank you @Brotherjones_ for posting about this and raising attention to this. To every journalist & media outlet — this should be on your front page tomorrow and should be the lead headline. This isn’t normal. But it’s not random. Be alarmed & call this hate out. Now. https://t.co/oyoyHIuwuT
— Victor Shi (@Victorshi2020) February 17, 2024
I am still trying to wrap my head around someone willing to sacrifice themselves like this, with a sure and certain death, but with the when and the how a mystery. Shocking amount of bravery, and I can only imagine how his wife is feeling right now.
The Russian Embassy in London last night.
In other news…
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco and Estonian Secretary General Tõnis Saar announced today at the Munich Security Conference the transfer of nearly $500,000 in forfeited Russian funds for the purpose of providing aid to Ukraine. The funds were forfeited by the United States following the breakup of an illegal procurement network attempting to import into Russia a high-precision, U.S.-origin machine tool with uses in the defense and nuclear proliferation sectors. Additionally, on Wednesday, Feb. 14, a citizen of Latvia charged criminally in connection with the procurement scheme pleaded guilty to violating U.S. export laws and regulations.
This transfer is the first of its kind from the United States to a foreign ally for the express purpose of assisting Ukraine, and the second time the Justice Department’s Task Force KleptoCapture has made confiscated Russian assets available for Ukraine—having provided $5.4 million in forfeited funds last year to the State Department for the support of Ukrainian war veterans. The confiscated funds are being transferred to Estonia since under current authorities, the facts of this case do not allow for a direct transfer to Ukraine. Estonia will use the funds for a project to expedite damage assessments and critical repairs to the Ukrainian electrical distribution and transmission system, which have been purposefully targeted by Russian forces.
It is the first time the U.S. will transfer funds to a foreign ally for the explicit purpose of assisting Ukraine and comes as foreign aid for the embattled nation has stalled in Congress.
The funds are being transferred to Estonia because current authorities do not allow for a direct transfer to Ukraine. According to deputy attorney general Lisa Monaco, the funds will be used for a project designed to streamline damage assessments of Ukraine’s electrical transmission and distribution systems.
“This is an incremental step toward justice and restoration. But it is a necessary step. And it blazes a new trail towards combatting Russia’s ongoing brutality,” said Monaco in remarks prepared for delivery at the Munich Security Conference in Germany.
“The Department of Justice will continue pursuing creative solutions to ensure the Ukrainian people can respond and rebuild. Dollar by dollar. House by house. Town by town,” Monaco added, noting that the administration would not wait for Congress, but rather would use existing authorities to provide assistance to Ukraine.
BREAKING: DOJ, the day after Alexei Navalny died, just announced that they have transferred nearly $500,000 in forfeited Russian funds to Estonia to help Ukraine fight Russian aggression — the first time this has ever been done. This is really big & good news.
— Victor Shi (@Victorshi2020) February 17, 2024
Day after Navalny’s death, DOJ announces in a press release:
“Justice Department Transfers Approximately $500,000 in Forfeited Russian Funds to Estonia for Benefit of Ukraine” https://t.co/KrMrA96vBq
— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) February 17, 2024
I definitely like the sound of this. I’m seem to recall that Trump had something like 30 days from the E. Jean Carroll ruling before she could start trying to collect, but I’m not 100% sure on that. So many cases, so many details.
How Trump will pay the $ half billion in new court judgments? It will be complicated: He surely has bank liens on his property and signed a personal guaranty for the Deutsche Bank loans, and may also have liquidity requirements to maintain the loans.
— Andrew Weissmann (weissmann11 on Threads)🌻 (@AWeissmann_) February 17, 2024
This would be funny if it weren’t so true.
Trump argument in Supreme Court re presidential immunity: Make Assassination Great Again.
— Andrew Weissmann (weissmann11 on Threads)🌻 (@AWeissmann_) February 17, 2024
What’s everybody up to on this fine Sunday morning? Weather-wise, we have sun, and beautiful snow on the ground, which to me is the only redeeming thing about winter.
Open thread.
WaterGirl
I kind of miss Sundays from the old days when there was a blogger who used to summarize the Sunday political shows. Brutal and funny, and you came away with a sense of who was on what show and what was discussed; what was good and what was bullshit.
I can’t recall his name, but I know one of you guys surely will.
TBone
@WaterGirl: prolly not who you have in mind, but this guy is always good! Doesn’t miss a trick.
https://showercapblog.com/
In particular:
https://showercapblog.com/moses-supposes-erroneously-yes-again/
Turgidson
But didn’t you hear?!?!
BIDEN IS OLD!! 😱
sab
@Turgidson: So am I and I still vote!
Lymie
“Dollar by dollar. House by house. Town by town”
Karma is my boyfriend – Karma’s gonna track you downStep by step from town to town
oldgold
Aaron Rupar is doing a pretty good job of covering the Sunday news programs.
You can check it out here: https://twitter.com/atrupar?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
JoyceH
Saw a news story yesterday that Denmark is sending Ukraine its artillery. ALL its artillery. Said words to the effect of “we’re not using it”. Gotta love ‘em.
NotMax
Weekend long watch: Vroom vroom!
;)
MattF
Brr. Was I always so sensitive to cold? The thermostat setting that’s now barely warm enough to keep me from shivering is 78°.
OzarkHillbilly
@MattF: 78 ??? That would have e buck naked in a bathtub filled with cold water!
Are you related to my wife?
frosty
@NotMax: Go back and check the thread with your birthday cake candle discussion. DesertFriar at the end suggested how you can do 196 years with 8 candles in binary. Go for it!
MattF
@OzarkHillbilly: Fortunately, my heat pump is working well. Maybe I’ll save money in the summer.
Delk
The ‘truckers’ in those Boycott NYC posters look like an off-off-off Broadway production of A Chorus Line.
RaflW
Very minor compared to Nazis marching in Nashville, but I noticed yesterday that Keystone ski resort announced on FB that March 2-3 is Queer Pride weekend (props that corporate giant Vail Resorts went with ‘Queer’ this year).
Well, the haters flooded Keystone’s FB thread. What that says to me, 46 years after the first Aspen Gay Ski Week, is that the GOP has re-normalized open homophobia in ways that would have been far less common a few years ago.
The good thing was, after the initial wave of butthurt from yokels in places like Indiana, Texas and S. Carolina, random ski fans (many of them straight by the looks of their profiles) were calling the haters out – often with humor and not being shy at all.
Keystone’s social media team also jumped on the comments to make it clear they weren’t backing down, and that Pride weekend welcomes everyone.
Kristine
Pumpkin pancakes for breakfast. Added pumpkin, yogurt, and spices to a Kodiak Cakes mix. Took a while to cook through—I really did add too much thick liquid stuff. But they were good.
Need some ingredients to make this Smitten Kitchen cauliflower soup. Thought about getting them today, but I can’t get excited about grocery shopping on Sunday. I’ll do it tomorrow. Besides, the chest freezer is so packed that I could probably live off of it for a couple of months with the occasional jaunt for veg, fruit, and dairy.
At least it’s sunny. Windy and chilly, but sunny.
RaflW
@MattF: Do you have a CO alarm? One of the symptoms of mild carbon monoxide poisoning is feeling chilled.
SiubhanDuinne
@WaterGirl:
I think it was called Bobblehead(s) (?), but I can’t remember who wrote it.
OzarkHillbilly
@MattF: I’m looking into getting mini splits for our house. Heat and AC, all in one!
Layer8Problem
@WaterGirl: Sounds like Jason Linkins in the Huffington Post back when.
Mike E
I was driving yesterday and heard Mary Louise Kelly interview an author who covers Putin’s Mafia empire (it’s the only time I listen to NPR, I avoid it normally) and she asked him [paraphrasing], “Didn’t Navaltny ask for this when he returned to Russia?” He responded in a way that was thoughtful and measured, ending with something like “That’s what a true patriot does.”
I wish I was Freaky Friday’d with the author at that moment so I could tell her to cover Putin’s orange puppet with > an ounce of integrity she seems to lack.
Jeffro
I’m with Ozark, temp-wise: we’ve managed to get used to having our thermostat at 62 in the winter.
And by “we”, I mean, “Mrs. Fro”…I’ve always been good with lower temps!
MattF
@RaflW: Yes, I do. We had a CO scare in the condo a few months ago (what’s that beeping behind that wall?) so we all got plug-in CO detectors.
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
Livin’ the McDLT life.
:)
Sure Lurkalot
@oldgold: Without a Twitter account, clicking on a link just leads to a bunch of jumbled tweets from 2 or 3 years ago. The last Nitter instance that I was able to use (freedit.eu) died today. Even there, videos wouldn’t play and Aaron Rupar’s feed is almost 100% videos. Elon likes his paid for bot traffic and nazi sympathizers.
lowtechcyclist
@NotMax:
Gotta say, I never bother clicking through to YouTube links anymore unless I’ve got a very clear idea of what’s waiting for me.
After I click, first I’ve got to wait through at least 15 seconds of commercial, and only then do I find out if it was worth my time to click in the first place.
Not to say you shouldn’t keep on doing what you’re doing, this is JMHO which you should feel free to ignore.
Jeffro
weaselly, cowardly scum, all of them: trump’s still mad at some conservatives for not backing his lies…and they’re afraid to speak out about it.
“Unclear” = “we’re not quite sure to the degree which he will pick judges based on how strongly they support his thirst for vengeance”
These fucking people will never, EVER, put their country first.
…something something denial something river in Egypt something…
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: We’re in the process of getting them installed now. The mrs HATES the high wall mount units, so we’re swapping them out for low wall units. For a cost, of course. Make sure you’ll be OK with what goes in. If you can see an installed unit, so much the better. We didn’t, and weren’t happy with the visual space they take up, especially in small rooms. Go with ceiling mounted wherever you can.
Also be aware that they do not humidifier in winter, and right now I’m betting your dewpoint is in the teens, making the indoor humidity way low. Gotta get that up somehow.
MattF
@Sure Lurkalot: Yep. Lotsa bots on Twitter. One might even suppose that Musk is not as bot-innocent as he claims to be.
OzarkHillbilly
@Jeffro: My wife is a self proclaimed “Mediterranean lizard” no temp is too warm for her.
@NotMax: I’m surprised JA hasn’t sued to have that removed.
CaseyL
@WaterGirl:
Someone – can’t remember if it was Eschaton or Daily Kos – used to review the Sunday gabfests under the heading “Document the Atrocities.” But that has to be, good heavens, 25 or more years ago.
Kos still has the occasional pundit reaction roundup, but mostly of social media posts these days.
I really wonder who’s still watching those Sunday things. The youngs sure as hell aren’t. If someone is politically aware and active, the gabfests are neither informative nor interesting. If someone is not politically aware and active, then there’s no reason they’d tune in at all. Do they even have an audience outside the punditariat?
bluefoot
F-cking Nazis. They all need to be punched in the face. As well as all the enablers who happily let them walk by. Cowards, all.
Good on the guy who was yelling at them, calling them out. If more people did that publicly, we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re in now. But god forbid we aren’t “civil.”
And I feel for all the sorority sisters and their loved ones and allies who had to be confronted with this shit when they stepped outside. Nothing like coming out of a happy event to be faced with a group who would happily kill you, with a bunch of bystanders who would passively watch that happen.
Baud
@CaseyL:
I abandoned media a long time ago, but I respect the people who put in the work to document the atrocities. It’s important to keep a watchful eye on things.
laura
@Mike E: might Mary Louise Kelly have been speaking with Masha Gessen? They have covered Putin’s Russia and the war in Ukraine since forever (pre-Crimea invasion)? Masha is a regular contributor to the New Yorker Magazine and here’s a link to their most recent article: https://www.newyorker.com/news/postscript/the-death-of-alexey-navalny-putins-most-formidable-opponent
I have the blues so bad this last week- just absolutely gutted by the abject failure to pass funding for Ukraine. Disgust at my fellow American’s gleeful slide into facism dragging our so called democratic values through the gutter for all the world to see.
Another Scott
@Sure Lurkalot: nitter.unixfox.eu still works. But you have to get the URL for a tweet with a video and convert it back to twitter.com to play videos.
It’s a pain, but it beats signing up for an account at the Nazi bar.
Cheers,
Scott.
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: I’ve seen them, a high mount is fine with us, which seeing as the bottom 3 1/2′ is poured concrete is a good thing for us. We currently have baseboard heaters on the interior walls (which we don’t use much) and a wood burner (for which I have a cast iron “teapot” that I keep filled with water. As far as ceiling mounted, no thanx. More cost for little to no benefit (if you saw our house, you’d understand.
Nukular Biskits
Good mornin, y’all!
Low 40s this morning. Already walked the dog, just had hearty Southern breakfast of sausage, bacon, eggs and GRITS!!! Only thing missing was homemade biskits. 🥺
Only one member of my congressional delegation has even mentioned the death of Alexei Navalny on their social media accounts or official webpages: US Senator Roger Wicker. The others, US Rep. Mike Ezell & US Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith have had nothing to say about him or Russia. Ezell has been pounding the table, demanding POTUS take a cognitive test while Hyde-Smith is whining about the administration’s delayed rollout of FAFSA … without mentioning WHY the rollout has been delayed.
Anyhoo, Wicker is definitely not a Putin fanboy like so many other Republicans. This begs the question of why he continues to support Donald Trump. This is even more interesting as Wicker, definitely a defense hawk, has refused to denounce Trump’s greenlighting Russian attacks on NATO member states.
trollhattan
@MattF:
We swapped the main gas furnace/AC for a heat pump a year ago. Central, forced-air system. Been tracking usage and billing since. Electricity consumption went up a few % and total bill remained about the same. Gas consumption dropped 30% and that bill stayed the same, too.
Punchline: electricity is the local consumer-owned utility and gas is PG&E. Got to keep those shareholders whole.
Kay
@JoyceH:
I’ve spent some time in Denmark and it hits …differently over there – Putin is a real and present danger to them. They’re so small – ony 6 million people- they really feel threatened.
Dan B
@OzarkHillbilly: We’ve had Mini Splits since 2010, love them! My partner’s big orange kitteh loves them too. There are locales near them that are warm like fireplaces have warm spots. There will be Kats! The coolth in summer is equally wondrous.
Sister Golden Bear
@OzarkHillbilly: FWIW, I was able to install mine in the attic, and run ductwork like a standard HVAC (helps that I’ve got a very small house).
Note: The outside part was still outside obviously, I’m referring to the part that’s typically mounted on an interior wall(s).
sixthdoctor
This is the type of support I want to see from Democrats, and they can adjust their language as necessary.
Steeplejack
@Sure Lurkalot:
I saw that freedit.eu got nuked. Bummer. I’m still having success with nitter.unixfox.eu, but who knows for how long.
MattF
@trollhattan: I had a significant heat pump repair about a month ago. Our HVAC in the condo each have an indoor air handler and an outdoor rooftop unit connected by refrigerant pipes. My rooftop unit developed a leak, all the coolant leaked out, my HVAC system went to electrical heating— which is about double the cost. It all got fixed, but diagnosis and repair cost around $2K.
zhena gogolia
@sixthdoctor: Hahaha
OzarkHillbilly
@Sister Golden Bear: We don’t have much in the way of “attic space” and the only access is thru the hole I put the whole house fan in. And that reaches only the “attic” in the main house. The attic in the “wing” is inaccessible unless I make a hole for it. Which I have thought of doing from time to time for adding more insulation but then I think of my swimming in insulation and decide it’s probably not worth it. (it’s a mostly unused room)
Shalimar
@MattF: I sweat at 75-76, so that is definitely not me. But we do keep our house at 70 in the winter now when it used to be 68, so getting more sensitive to cold. I would love to get to the point where I need a lot less air-conditioning in the summer.
Paul in KY
@JoyceH: Go Denmark! Kudos to them!
H.E.Wolf
If you’re shivering everywhere, not just at home, it’s a question for a medical practitioner.
If it’s only at home, could your house’s thermostat/heating system be malfunctioning, and reporting an indoor temperature that isn’t valid?
Baud
@sixthdoctor:
👍
NotMax
@lowtechcyclist
Any number of ways or tools to zap or bypass the ads.
Can honestly say have never even once encountered an extraneous ad on YouTube so tend to forget it may not be the same for others.
John S.
@Dan B:
I installed infrared heating panels on my ceilings when I bought my house 2 years ago. They are saving me a fortune since the only heating previously installed were baseboard heaters.
It’s certainly an unconventional way to go, but they work great. It’s like someone turned on sunshine inside the house, and they keep a constant temperature rather effortlessly.
ETA: As an added bonus, I got them from a manufacturer right here in WA. I drove up to Bellingham to get them from the factory myself.
https://www.ducoterra.com/
smith
@Sure Lurkalot: You can check for still-working Nitter instances here
ETA: And you can find more options here
trollhattan
@MattF:
Ouch. Hopefully a one-off.
Cost to repair on our old system kept increasing with each event–the last straw was a failed furnace blower motor that had to be ordered from the factory, with a couple hundred “expedite” bucks added so as to ship it faster from Tennessee. Furnace failed on New Year’s Eve so we were…motivated. That was a couple grand when the dust settled.
Limped along for another year than made the swap. We’d rid ourselves of gas entirely, but a second furnace, two water heaters and a gas range standing in the way. New system is SO much nicer. Better heating and cooling, vastly quieter.
Miss Bianca
@TBone: I love this guy. Thanks for pointing him out to us.
TriassicSands
Well, maybe not completely passively. They’d surely be hard at work taking videos for posting on line to entertain their friends.
Mike E
@laura: Thanks for the link… I went to the interview in question:
Rufus T Firefly
Folks, this is a BFD decision from the Alabama Supreme Court: IVF embryos are people covered by the AL wrongful death act. This came out Friday and so far I have only seen it covered by Drum.
https://jabberwocking.com/alabama-puts-the-ivf-business-out-of-business/
Nelle
@Jeffro: I’m getting tired of reading “what if” pieces about Trump winning. They’ve got the megaphone in their hands to be very clear about who he is now, right now. They could help preventing a “what if.” What? Does the “what if” give the writer a titilating thrill of doom?
Jackie
@sixthdoctor: I ♥️ Fetterman!!!
cain
The response to Jones Twitter post is filled with racists.
He should get the fuck out of that platform.
CaseyL
I thought long and hard about getting mini-splits, just for the AC part as my electric baseboard heaters work just fine.
But the quote was twice as much as I was prepared to spend, because my electric panel would need to be upgraded.
Since all I wanted was the AC part, and I felt guilty about wanting it at all (bc of the environmental impact of AC) I may finally unbox and try the evaporative cooler (aka “swamp cooler”) I got a few years ago, the next time summer in Seattle reaches unbearable temperatures.
Has anyone here tried using evaporative cooling in moderately high humidity? Does it just plain not work at all, or does setting up a dehumidifer in the same room help at all?
Baud
@Nelle:
Yes.
OzarkHillbilly
@CaseyL: My only experience with it was in the desert.
Jackie
@Shalimar:
Same. It’s funny; my nose turns into an ice cube at 68 degrees LOL
In the summer I keep the AC at 80, and dress appropriately – shorts and tanks. If it gets cooler I find myself pulling on a lightweight sweatshirt.
trollhattan
@Rufus T Firefly:
Note to self: Do NOT trip over the freezer power cord, again.
Up next: eggs.
Gin & Tonic
@SiubhanDuinne: Neither my memory nor my google-fu seem up to snuff today, but yes, there was a blogger who did a more-or-less play-by-play of (at least) Meet the Press, in the era when Dave Gregory was host. It was very inside-baseballish, but hilarious, and I think was called The Bobblehead Chronicles. But as I said, I can’t at this point find any links in that direction. I think they’d sometimes even post here, but I’m also coming up empty on that. Sounds like a project for Another Scott.
Miss Bianca
@Jackie: My God, who are all you people who have heating systems that will take you up to 70 degrees routinely and with no work involved? We spend all day shoveling wood into the woodstove to get us *maybe* to 65 downstairs at the end of the day.
Admittedly, the woodstove upstairs heats up quite a bit faster – up there, we can go from 57 to 70 in a matter of a few hours.
Another Scott
@Gin & Tonic: It’s been driving me nuts since WG mentioned it this AM. I can’t find it either.
It should be listed on old blogrolls somewhere, but none I’ve checked (even at archive.org) have given it up to me yet.
Very frustrating when the old noggin is uncooperative…
Cheers,
Scott.
Salty Sam .
That was Charlie Pierce’s beat back in the day- Monday morning wrap up of the Sunday news shows. He dropped it when the hypocrisy became apparent on a daily basis ( that was his stated reason- I believe he could no longer force himself to watch the bullshit).
trollhattan
@CaseyL:
This article includes a temp/humidity graph for swamp cooling.
https://piec.com/5-ways-humidity-affects-evaporative-swamp-cooling/
Last Arizona visit I saw the Weather Service forecast included some sort of evaporative cooling index. The good old “monsoon season” rendered them ineffective at times, galling considering monsoon season is during the hottest part of the year.
Jeffro
@Nelle: ??
would you rather the writer NOT be sounding the alarm?
if you have a chance, read the piece. Many, many GOP sources refused to comment (which in itself is a story) but there’s a lot there that could help wake up some of our blessed normies
Jackie
@Miss Bianca: I remember those years and don’t miss them at all! I DO take joy in enjoying the wood burning stove as an accessory, rather than the only heat source. 😊
CaseyL
@trollhattan:
Thank you; that’s incredibly good and helpful information!
In Seattle, I am most likely to need something other than a fan and thermal curtains once the temps go into the high 90s. At that point, even the mere 10 degree difference would be a relief.
And, yes, dehumidifiers DO help swamp coolers work better, so I better get one of those, too.
Kelly
Mom fell yesterday. She landed on her left elbow. She has a crack in the knob at the top of her humerus that fits into the shoulder socket. The emergency doc put it in a sling and prescribed oxycodone. We’ll see an orthopedist as soon as we can. ER doc suspects a sling and pain medication is the best we’ll be able to do.
Mom is 87. This is her fifth health setback since January 2023. She had been getting the around the house well with her walker. She lost her balance backwards. The walker doesn’t support that direction. She really wants to stay in her home of 31 years. Our home is next door but I’ve mostly lived at her house since September. Mrs Kelly and the cats moved here in January. The house has high vaulted ceilings and open beams. A lot of cat accessible high spots that they enjoy.
Salty Sam .
No, it was the former US ambassador to Russia (didn’t catch the name… Mike something?). He knew Navalny well and held him in great esteem.
cain
@laura: it’s been a great news cycle. Things are going to improve. It’s going to be a hell of a fight though.
John S.
@CaseyL:
The way I’ve been dealing with the odd unbearably hot Seattle summer day is with a Toshiba portable AC.
We also use dual fan window units to suck in the cool air at night to get temps back down to the high 60s so that even on hot days, we maybe get up into the mid 70s in most of the house. Except upstairs where the bedrooms are, which is where we use the portable AC maybe 5-10 times per summer lately.
cain
@Rufus T Firefly: JFC .. they are literally going to drive families out of there .. those who can leave and I reckon jail a lot of women too.
Glidwrith
@Sure Lurkalot: Rupar posts in Threads as well
eclare
@Kelly:
I’m sorry about your mom. Best of luck with an ortho appointment, hopefully there is another option besides the sling.
CaseyL
@John S.: Thanks for the tip!
I don’t have a portable AC, but do already have the swamp cooler. I may as well give it a spin if we get another Summer From Hell and see if it does any good.
Ordinary summers – that is, when the temp “only” gets to the low-mid 90s – I can make do with thermal curtains and box fans.
The thermal curtains made a real difference last year, to my pleased surprise. I had hung them to keep heat in during the winter; hadn’t realized they were almost as good at keeping heat out during the summer!
eclare
@CaseyL:
I’ll have to check out thermal curtains, I have French doors facing west in my living room, and in the summer my regular shades don’t do the trick keeping out the sun.
Another Scott
@Gin & Tonic: @Another Scott:
Found it! I knew it was “bobble-something…”
The Bobblespeak Translations at MoonshinePatriot.Blogspot.com Last entry is January 8, 2017.
New stuff on nitter.unixfox.eu/Bobblespeak
(Found it via searching the archive here for “MTP”)
Whew!
Cheers,
Scott.
RaflW
@CaseyL: Dehumidifiers throw off heat as part of the process, so the net effect of a swamp cooler + a dehumidifier may be quite limited, and use more electricity.
My off the cuff suggestion is one high EER, small BTU window unit for your bedroom? Getting enough sleep, and the chance for one’s body to cool for a stretch of time, can be enough to make it through heat waves with a modicum of comfort, but with fairly light electric use.
Our lake cabin didn’t have central a/c, and we bought 5K and 6K window units for the two bedrooms used the most. They’re decently quiet and make all the difference on humid midwestern nights.
That said, the forced air furnace is 22 years old, and really noisy, so I am hoping to switch to a heat pump + aux. gas system if I can find an experienced contractor who really groks these hybrid high efficiency setups.
John S.
@CaseyL: Oh yeah, window coverings make a huge difference for me too. Especially for the bedrooms upstairs that get direct sunlight without any benefit from the tree cover that shades the rest of the house.
I swear if my house wasn’t in the forest surrounded by trees, I’m pretty sure I would not have been able to handle the last couple of summers without having central A/C.
evodevo
@Miss Bianca: Yep…I hear ya. We have a wood-burning furnace (located outside) and spend virtually every day from Oct. to Mar. cutting firewood on our hundred acres. Well, at least we’re outside exercising LOL, but I am the one who, this AM when it was 10 degrees outside, had to go out and start up the almost dead furnace for the day. Luckily we have stockpiled a lot of wood in the shed, so I didn’t have to split any on the spot. You city slickers with yer gas heat and thermostats and new-fangled heat pumps!! On the other hand, the wood is FREE and I calculate we have saved many thousands in LP gas charges over 40 years..
lowtechcyclist
@NotMax:
Yeah, just one more thing to have to learn about in order to…what? Not have to watch an ad in order to follow a blind link? Easier to just not bother to click on blind links.
Paul in KY
@Miss Bianca: You need to come into the mid 20th century :-)
Paul in KY
@Kelly: Sorry to hear that. Please make sure she properly hydrates. Best of luck to her and y’all!
lowtechcyclist
I’ve known for awhile that only something like 1-2% of American households are heated and cooled by heat pumps, but it still weirds me out. This house had heat pump HVAC when we bought it in 1998, and it was familiar territory to me by then: the apartment complex I was living in in 1982 put us on heat pumps when it went condo that year, then the apartment I lived in in Newport News for three years in the late 1980s had heat pumps for each unit, as did the apartment my wife and I lived in in Florence, SC for two years in the early 1990s.
We got a new heat pump a year and a half ago after the old one died 12 years into a 10-year warranty. It’s been using about 15% fewer Kwh than the old one did so far, so there have apparently been some improvements in efficiency over time.
Jacel
@WaterGirl: How long ago are you thinking of this sort of Sunday Show scrutiny? Perhaps Media Whores Online?
bluefoot
@TriassicSands:
Ain’t that the truth. Lynching postcards for the modern age.
WaterGirl
@SiubhanDuinne: @Layer8Problem:
Bobbleheads sound familiar, so it cold be that. Definitely not Jason Linkins.
I could definitely pick the name on a multiple choice test!
Miss Bianca
@Paul in KY: We do have electric baseboard heaters at the Mountain Hacienda, but they are hella expensive to run, so they are on timers to click on and off early in the morning – just enough to warm up the tile floors to get moving. :)
WaterGirl
@lowtechcyclist: That’s how I feel too. Life’s too short to sit through a fucking YouTube commercial if I don’t know what’s on the other side.
I miss all of Humboltblue’s links, some of which are probably good, but my days of clicking blind youtube links are over.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@bluefoot: Punching Nazis is wrong. Use a baseball bat instead. That way you don’t hurt your hand.
WaterGirl
@CaseyL: This guy was super snarky as he described the shows, so awesome and funny but you also go to know the subjects that were being talked about.
WaterGirl
@MattF: Could it be that your thermostat isn’t registering the right temperature?
I have a fan and a ceramic heater that both tell you the temperature in the room. Might be worth checking?
edit: and I see that H.E. Wolf had the same thought at #48.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: After Subaru Dianne suggested Bobblehead upthread, Bobblehead Chronicles popped into my head. I googled and it’s like it’s been wiped off the map.
I even tried the Wayback Machine and Bobblehead Chronicles. No luck there, either. But I’m pretty sure Bobblehead Chronicles is right!
CaseyL
@RaflW:
My house is a sort-of A-Frame townhouse (“sort-of” because the neighbor unit forms the other half of the slant; our interior connecting wall is straight). The complex looks like a bunch of ski chalets. I love my little house dearly, but one of its oddities is that it has no conventional windows.
I have sliding glass doors off most of my rooms (leading to balconies or decks), and enormous windows that either don’t open at all or are tall and skinny and open-sideways. Only the kitchen has “normal” rectangular windows. There’s no place to put a window unit, and a portable AC would probably have to drain into the bathtub.
ETA: The complex was built in 1969, when no one ever dreamed Seattle would need AC.
WaterGirl
@Kelly: Oh, that’s so worrisome about your mom. Big hugs.
WaterGirl
@Another Scott: Yes! Bobblehead Transalations!
thank you!
zhena gogolia
@Salty Sam .: McFaul.
Another Scott
@WaterGirl: Bobble
headspeak. Bobblehead will throw you off the track and you’ll never find it – too many plastic dolls!!:-)
Glad to help.
Cheers,
Scott.
Gretchen
@Rufus T Firefly: OMG! I have seen other things that they’re going after IVF. A conservative friend sent me an article that was a mish-mash of worries about trans athletes and the like, but mentioned IVF in passing. I don’t think these bozos realize how commonly used IVF is, how desperate people are to get pregnant by the time they get there, and how long it’s been used. I know 5 people who’ve had babies this way, including 2 IVF babies now in their 30’s having babies of their own. And that’s just the people I know well enough to have shared their reproductive problems with me. It was a highly emotional journey for all of them and they were desperate to have a baby. Good luck, Republicans, going into that buzz-saw of emotion among people who can afford thousands of dollars to have a baby.
Gretchen
@Kelly: I have had that same break twice, and a sling and Oxycodone were all that was needed. It’s important to keep it as still as possible, though. I slept propped up on the couch for a few weeks. Very painful at first but doesn’t take long to feel better. My husband, on the other hand, kept moving it and ended up needing surgery. Very common old-person injury.
Origuy
@Kelly: I broke my shoulder in the same place. I was skiing at Heavenly Valley at the top and had to ski all the way down to the lodge. I was a lot younger than your mother, but I healed fairly quickly. My sympathies to her.
Gin & Tonic
@Another Scott: I knew you’d get it.
Gin & Tonic
@Origuy: I did the same thing at Alta, but I decided to have ski patrol take me down. Only trouble was, since I had to drive back down LCC, they couldn’t give me any narcotics.
Gretchen
@Gin & Tonic: that must have been tough. I broke mine falling over my dog – he backed into me while on a walk. I had to walk home but was pretty impatient with my son dawdling about taking me to the ER. I wanted drugs NOW. Fortunately the ER was quick with them when we got there. I don’t do well with pain.
mrmoshpotato
It’s 43° by the great lake. Definitely no snow, but I could totally go for a wild thunderstorm.
Kelly
I jammed my shoulder like that crashing skiing. Never broke and was ok in a day or so. I’ll have her give the recliner chair a try. Fortunately she only weighs 100 lbs so I can manage helping her move.
different-church-lady
Our failed media would really prefer it to cover rising Nazism as a hot new social trend, but it’s not quite popular enough. Yet.
wjca
Baseball bats have better uses. Stick with rebar. Cheaper, too.
Princess
@Rufus T Firefly: So if you’re in Alabama and there’s a fire and you need to run and you can carry with you either a) the living baby or b) the tray of twenty embryos you’d better take the tray and let the baby burn to death.
catclub
@lowtechcyclist:
 
This is the problem when your housing stock is not routinely devastated by war – old, energy inefficient, housing stock.
My house was heat pump hvac in 1995.
Paul in KY
@Miss Bianca: I used to have baseboard heaters (or what I called ‘poor people heat’). The only thing I liked about them was you could turn them off in rooms you hardly went in. I had a couple of bedrooms that you could hang meat in! Upgraded to forced air/ductwork once I got some change.
Paul in KY
@CaseyL: Cut a hole in the wall and keep it in there all year round. Professionally done, of course.
Paul in KY
@Origuy: I had a ‘yard sale’ fall at a ski resort and put a bad bone bruise on my knee. Had to crawl around and gather up all my gear and then ski down on one ski. Met a dude that saw it happen while he was in the lift. Said it looked really wild. Was spinning around in air, etc. etc.
That retired me from skiing.
NotMax
@Paul in KY
Trivia:
Kitchens during the reign of Henry VII used to hang meat in his bedchamber. Notorious for being stingy when it came to heating, it was deemed the consistently coldest room in the castle.
Gretchen
@Princess: I’ve asked these folks who insist that there’s no moral difference between a born baby and a fertilized egg this question. They never, ever answer.
SteverinoCT
@Kelly: My wife slipped and fell in the driveway on Mother’s Day last year: dislocated her shoulder and fractured a bone up in there somewhere. Pain meds and sling, and after the bone healed, therapy. She was complaining about discomfort for at least six or eight months. FWIW. She’s only sixty-five. Hope your mom does better!
Chris T.
@Gretchen:
I had no idea it was that common, but osteoporosis issues make it make sense. (This is a good reason to do weight-bearing exercises from age 50 onward, to preserve bone strength.)
I found some very comprehensive information here: https://www.orthobullets.com/trauma/1015/proximal-humerus-fractures
Gretchen
@Chris T.: the first time I had that injury I was only 36, but I had nursed 4 babies in the previous few years and was nursing twins at the time, so I think my calcium stores were at rock bottom. The second time it happened, I was past 60 and so was my husband, and I’m not great at drinking milk or taking calcium.
Gretchen
@Kelly: sleeping in the recliner chair will probably be a good option. Let us know how she does.
Paul in KY
@NotMax: Can believe that. He was a supreme tightwad. Henry VIII spent it all.