California: Vote No on Prop 1

This is a link to Center for Biological Diversity and is meant for California voters only.

At issue is how the proposed purchase of out of system water will be used, and for what purpose.  Proposition 1 on our ballot is not the sort of thing anyone wants to see on any State's ballot.  So anyone else in another state should watch anything to do with their own water issues.  Like other things, these sorts of ballot measures can have a, forgive the pun, a ripple effect.  We all know what that lead to in the last decade.  This is America.  I think we've done enough bending over.

Our state's water is used to a great degree by agriculture, and this is fine, but there are other issues here, the fact that once water goes to streams and rivers it is classified as "abandoned" and can be recaptured by agri-business, a nightmare conglomeration that has given rise to many problems in food production, and that is busily grabbing up small farms as well as water mandated for the survival of native habitat.  

California: Vote No on Prop 1

Will Weatherford..Don Gaetz..et al Freedom Fighters!

This LINK is to the article on the Daily Kos.

The article explains how some Republicans are fighting back for our democracy, against some pretty hardcore, diehard party stealth enemies of our Fair Democracy.

This is WAY BETTER than any Saturday Komeek.

Go Baetz and Weatherford et al! Cheers for the Democracy!  It works when we all put our backs into keeping it free of stealth  maneuvers by people who don't care about the Will of The People.

Read it and pass it on if you feel that we don't need any more "Dirty Tricks" mucking up our elections.

Saturday Komeekz, Sky Watcher, duct tape

Thanks to an amazingly quirky fellow named Stephan Pastis, we have this:

I'm going to take the flying lawn chair somewhere in the Universe this weekend.  It's lots more fun than reading the Union Tribune and their full page ads full of lies about the Democrat running for Mayor.  Ooops!  Stealth Politics!  Nahahahaha!

We had clizzle -low clouds masquerading as rain- today.  You know, just enough to get the dusty cars all spotted.  Here's last night's sky before this thing rolled in:

This is a snap of the mussy Tussy sky last night before the cloud bank came in off the ocean to spit on us.  You can see it creeping in from the right bottom corner.

I can't seem to get my knitting re-ignited because it has to be under 70 degrees before I feel chilly enough to even THINK about handling wool stuff.  I did trot out to Michaels this AM with DH - you can only use one coupon per day so he's extra hands - to get dried things for the cornucopias, and DH spotted this amazing duct (duck) tape to go with the hot pink.  Good Eye Mr. Zippi!  Projects will be along in a few days.

Remember in "Lost", when they were trying to get that Airbus off the Island?  Remember when Miles was fixing the hydraulic feed to the nose wheel with duct tape.  He was handed the tape along with some other stuff, and he and Ricardo go to the wheel well.  Ricardo asks Miles, "Did it fix it?"  Miles says, "I don't believe in a lot of things but I do believe in duct tape!"



I laughed and laughed about that one!

Keep laughing, because if you don't laugh then you just gotta cry.

Knit All Day Day... /cloudy day, some tiny rain..

It looked like this when we left for some meds tests for me:

It rained a little and just glowered all the time we were out.
It's even darker now at 3:30

So far this has been a "Do anything but knitting" day.  "Get Fasting Blood Test" Day, Shop for "How to Knit with Charts book" Day,"See if shop has Macco Glazes" Day, "Water the Thirsty Shade Patio" Day,

and I found this while watering when we got home:

This is a favored food of the Torts so I have to keep it up off the patio pavers.
They will eat it down to a nubbin. It's a crassula but I don't know which one.
Isn't it a pretty little flower?  Look at it very BIG!

I also found about five billion little babies from this Mother of All., Crassula Multicalva.  Get it?  Makes many calves?   If you get weak at the knees and get just one of these "mommas" from a place between the pavers at Spanish Village ( or anywhere else), believe me, you're going to regret it! 

OK I'm trying to find a couple of books that will help me with color knitting and with charts.  Please feel free to email me with suggestions about ones you've found helpful.  I can buy one of each.

I'm taking my aching back to the Comfy Chair and the Pink Bates knitting needles.  I'll try to stop looking at the needles long enough to get the YOs/SKPs and K2TOG/YO's straight.  That is slippery yarn on slippery needles, and I dare anyone to turn their back on that combination. 

Stealth Politics:

I'm going to read The Beginner's Guide to Walking the Buddha's Eightfold Path  by Jean Smith.  I think I'll also read  Don't Just do Something.  Sit There.  Vacation Reading, eh? 

I need to get my head back from the Never, Never land of Crooked Politicians/CEOs and Their "Merry Men".  You know, the ones who we are learning about, those villains who steal from the Poor (as well as the middle class) and give to themselves.  I've found the only way to calm down is to sit and do nothing.  I'll be doing a lot of that from now on.  Being Hyper busy just isn't good for me.  I threw the knitting across the room this afternoon.  I'm losing confidence in my ability to knit.

SkyWatcher Post. knitting chatter Stealth Politics

Today's sky at about 6 pm.  Make it BIG..

I'm knitting.  I've got nothing to show for it, other than knit-frog/knit-frog angst which is not worth sharing.  I would rather stick my head in an oven than do that to you.  I've figured out that the problem is that my brain doesn't like charts.  Because of it's  old foggie poot like nature,  my brain has to translate charts into lines, which it's used to and LIKES VERY MUCH, and therein lies the problem -  Faulty Schematics from a bygone age!  "Reet!"  Every sweater that I've knit so far, using charts, has suffered from the knit-frog dilemma.

It was a rather cooler day but a little muggier.  I'll take a little mugginess if it keeps the "eggs from frying on the sidewalk" weather that we had a day ago!   The little black dog is a lot happier that it is actually cooler with a cloud cover.  Little black dogs do not like hot weather.

I went to my sister's house and tried some wax on my face, because she knows about such things.  OUCH!  End of experiment!  She gave me a bite of her Dinosaur Egg fruit (also called a Plucot), and that soothed my lower lip a bit.  She showed me her new magazine and inside of it was a much coveted Pink Phone!  It has a dial.  I have a red one with buttons but it's must not the same.

This is a bunch of trash talk because I didn't want anyone to think I'd died of ingesting sludge from the other night, but had absolutely nothing worth saying today or yesterday.  Once I watched Ethos, I sort of gave up on most Politicians and  Corporate Heads, and just went to work immediately on a death ray that is Highly selective!  One that possesses pin point accuracy.  This is not your common garden variety drone we are talking about here.

Stealth politics...

HERE is a Grist article on what the Oil industry hacks in Congress are trying to force on the Military, which is a WHOLE lot smarter than the average Bear!  David Roberts makes it fun to follow!

Don't forget to eat Pretzels and chocolate, or anything that comforts you.  Hugs and Kisses!

What the Borg are up to! Trans-Pacific Partnership meeting. Sierra Club Alert.

Sierra Club sent this out to its members this evening.  I figured that the rest of us deserve to know, too:

"Dear Sierra Club members,

The largest free trade agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will happen right here in San Diego  June 30 to July 8.  This secret trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations, with the help of over 600 corporate representatives, has almost zero public oversight!

Powerful corporate interests have official access and have been pushing for the TPP to:
·  Offshore good-paying jobs to low-wage nations and undercut working conditions globally
·  Create new tools for attacking environmental and consumer safety standards
·  Expand the deregulation of banks, hedge funds and insurance companies
·  Further concentrate control of global food supplies, displacing family farmers and peasants and subjecting consumers to wild price fluctuations and un-labeled genetically-modified food
·  Undermine public health policies that reduce tobacco consumption and increase access to medicine
·  Give multinational corporations and private investors the right to sue nations in private tribunals.  These tribunals have the power to overturn environmental,  labor, or any other laws that limit profit, and award the corporations taxpayer-funded damages.
·  Encourage privatization of lands and natural resources in areas where indigenous people live

The agreement will impact just about every issue we care about: jobs, environmental protection, public health and safety, financial regulation, access to medicines, Internet neutrality, and most importantly, our democratic sovereignty. Please join us next week to say Stop TPP!

There will be two rallies, a major march with pots and pans, an educational conference, and more. Please join us for these three events:

·        Monday, July 2nd on your lunch hour: Noon - Press conference and kick-off rally, at the Hilton Bayfront and Convention Center (where the negotiation conference is taking place).  The event will include a featured speaker from the Sierra Club and sponsored by the San Diego/Imperial County Labor Council of the AFL-CIO.

·        Saturday, July 7th:  March and rally. Gather at 10:30 at the Civic Center (aka Freedom Plaza at the corner of B and 3rd Street downtown); March leaves at 11:00 and heads to the Hilton Bayfront for a rally at noon (coinciding with trade negotiators' lunch hour).

·        July 2,  3,  5,  6,  7 -- "People's Conference: A Better World is Possible" Evening discussions with international,  national and local grassroots organizers and experts.

For more information and details go to http://www.stoptpp.org/.

To get involved - contact us!

Thank You"

Hank! Hank! Hank!

© 2012 Hank For Senate Committee. All Rights Reserved.

The right cat for the job!

Well, Dang it!  We should all get to vote for Hank!  I wonder if we, the whole Western US of A, could all pile into Virginia without tipping it into the Chesapeake, and tent camp until we were residents so we could Vote for Hank?  Ladies, take your knitting!

I didn't have a stand in photo for Hank, so I borrowed a picture of him from his AMAZING WEB page.

The small print to read with difficulty:
"But", said a tiny squeaky voice, "Isn't Hank a Maine Coon Cat?" "Blasphemer!', screamed the Campaign manager.  "You, Sir, will have to prove your allegations in a Queen's Court to convene on the Morrow!"

Following the Small is Beautiful Manifesto......

I'll write a little about personal paths:

The Peace I've found in Friends Silent Meeting

I was baptized Methodist, though there were Quakers in my background.  When I told a Friend of this, at the first Friends Meeting I went to,  he said that many Quakers and Methodists jumped back and forth between Friends of Jesus ( Society of the Friends of Jesus is the actual name) and the Methodists.  He smiled at me and nodded that he understood my longing to be a Friend by conviction.

Being a particularily silent person in daily life, I have become more silent and meditative except when someone or something pushes a line inside me.   Then I struggle with all the demons of anger, or wanting to administer "two tight slaps" to an offending person - criminal, politician, etc.

Of course this is not the Friends' Way at all.   Our way is to talk them to death  reach a compromise through discourse while getting words in edgeways, working on matters of conscience, if in truth, they have one, and aren't so far gone on the "main chance" as to be deaf to the call of compassion and Christ's amendment to the Ten Commandments.  It works but takes longer than a fire arm.

 Back to Silent Meeting.  I feel, like most Quakers, that in the silence one can center down to hear the voice of a group's collective spirit, given us by our Creator, and that souls answer to one another during this ministry.   It's happened for me, and I've answered the heart of another in silent meeting. 

Believe me, it is extremely moving to hear a concern with which you are struggling be answered by another who has heard it through only their heart's inner voice.  There is no mistaking it because it's like a laser to the point of trouble in your soul.  This makes you believe that in no uncertain way, that all human hearts and spirits are One.  This is, in the view of Quakers, the ministry of the Holy Spirit, who is present in the centered group.

Now, about politicians.  My very sweet Sister-in-Law once asked me what I thought of  Richard Nixon, who was then president.  Was he a good or bad Quaker?   I thought, "Well, that one is in the 'two, tight slaps' category."  While I was thinking about whether Nixon was Friends Meeting or Friend's Church- entirely different- she answered her own question saying, "He's a very bad Quaker!"  I shook my head, laughed and had to agree.  Ben Franklin was not a Quaker, either, but he would get those two tight slaps, for pretense. 

This page tells more about the Quakers and their ways.
 

Jon Stewart On Recap for the week

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Indecision 2012 - Corn Polled Edition - Ron Paul & the Top Tier
www.thedailyshow.com
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Muck's Up! Wall Street's on the move!

From my Daily rag. I was shocked to see it there but then again the times, and other things, may be changing! Huzzah!

I knit, therefore I read.

Pretty in Pink

Newest, and probably last, of the Supermarket lovelies.

Last week, in order to not buy the delicious two bite blueberry scones that I shouldn't be eating, I bought another African Violet, a ruffled pink. The picture was taken in afternoon light under a sky light, so it's accentuated the blue tint. The flowers are too far blown by now to show well, so there it is...

The other bits and pieces of the earlier AV surgery are still alive! Wonder of wonders. They have not produced any little leaves at the base but hope springs eternal in the heart of African Violet surgeons.  Here is the non-progress piccie, but as they say ( and "they" are always saying something!), "Where there is life,  there is hope."  The Mother plant continues to live as well but those little tiny nothings at the base of the slice are still just little tiny nothings.  If there is any growth at all there in the last week, it would take a 70 power microscope to see it!

In other news, I've been shopping and bought some beautiful discounted summer dresses, the Indian cotton type that I can stand in a cold water shower while wearing, letting the water run into my hair and onto my clothing.

We are having cooler temperatures here, but that is to say that it's only around 85 out there on the sidewalks of our city. I still wouldn't want to be the postman.

The political climate, however, still leaves much to be desired but then how can you have perfect weather within an imperfect system?  Maybe if we all yelled at once, even the laid back coffee drinkers, there would be such a din that it would create an earthquake in the heads of the Big Money Boys who are now thinking of cutting Social Security or making people work five more years before retirement.  As if we didn't already work more and longer than anyone in Europe, for instance???!!!???  Why don't they just carve a side off that Sacred Bull that's eating all the money?  Huh?  Any of the tea baggers have any logical answers?