It is raining, 50 degrees, I am cold, and I want to go back to the desert.
Open Thread
by John Cole| 69 Comments
This post is in: John Cole Presents "This Fucking Old House"
Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.
American history and black history cannot be separated.
This blog will pay for itself.
Hot air and ill-informed banter
They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.
Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.
Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.
Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.
Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity
Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?
Usually wrong but never in doubt
Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.
A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.
Fight them, without becoming them!
Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?
I’m more christian than these people and i’m an atheist.
GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.
You cannot love your country only when you win.
Damn right I heard that as a threat.
Books are my comfort food!
Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.
It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.
It’s the corruption, stupid.
“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”
schrodingers_cat
You don’t like rain? Monsoon season is the best if you are in the tropics. Its a season of love. Kalidasa’s Meghdoot is not the only poem that celebrates it.
I miss the monsoon in Mumbai. I have to make do with this instead. That’s my neck of the woods they are walking through.
Professor Bigfoot
49F, grey, rainy, miserable here in the Hall of Fame city. Spring planting is on hold as neither of us wants to go outside in this muck; and of course the roadster’s staying under a roof today. Bleah.
raven
I don’t know if John got this the other day but here it is again from Okracoke Island!
schrodingers_cat
@schrodingers_cat: *Meghdoot (Megh: Cloud, doot: messenger)
schrodingers_cat
@raven: So did you solve the mystery, Indian or Pakistani or neither?
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: Ah, but aren’t the monsoon rains pretty warm?
Truth is, this isn’t so terrible— kinda like Seattle in the winter, and all you really needed there was a good sweater, a Gore-tex (or equivalent) raincoat, and it wasn’t terrible at all. (I guess one can file that under “there is no bad weather, there is only bad clothing”)
But splashing around in a warm summer rain can be wonderful.
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: Warm is relative. They are cooling after the oppressive heat in May. But the temps are around 25 to 30 Celsius.
We would make weekend trips to the mountains in the rainy season (Sahyadris which are a part of the Western Ghats) nearby and ghats are like mesas.
kindness
Seems as if you have a few more years migrating back and forth. It’ll happen in time.
Butch
I wish we’d get up to 50. Cold, windy, and cloudy here in the UP – miserable to be outside.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Glorious sunshine and 61 at the moment in Denver.
MrRoivas
Two people were killed outside of an event hosted by a Jewish museum in DC.
The man who killed them had a keffiyeh on.
He said, “Free Palestine.”
He said, “Globalize the intifada.”
He has told us exactly what motivated him.
He has told us which movement gave him the idea that Jews are evil and killing them is social justice.
There will be more of him.
Suzanne
I’m not too far from Cole, and I have the same 50-degrees-and-raining weather. I love it. I love not being hot, I love not feeling my skin get dry and crusty. I love wearing a soft hoodie.
Jeffro
Despite getting BUCKETS of rain last night, this morning’s walk was a disappointment, wildlife-wise.
Our box turtles seem to have disappeared and our fear is that once again a ‘turtle-napper’ has come through. We had one here a few years ago who had taken dozens of them from area woodlands, to sell them as pets. Fortunately he was busted and is doing 30 months in the federal pen, but the damage had been done – they don’t do well unless they’re returned to the same square mile or so from where they came.
We’ll keep looking!
It does seem like we’re in for a nice day, though. =)
Jackie
All of you complaining about the cold better not show up complaining about the heat when it cranks back on – and you’re living through record breaking heatwaves… //
Paul in KY
@MrRoivas: Assuming he’s guilty, he should get the maximum punishment.
Gin & Tonic
@schrodingers_cat: Go for a walk outside and come back to tell us how it resembles monsoon in Mumbai (I don’t think Mumbai has temps in the mid 40’s.)
MrRoivas
@Paul in KY: he did it on camera. He released a manifesto.
schrodingers_cat
@Gin & Tonic: It feels nice to see the rain outside and not be stuck with oppressive heat indoors.
I am going out to run some errands. And I will be wearing my LLBean Boots and a rain jacket so I will be warm and toasty and look sharp as well. My hair is another story. It does not like humidity.
bbleh
I want to go back to the desert.
Me too! This is nuts.
Cue plaintive wailing from the Eagles.
Stoopid Icelandic heat dome.
@Jackie: Yeah, unfortunately am told long-range forecasts are for an unusually hot & dry summer in the eastern US.
@Gin & Tonic: they do, sometimes. Except Celsius.
mrmoshpotato
Sounds like hot chocolate weather.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Jeffro:
This reminds of back in Central Misery.
It’s high season for Box Turtles Crossing the Road. If one was in the road, we’d stop, pick it up and put it on the other side because there were few things more sad than seeing a crushed turtle on one of red, rurl Misery’s back roads.
RevRick
Since we have been in drought conditions here in the Lehigh Valley, this drenching we’ve received in May has been much appreciated. Everything is so lush and green now. Yay photosynthesis!
Ten Bears
Watching white-caps get closer to topping the seawall, pondering the innocent lack of foresight: everyone who planted oaks & black locusts a hundred years were not thinking a hundred years ahead. Forty-eight degrees and it’s raining sideways about fifty miles an hour
I haven’t been out here long enough to draw conclusion but if I were to hypothesize I’d venture the AMOC really is collapsing and we’ve got a faux mini ice age on our hands …
mappy!
48° and light rain. Great for the Azalea, Fleabane Daisy, Iris, Allium, Chives… Extends the season. Flowers last longer. Rhody buds opening. Strawberries and Black Currants set and on the way.
Vote like your kids lives are on the line.
rikyrah
Not raining..yet
Cold, but I don’t mind.
Have a good day, Cole🤗
mrmoshpotato
@Ten Bears:
Sounds stormy. Are you safe?
schrodingers_cat
@mrmoshpotato: Chai and bhajia weather.
These are even more delicious with the addition of tiny shrimp with transluscent shells that you get during the monsoon.
They Call Me Noni
Here in southern Indiana we have had very few warm days and it is cool, windy and wet again today and will be the entire weekend. Am waiting to finish my outside chores until the weather is a bit more agreeable. Haven’t even unpacked the summer clothes because they haven’t been needed. I just really want some sunshine and I bet we will see little rain this summer.
They Call Me Noni
@schrodingers_cat: Those do look yummy and I love chai.
schrodingers_cat
@They Call Me Noni: They are pretty easy to make if you have (besan) chickpea flour. If you have access to an Indian grocer, it should be pretty easy to find. Many health food stores also carry it. I am sure Whole Paycheck does as well.
tam1MI
Never let it be said that the Gazassholes never accomplished anything.
catclub
and waterproof shoes!
gene108
@Gin & Tonic:
Northern India does get that cold in winter. People will take it over 40°C temps in May.
It’s all relative to what there’s to compare weather to.
Look at Ms. ex-Arizona resident Suzanne’s attitudes to 50°F and raining at the end of May, “I’m not too far from Cole, and I have the same 50-degrees-and-raining weather. I love it. I love not being hot, I love not feeling my skin get dry and crusty. I love wearing a soft hoodie.”
Me? I’ve lived most of my life in the Midwest and East coast. Late May should be the best most temperate weather all year. Highs in the 70’s and 80’s, with relatively low humidity. Enough of the god damn 50 something rainy weather. We had it for the last two months.
It’s time to be in shorts and T-shirts when you go out, and not have to think wearing anything other than shorts and T-shirts.
catclub
they do, but its celsius.
catclub
I saw that the SC deadlocked on a lower court ruling against establishing a religious charter school. Therefore the ruling stands.
I count that as a good thing.
No charter school grifters like religious ones.
Omnes Omnibus
It’s supposed to get up to 58 degrees today here in Madison. And sunny. Mid=60s and sunny for the holiday weekend. I am not complaining. The heat can hold off for as long as possible as far as I am concern. Not interested on living in a desert. At all.
JML
@catclub: seriously. so many charter schools are already grifty AF, last thing we need is to add in religion to the mix. (I’m sure the people of SC would also find a way to exclude Islamic schools from the opportunity too…)
My biggest and consistent gripe about charter schools is how poorly they are able to replicate their success when you remove key leaders from the mix, and how they always pretend that the self-selection aspect doesn’t actually have anything to do with their ability to produced “better” results. That, and the fact that so many people have used the reduced regulation and oversight to flat-out steal public money…
Professor Bigfoot
@They Call Me Noni: I found one pair of shorts, then went out and bought a few more, and then it turned cold again.
“The fundamental perversity of the Universe” at work again! LOL
Professor Bigfoot
@catclub: Which brings me to another climate-related concern— is Mumbai one of those places that, absent air conditioning/refrigeration, that wet-bulb temperatures over 31C could be actually hostile to human life?
eclare
@Suzanne:
I would also love to have Cole’s weather. Plus, he gets cold at 50? In the winter I keep my heat at 55 because I have an old, drafty, expensive house to heat.
Rainy days are good reading days.
RevRick
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m totally with you on desert living. It’s called a desert for a reason. But then I was born in Connecticut along Long Island Sound, so I have a huge preference for oceans and seasons.
eclare
@schrodingers_cat:
So far I’ve had two cups of chai…might be time to have another.
Melancholy Jaques
About the only thing I miss about living in Cleveland is the rain. In Southern California, it’s a blessing even if the locals don’t know how to deal with it.
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot: I haven’t been able to figure out how many blankets to put on the bed.
But….. fuck the desert.
Elizabelle
@schrodingers_cat: Wow that looks good. And not hard, with the right ingredients.
They Call Me Noni
@schrodingers_cat: Pretty sure I can find it somewhere here local. There a Rainbow Blossom not far from me. I’ll have to give them a try. Thanks for sharing.
Fair Economist
We just had a heat wave in Socal so you should warm up in a few days. Probably more than you’d want.
They Call Me Noni
@Professor Bigfoot: We turned on the air conditioner about a month ago, then back to heat and then back to air a couple of weeks ago. Weather whiplash!
Professor Bigfoot
@Suzanne: Oh, man, I miss living in the desert. I found that all I had to do was stay out of the sun and drink a lot of water and I was just fine even on the hottest days.
TBH, I actually relished those days, because even at 112 F I was *never* miserable.
I have a photo of my sainted Pops, working in his garden in summer in Tennessee; that man is wearing long pants, a long sleeved shirt, an undershirt, AND a hat; digging in the dirt and happy as can be; so I figure my acclimatization to Arizona was at least partly genetic.
That it was a “dry heat” meant that the human cooling system, SWEAT, actually worked. As I remember, if you were comfortable in the pool and you got out, you went through a few minutes of teeth-chattering cold as the water evaporated quickly. Then suddenly you were dry and warm again.
Jackie
@gene108:
You’re living in the past. The pre-climate change past. I’m only half snarking. /
Professor Bigfoot
@They Call Me Noni: I had JUST swapped the glass panel for the screen panel on the front storm door— perfect for air flow through the house. So we JUST managed to avoid turning the A/C on.
AND it suddenly got cold again!
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot: I don’t miss the dry skin and sunburns and the nosebleeds and the cracked heels, and I absolutely don’t miss being stuck in traffic while my poor car AC struggled to keep up. I don’t miss sweat soaking my clothes just from walking across the parking lot. I don’t miss scorpions in my house. I don’t miss dust. I don’t miss $500/month summer utility bills, and I don’t miss being freaked out about water shortages.
I do miss the sunsets, and the cacti, and the yucca, and the smell of the desert when it rains, and the respect for natural forces that I feel when knowing that the environment is not meant for you, that your survival is a tenuous thing.
Professor Bigfoot
Another example of my own weird physiology— I lived there for 4 years with a car with no A/C. 😂
raven
@schrodingers_cat: Nah, we left without me having the opportunity.
Omnes Omnibus
@Professor Bigfoot: Have considered seeing a doctor?
::ducks::
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot: I still remember the day we moved to Arizona. Car had no AC. I…. was emotionally unprepared.
Ten Bears
@mrmoshpotato: Yes, thank you. Surprising how sturdy these old houses are
Paul in KY
@MrRoivas: Sounds pretty guilty then.
Professor Bigfoot
@Omnes Omnibus: too damn many of ‘em, of late… LOL
Ruckus
Here in SoCal it’s 70 and sunny blue sky at just after 9 am. Supposed to get to mid 80s today.
Eunicecycle
@Jeffro: Box turtles are also notoriously bad reproducing. They will try to mate with a box turtle-shaped rock.
jonas
It doesn’t look like it’s going to break 50 through the weekend here in CNY. 48 and drizzling outside right now. Blech, indeed.
brantl
@MrRoivas: If those cases happen it’s good when they sew themselves up.
mrmoshpotato
@Ten Bears: Good to hear. I love a good storm as long as it doesn’t break anything or flood the basement.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Ever since my surgery, the cold seems to hit me like a sledge hammer. Pain in the front and back of my left thorax. I’m almost tempted to go for the narcotic painkillers I was prescribed on discharge, and I can see how fentanyl became such a problem.
I’m told that everything I’m going through is to be expected in the wake of what was done to me, and that I’m healing wonderfully. I’ll have to take their word for it, because it doesn’t quite feel like it from the inside.
Ben Cisco
@Professor Bigfoot: Served my last tour in Tucson, and my experience…was rather unlike yours…
BillD
I often self-describe as the only old retired guy who moved from Arizona (Prescott) to New England (Lowell, Mass.). Daughters and grandkids in the Boston area. Love ’em but really miss Prescott. Near perfect climate—not too hot (mostly) in the summer, mild winters, occasional snow.
sab
@Eunicecycle: That is so sad. All those frustrated stupid box turtles.
I don’t know why I don’t feel that way about MAGA male Rogan listeners but I don’t. Just hump that rock you stupid morons.
WaterGirl
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: Glad to think they think you are doing wonderfully, and sorry to hear that you’re not feeling it yet! Still, I’m really glad the surgery is behind you and that you are recovering, even thought it’s slower than desired.