It’s rainy and cold and shitty here. BFF Tammy is in town for the weekend, as she came up for the annual church Christmas bazaar that my mom and dad were in charge of this year (Tammy is basically the fifth child, and spends as much time as my parents house as she does here and has sleepovers and watches tv and chats with my parents- which is good, because they are all talkers and it is good to keep them segregated from the gen pop). At any rate, I picked up what is called a “bird bowl” but pretty much looks to me to be a bird house from the local potter:
I’m going to hang it on the front porch near where the fern that hatched my bebbies this spring hangs, so maybe if mama bird comes back she will have the option for an upgrade to a luxury condo. The potter is friend of the family Herb Weaver, who many of you may remember as the man who did the excellent tile work in my bathroom.
At any rate, not much going on here tonight. Weather has kind of dimmed spirits and we’re in homebody mode. Watching Alabama play Georgia and of course rooting for the Dawgs, as it is one of mom’s alma maters and we watched them our entire lives. Also because we love UGA (we’re up to Uga IX now!).
satby
I’m liking the bird bowl. Hope momma bird comes back and likes it too.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Tide is getting rolled
Nicole
Went to see “A Christmas Carol in Harlem” at Classical Theatre of Harlem. Absolutely delightful and I recommend to any other NYC jackals. Christmas Past was in a disco suit and roller skates. Awesome.
NotMax
What’s up with site rebuild? Getting more rickety and persnickety by the day.
satby
@NotMax: hey, got back and saw the new viewing suggestions, thanks!
Yarrow
Very cool “bird bowl.” Slow night for me although I have to go do some prep work for something I’m doing tomorrow. I’ve been avoiding that all day.
NotMax
@satby
Very curious what you think about ’em. As stated, sufficiently entertaining but not full-throated recommendations.
A Ghost To Most
28-21. We’ve seen this movie before. C’mon Dawgs.
Suzanne
Ooooh. “Bird bowls”. I’m a potter, it it never occurred to me to do something like this.
I think I know what next year’s Christmas present will be…..
John Revolta
Apparently I’m officially out of the loop. I just watched a video for the hot new item- a jellyfish tank. This was bad enough but then the guys who invented it said “We set out to create the ultimate jellyfish tank………..one that didn’t have the problems of all the other jellyfish tanks on the market“.
Wait, what?
Mnemosyne
Youngest cat Charlotte is very happy that my knee is sufficiently improved that I can now lay in bed with my knees bent, which means I have created a comfy tent for her to nap in when it’s on the chilly side in So Cal.
I have been cleared to walk without a brace or crutch but will still be getting physical therapy since I still don’t have my full range of motion. Getting the quadricep and other leg muscles built back up to normal will take about a year according to my orthopedist. So ACL surgery recovery continues apace.
Shana
@Mnemosyne: Good news both for you and the cat.
Did you get over to see LMM’s star ceremony yesterday?
p.a.
@John Revolta: Those jellyfish DVDs are very relaxing too.
Maangchi has a jellyfish salad video on youtube.
Corner Stone
No one is buying your Tams cover story.
Mnemosyne
@Shana:
Sadly, no — I had to work. I didn’t even have a chance to watch it live stream. ?
debbie
@Mnemosyne:
Glad you’re healing well, if slowly.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@John Revolta: We used to call those “lava lamps”
lahke
Very slow evening for us non-sport fans, but boredom meant that I finally looked/listened to the NY times magazine travel issue from October, the one with the soundtrack of lava in Hawaii and rats in New York (rat laughter is weird) and snapping shrimp in coral reefs. Worth the time.
rikyrah
The bird bowl is nice?
John Revolta
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: I know right? Only you didn’t have to FEED them.
Ben Cisco
Tide and the Dawgs are… tied.
Ken
@John Revolta: From a quick google, apparently jellyfish tanks have to be round or they get stuck in the corners. Caveat, the top hits are all pages that are selling the tanks.
John Revolta
@Mnemosyne: will take about a year
Daaayuum.
How long is it since you got hurt? Is it like a year now?
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
So I’m in Paris. It’s rainy and cold and shitty here, too, plus fiery, teargassy, riot-y, and generally mayhem-and-pillage-y. We were trying to do some basic idle tourist stuff today but were diverted and rerouted over and over by street and Metro closures. Luckily we didn’t get caught up in any of the violence ourselves, but we were too close for comfort. Tomorrow I was planning to do a bit of window-gazing at the fancy grands magasins while my companions hit the free entry day at the Louvre. Both those were targets of attacks today, and we’re not sure what’s going to happen tomorrow. Yikes!
Corner Stone
Well that was an interesting call.
Bruuuuce
In a move that we can hope becomes sympathetic magic, the New York Mets failed to tender a contract to the original Wilmer (Flores) by the deadline to do so, meaning he’s almost certainly gone. We can but hope, right?
zhena gogolia
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
What happened? I haven’t heard about any of this.
James E Powell
No football thread, but for the second year in a row, Georgia completely collapses. Their coaches just don’t have a sense of the moment, the knack for controlling the flow.
debbie
@zhena gogolia:
There have been demonstrations about increasing gas prices, and it sounds like some have gotten pretty rowdy.
Bemused senior
@John Revolta: my twin grandkids, age 3, love watching the livecam of the jellies from the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I would certainly kill jellies if I tried keeping them, so i’m happy to have a digital recreation.
Yarrow
@debbie: Seems odd since the price of oil has dropped. Has France raised gas taxes or something?
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@zhena gogolia: The “gilets jaunes” protest movement held a demonstration that was highjacked by violent hard-right goons, anarchists, and looters – small groups of them roamed around burning cars and barricades, smashing shop windows, attacking public buildings, etc. A couple of hundred people have been hurt and at least as many arrested.
Pete Downunder
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: suggestion – take the TGV from Gare de Lyon to Lyon (2 hours)and find an AirBnB in the old city. Vieux Lyon. Get a city card from the tourist office. Smaller than Paris but great food and the museums are really interesting. No riots.
Ben Cisco
@James E Powell: I have to admit I’m surprised. Didn’t see them doing that again.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Yarrow: Yup, increased gas taxes plus overall discontent at low wages and increasing inequality between the wealthy political and business elite and everyone else. (Sound familiar?)
The photos in US media of the protests/riots today do not even begin to show the violence and extent of the damage I see in French media.
debbie
More here.
And here, which says taxes are going up by $.30 a gallon.
Kelly
I’ve been playing fetch with 5 month old kitten Phoebe. I didn’t teach her. She’s always liked chasing a ball. Last week she started bringing it to me. For maximum fun I need to throw it down the stairs or roll it under the furniture. She is a cat so after 5~10 rounds she drops the ball somewhere else or “can’t find it”.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Pete Downunder: Thanks for the suggestion – wish I could, but we’re heading back to the US Tuesday so not enough time. I lived here for years, so I know my way about and I’ve seen plenty of demonstrations, strikes, and occasional mayhem, but this seems different.
Raven
UGH, we gave it our best shot.
A Ghost To Most
@Raven: Fucking Red Tide
James E Powell
@Ben Cisco:
I know it’s easy to coach from the couch but that fake punt was a bad idea to begin with and ought to have been called off the second they saw (assuming they saw) that Alabama’s defense was still on the field.
khead
The last time Georgia collapsed so catastrophically, Gen. Joseph Johnston was in charge. That missed FG at 8:20 in the third changed everything.
A Ghost To Most
: @khead:
The fake punt that Bama was ready for didn’t help.
Yarrow
@Raven: Sorry, Raven.
Ohio Mom
@lahke: Now I want to go to the salt desert in Chile.
Many thanks for this wonderful link.
The Dangerman
4th and 11 from midfield and faked punt? That, I say, that wasn’t very smart.
/foghorn leghorn
ETA: Bama vs. Oklahoma or OSU might be interesting. Clemson vs. ND won’t be pretty.
Mnemosyne
@debbie:
It feels like the recovery is going better this time, but last time I was working a super stressful job that had long hours AND we got married 3 months after the surgery, so it may just be a less stressful time of my life overall.
@John Revolta:
Yep, first injured it in mid-October of 2017, so it’s been a little over a year. My HMO dragged their feet on every little thing, so it took 10 months to get to the repair surgery. So that stretches out the recovery time, too.
Pete Downunder
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Sounds like a right wing May 1968 (before your time I’m sure) layered on top of a legitimate and peaceful manifestation by les gilets jaunes. Macron has really lost the connection, if he really ever had it it, with the working class and poor folk. In other news have you seen Le Gorafi (Figaro in verlan) the French version of the Onion?
Origuy
Air New Zealand Christmas ad Summit of the Naughty Kids of the World. Watch for the one in the red cap.
poleaxedbyboatwork
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
Tx. for the ear-to-the-ground report, and sorry your visit coincided with the tumult.
The co-opting of the protest by right-wing goons is such a freaky coincidence, specially with Macron away in Argentina. Quelle surprise!
What is allus maximally annoying is how, seemingly the world over, right-wing menace gets translated if not transmuted into understandable (and therefore justifiable) “economic anxiety” whereas even the most peacable if raucous expressions of left-wing discontent are conveyed as the second coming of Pol Pot by the Very Serious Peeples.
Funny old world, that.
trollhattan
@A Ghost To Most:
Call them Deacon Blue.
Ben Cisco
@James E Powell: Agreed.
Ben Cisco
@Raven: They put up a good fight.
John Revolta
@Bemused senior: I suppose it’s better than the Teletubbies!
@Mnemosyne: Daaayuum.
James E Powell
@poleaxedbyboatwork:
One need only consider who signs the Very Serious Peoples’ paychecks, current and hoped-for.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Mnemosyne: Good on being cleared to walk more freely. It’s good they warn you how long it takes.
trollhattan
@Origuy:
That is brilliant!
Denali
There was a very scary photo which appeared to show the Jeu de Palm museum on fire, but it has been confirmed that it was a car fire instead. Time for Macron to get back to Paris before this chaos truly gets out of hand.
Luthe
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Alas alack, you will probably be heading to the airport as I am heading away from it! (my flight to Orly lands Tuesday morning)
Do you think things will have died down by then? I’m not sure “civil unrest” is covered by my travel insurance…
Mnemosyne
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I’ve been pretty happy with the orthopedist they sent me to — the printed instructions have been very complete and say things like The exercises will cause pain at the front of your knee. This is normal. Since I can be a bit of a hypochondriac, it’s helpful for me to know ahead of time which symptoms I don’t have to worry about. ?
poleaxedbyboatwork
@James E Powell:
Agreed.
Very Serious Peeples syllogism:
A: Entrenched privilege is best preserved by maintaining the status quo.
B: Given the choice, “the-devil-you-know” right-wing rule best perserves status quo.
C: Hence Very Serious Peoples will abide nearly any right-wing perfidy — including lying to themselves and everyone else ’bout reality — to maintain this fallacious whistlin’-past-the-graveyard worldview.
Never fucking changes.
(Till ever’thing falls apart, course. Then even Very Serious Peoples will take a flier onna black guy for preznit. Imagine!)
A Ghost To Most
@trollhattan: Ha! I hadn’t thought about that song for awhile. Time to listen to Aja again.
karen marie
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: I have a Greek friend, born, raised and currently living in Athens, Greece. She scoffs at Americans who are alarmed by violent demonstrations. That being said, I hope you are able to stay outside of the fray, avoid injury and enjoy your visit to France!
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Mnemosyne: I feel that way about being wired up to a heart monitor during cardiac rehab too. It’s comforting.
raven
@A Ghost To Most: Everyone here is hysterical about that. The way they were moving the ball on us in the second half I think it was the only shot we had. There is a reason that they are the defending national champs and undefeated and it ain’t luck. They are fucking loaded.
Albatrossity
Nice bird bowl! Your House Finches won’t use it however; they are not cavity nesting birds. They like to be able to see the stars above from the nest. But you might get a Carolina Wren, House Wren, or chickadee to use it!
Procopius
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
Hmmmmm. I bet they’re afraid of giving people here ideas.
poleaxedbyboatwork
@raven:
Much less a football fan nowadays, but still follow a bit. (Mostly enjoy seein how folks performs under adversity, so this time a year, with a game of some moment, will occasionally tune in with friends.)
But must confess: there’re humorless pricks coaching football who I enjoy when they lose! Tho’ din’t watch it, will say was saddened (both for you as a Dawg fan n for the world at large) that the ‘Bamaborg all-seein’-eye-a-Sauron-Sabin emerged victorious yet again. Similarly, news of the ‘Boys losing always cheers me, only on account a the tears of Jerry Jones are especially sweet.
Hadda conundrum here recent, tho’: Michigas vs. OHeilO State. What does any decent human being do inna contest betwixt Urban “Hey,not-as-bad-as-the-Pope-of-old!” Meyer (that we know of!) and Jim “My-smile-*izza*-scowl” Harbaugh. Hell, I grad-gee-ated from Michigan, and I din’t know who to root for.
Sometimes it’s all a body can do to root for (coaching!) injuries.
Raven
@poleaxedbyboatwork: Yea, it was a drag.
SiubhanDuinne
@Origuy:
That is just perfect.
jl
@Albatrossity: Thanks for info. Glad to know it is some kind of bird house. Not that I don’t trust Cole, but I don’t trust Cole, and was carnsarned that he did not make sure he knew what it was before he bought it. Given Cole’s luck, it might be some Twilight Zone thing that attracted the Giant Rat of Sumatra, which would eat up his house, or something.
I hope it attracts a chickadee. They are cute birds with some nice songs. But if Cole bothers them or is insolent to them, they might do their buzzy beep beep beep call.
sigyn
@p.a.: ew. jellyfish is basically membrane, fish-flavored membrane. Thanks for the link. I watched & subscribed because I like some Korean food, but I’ll pass on the haepari for now. Call me a snob, but “you must have been Starving!” is the line that I’ve drawn.
A Ghost To Most
@sigyn:
Or, “I don’t eat bait.”
A Ghost To Most
@jl:
Wrens also like little bird houses.
lahke
@Ohio Mom: thanks for seeking it out– I can’t seem to do links on my phone.
I’m going there next July for the solar eclipse. It’s about the driest place on Earth, so both the eclipse and the night sky should be great.
Ohio Mom
@lahke: Sigh. I must wait until 2024 when it’s Ohio’s turn again for an eclipse. (I can say I want to visit exotic locales but it’s not in the cards for me).
joel hanes
@Albatrossity:
But you might get a Carolina Wren, House Wren, or chickadee
or more likely, an “English sparrow”.
One can select for wrens by making the opening small enough that sparrows can’t use it.
It looks to me as if the opening in Cole’s bird pot is larger than that, sparrow-sized.
The best birdhouses have one or more small holes in the bottom, so airflow can keep the nesting materials dry.
joel hanes
@jl:
the Giant Rat of Sumatra
Ssshhh! Weren’t you briefed? The world is not yet read for _that_ tale. Or tail.
trollhattan
@joel hanes:
Still have that LP. Somewhere.
Amir Khalid
@Origuy:
I hope somebody shows that to Trump. On Christmas morning.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@karen marie:
Well, bully for her. We’re not by any means in a panic – again, we lived here for a long time and have seen plenty of demonstrations, including some that turned ugly – but I have asthma, and a good dose of tear gas could literally kill me. I’m not interested in taking that risk to demonstrate either solidarity or bravado. Discretion being the better part of valor, I’d prefer to just go about my business and stay out of the trouble zones.
(Sorry, dead thread but I had to go to bed.)