For all the early-morning angst I had yesterday, nothing horrible happened. At least, not here. Kat was sick enough to stay home all day. She’s feeling some better and will be at the salon this afternoon, but it’s still questionable whether she’ll attend an event planned for this evening. The kids were over an hour late getting home because the bus broke down and they had to wait for a replacement. Again. They were exhausted when they did get home and when I went to bed at 8:00, I was the only one awake. They did have dinner, but there was no conversation. Days like this pass as a blur.
What did happen yesterday was that the Orange Felon held a press conference from Mar-a-lago. Supporters will say he was “forceful.” Everyone else will say it was unhinged with the most ridiculous moment coming when he claimed that the crowd at his Jan. 6 2021 speech was larger than that of MLK’s “I Have a Dream” speech. There was a lot of looking back at his first term and exaggeration of numbers. He admitted he lost in 2020, which was startling. Remember that when he reverts back to the lie later. What’s possibly most relevant, from my perspective, is that the Felon hasn’t been out campaigning this week. At all. He’s sent Vance, who hasn’t brought the numbers he was supposed to bring. The optics lean into the fact that the Felon is 78 years old. He would be the oldest President ever, and there are already plenty of warning signs that he’s losing what little mental faculties he had. As Nancy Pelosi has said, we can’t let “that man” win.
ABC News reports that the September 10 debate is back on. The Felon says he wants more, but there’s been no comment from the Harris/Walz campaign. In fact, the Vice President hasn’t been giving interviews, either. She’s sticking to campaign speeches where her message is well defined and there’s little chance of misspeaking. How long will that strategy work?
Microsoft is saying that Iran has accelerated cyber activity which is most likely a sign of increased interference in the US election. Be on the lookout for attacks against Harris/Walz that are completely unfounded. Don’t be afraid to call them out. Their whole purpose is to create chaos and disenfranchisement around the election. Please, again, check your sources carefully.
You may be seeing holiday displays even earlier than usual. Reuters reports that retailers are rushing holiday shipments on anything imported out of fear that their could be disruptive events in the near future. Both the fluctuations of the stock market and threats of terrorism are to blame. This could mean early discounts as excess inventory crowds stores, but also be aware that this year’s prices are already higher than last year as companies look to pad their profit margins as much as possible.
If you use a nebulizer for asthma or migraines, you know how clunky and unwieldy those devices are. That may be about to change. Companies are again testing vape-like devices that would be considerably easier to use. The delay comes from having to convince the FDA and other medical professionals that the devices a) actually work, and b) don’t accidentally encourage other vape use. There are also the optics. Imagine being in a restaurant, almost all of which are nonsmoking now, and needing to use a nebulizer. Cue conflict over convincing your server that no, you’re not smoking. The new devices would be considerably easier to use, but they’re still not likely to be available any time soon.
There are clusters of international stories taking up space this morning, but nothing that currently raises severe concern. Internal struggles are just that: internal. They have to be worked out by those affected.
One last thing, though, Chi Chi Rodriguez, Hall of Fame golfer known for antics on the greens, has died. Now, I’ve never been a huge golf fan, and had it been any other golfer I might not have bothered to mention the passing. But people of a certain age will remember a famous episode of the television show, “WKRP in Cincinnati” where the station’s news director, Les Nessman, played brilliantly by Richard Sanders, completely bungles the golfer’s name while on the air, to the horror of Johnny Fever, played by the late Howard Hessman. So, we say goodbye to Chi Chi with thanks for being a good sport. Here’s the clip:
I’m not making any firm weekend plans as both kids have mentioned possibly doing things with their friends. These are the moments we have to step back and give them room to grow beyond academics. Letting them out of our sight is something that’s never quite comfortable. When the Citizen app issued an alert yesterday that someone had been hit by a truck on Lafayette Road, Kat was quick to have both kids check in, making sure they were safe. We hope that we’ve given the kids enough guidance and support to be able to make safe decisions, but we also know that teens test boundaries and often think that past rules no longer apply. So, I’m going to sit here and try to be flexible and supportive and encouraging, and no, I’m not crying. You’re crying.
Kat’s finally sleeping. The twins are snuggled up together at the foot of the bed. Both dogs are back to sleep. Queen Bit plopped herself down right smack in the middle of the bed, defying anyone to disturb her. All the rain chances are along the East Coast and remnants of Hurricane Debby continue to make life difficult.
Maybe I’ll just have another cup of coffee and sit here quietly. Because I can.
Morning Update: 08/10/24
Here it is 7:30 AM, I’m just sitting down to write, and there’s no other sound in the house. Kat and both kids are still asleep. Animals are all asleep except for Belvedere lying here on the bed watching me, wondering when he’s going to get breakfast. This is the tone set for the weekend. I think Tipper may have tentative plans with a friend but I’m not sure. She came in from school and crashed hard. G is, unsurprisingly, planning on getting some schoolwork done. He’s still a bit upset at how long it took them to get started. Kat will go to the salon and then head North for the weekend. I’m just here in case of an emergency.
It’s a chilly 57 degrees outside at the moment. Skies are clear. Not much different than 2:00 AM when the dogs decided they needed to go out. That’s really my own fault. Normally, I take the dogs out for the last time around 8-8:30 in the evening. That typically gets them through until 6:00 the next morning. I fell asleep shortly after 7:00 last night, though, which didn’t give them a chance to go out that last time. Thus, come 2:00, someone was needing to go pee quite badly. I slipped on my shoes and took them out only to be surprised by how cool it was. I’ll have a jacket on when I take them out again this morning.
Weekends like this are for reading and there’s plenty to read. Of course, dominating headlines this morning is the crash of an ATR 72 twin-engine turboprop in Sao Paulo, Brazil. This is a story you’ll want to come back to off and on over the weekend as more details become known. All that’s certain at the moment is that the plane went into a flat spin before crashing inside a gated community, killing the 61 souls on board.
We’re also just finding out that a Serbian competitor in the CrossFit Games died while competing in a swimming event Thursday morning at a Texas lake. Again, details are sketchy. An official with the Fort Worth Fire Department said they were called out around 8 a.m. to assist police because there was “a participant in the water that was down and hadn’t been seen in some point in time.” No cause of death has been given and CrossFit isn’t answering any questions.
Boxer Imane Khelif won gold to cap an Olympics marked by scrutiny over her sex. After all the ridiculous fuss, it only seems fitting that she should walk away with the top prize. Sha’carri Richardson was able to finally capture her first gold as the anchor in the women’s 4×100 relay. But 60-year-old swimmer Jim Dreyer apparently gave up after two days trying to cross Lake Michigan. Actually, no one’s sure exactly what happened. Dreyer isn’t responding to questions and the U.S. Coast Guard confirmed he’s no longer in the water.
Making Mars inhabitable seems to be a big issue this morning. The easy-to-digest version is on Reuters’ home page, but the more scientific version is in this week’s Science magazine. What it all boils down to is the possibility that soil samples from the planet can possibly be used to make rods that would warm the planet enough for it to terraform itself. Don’t hold your breath, though, Elon. Even in the best possible conditions, we’re still decades away from even thinking about putting people up there.
There’s an interesting feature in this morning’s New York Times that has cool graphics to go with it if you read it online. It seems that China has been building new villages and relocating people to live all along its Western border, including some disputed territories with India. This is interesting for a number of reasons. One, it feels an awful lot like it did when Israel first did the same thing along its West Bank border, and we see how disastrously that plan worked. Two, the previously uninhabited regions were uninhabited for a damn good reason. Villages in the Himalayas are subject to severe winters with roads impassible several months of the year. Other areas are too rocky for any type of agriculture to take place. China is digging in, though, saying that the towns are critical to the country’s defense. The article is worth the read.
Everything else this morning is war and politics and I’m not inclined to give any more oxygen to those situations when those who could do something constructive sit on their hands or make the situation worse.
I’m crossing my fingers for a nice, quiet weekend. We’ll see if that’s possible.