Sunday Morning Stuck at Home Links

by | Mar 29, 2020 | Daily Links | 423 comments

 

SP and I have been pretending to shelter in place. This means wine (a nice Loire Valley Chenin last night) and movies (It Happens Every Spring and Anatomy of a Murder, an odd double feature). But not all is frivolity. I need your help, each and every one of you. Apparently the euphemistic term “Social Distance” has caught on and overwhelmed the term I prefer and believe more accurate, “Leper Length.” I need help reviving this term from its coma and trying to mainstream it. Won’t you pitch in and start using it in your daily conversation?

Birthdays today include a guy, who despite the rumors, I never saw pitch; a guy who I did see pitch; a guy who made all of us laugh our asses off; a guy who let politics taint his science; the most annoying Star Trek character ever; a tennis player who seemed like she’d be fun to hang out with; and a guy who’d be happy to tell you that you’re WRONG.

News, yes, let’s.

 

Trump tells NY, NJ, “PSYCH!” Master troll.

 

There just isn’t enough popcorn in this world.

 

HAHAHAHAHA… oh wait… HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

 

Florida governor looks at Rhode Island and says, “Hold mah beer!”

 

“If you want a picture of the present, imagine a boot stomping on the human face, forever.”

 

JFC, California. I am so glad to be out of there.

 

Aha, just as we suspected!

 

 

Old Guy Music is a song from what might have been the greatest jazz concert ever played.

About The Author

Old Man With Candy

Old Man With Candy

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me. Wait, wrong book, I'll find something else.

423 Comments

  1. PieInTheSky

    There just isn’t enough popcorn in this world. – I say a good civil war could be entertaining.

  2. PieInTheSky

    Florida governor looks at Rhode Island and says, “Hold mah beer!”

    Florida governor plans checkpoints to screen Louisianians – I blame the french myself

    • Brett L

      Luckily, we already have permitting in place for hunting invasive animals.

  3. PieInTheSky

    Also, the links are finally back at the correct hour

      • Rhywun

        oh god don’t say “booze”…

      • PieInTheSky

        why? no one sounded drunk drunk last night

      • PieInTheSky

        I don’t even know why I said last night. It was this morning.

      • Rhywun

        We are a high-functioning bunch.

      • MikeS

        You’re right, but keep your voice down.

  4. PieInTheSky

    JFC, California. I am so glad to be out of there.

    Our European visitors are important to us. – LIES

  5. PieInTheSky

    “If you want a picture of the present, imagine a boot stomping on the human face, forever.” – in romania breaking no meeting rules is called, to translate, thwarting contagion prevention

  6. PieInTheSky

    Where is everyone? Wakey wakey eggs and bakey

      • PieInTheSky

        You americans and you weak internet

    • Sean

      Morning Pie.

      • PieInTheSky

        Afternoon

    • Not Adahn

      Coffee, cheese and rolls here. Had bacon and eggs yesterday.

    • Fourscore

      Time to put that camel to sleep

    • Gender Traitor

      Better MM. (Thanks for giving me the cheap, tawdry excuse to link it.)

      • Ted S.

        But that one wasn’t relevant to a night in Tunisia. 😉

    • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

      Better cover of Midnight at the Oasis. Renee Olstead was fifteen. years. old. when she did this version!

  7. Shirley Knott

    I’ve recommended it before, but it’s appropriate to mention on this day.
    Eric Idle’s “sortabiography” is a delightful read. He’d be great fun to have cocktails with.

    • Gender Traitor

      Somewhere I remember reading an account of a phone call involving Idle and Paul Simon while Idle was recovering from surgery. The conversation seemed to revolve around farting, as I recall. Curious to know if that made it into the memoir.

      • Shirley Knott

        IIRC, yes, yes it did. Many wonderful anecdotes about a wide range of people. Lots of interesting tales about Python, work habits, good times and bad, but heavily weighted towards the good.
        I’d enjoy cocktails with him, more than any of the other Pythons.

      • egould310

        I was in Santa Barbara, CA in March 2003, on my honeymoon. I walked over to a coffee shop on State St to grab my morning cuppa. On the way out, I saw a dude that looked like Eric Idle sitting at a cafe table. I took an extra second just to make sure it was Eric Idle, an yep it was him. And then I noticed that we was sitting with Steve Martin. That must have been an entertaining conversation.

  8. Fourscore

    Morning OM

    I never saw Denny McClain pitch in real life but my son was a Tom Seaver fan and we had a chance to see him (Tom) once when we lived in NJ. I liked DM, winning 30 games is tough and today would never happen.

    Nice start for a Sunday morn, thanks

    • westernsloper

      Growing up in a state that had no pro ball team led to my not following it at all. The only “great” pitcher I have ever seen pitch is Randy Johnson when he played for the D-backs. I saw a few of their games. I thought that was a great ballpark to spend an afternoon.

  9. westernsloper

    should stay home and avoid crowds, and everyone should practice “social distancing. Leper Length.”

    Trying to do my part. What is leper length? The distance you can knock a lepers nose off with a stick?

    • PieInTheSky

      What kind of stick you got? My grandmother in the countryside had some really long ones

      • Brett L

        Told you about my visit, did she?

      • PieInTheSky

        I hope your nightmares will be gone soon

      • westernsloper

        Well, that is what I am asking. Are we going with Romanian country grandma stick, or another stick. We need international consistency.

      • PieInTheSky

        Romanian grandmother stick was about 7 to 10 of your silly feet

      • westernsloper

        I think anything over 5 feet is going to be unwieldy for leper poking.

      • R C Dean

        Add in the length of your arm, and a proper Leper Poker is around 4 feet. Pretty much the length of a cane.

        Who’s laughing now, whippersnappers?

      • westernsloper

        So two cubits + a Gary Coleman. Got it.

      • Shirley Knott

        ALOL

    • Grosspatzer

      PornHub has the answer. So I hear.

    • The Last American Hero

      I heard support for the term leper length fell off.

    • Shirley Knott

      Thank you, that was entertaining.

  10. Trials and Trippelations

    I just want to commend my local gang members for abiding by Leper Length in these trying times, and shooting their rivals from more than 6 feet away. They are giving my hospital much needed patients to fill beds.

    • juris imprudent

      I have to admit, I had the morbid thought of wondering if this was doing anything to help reduce Chicago’s murder rate.

      • 61North

        It probably is. I know the police here are limiting public contacts and arrests are way down. How much of it is people not being stupid and how much is police not hassling people is not really clear. People have been driving a hell of a lot faster than usual, but traffic is a lot lighter and there’s noticeably fewer cops out and about.

  11. westernsloper

    We might get to the Escape from New York scenario faster than I thought. Where’s Snake Plisken to rescue NYC glibs when you need him.

  12. Grosspatzer

    Great music selection – with Bird on a plastic saxophone, no less.

    Never heard the term “leper length” before, but instead of arresting those evil partygoers in NJ, they should have just set up a perimeter with people chanting “Unclean! Unclean!”.

    • Rhywun

      We’re all Thomas Covenant now.

  13. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Letters to the Local Rag: I’m Not Saying It’s Aliens…

    Does anyone know why the History Channel has that background noise that makes it hard for one with a hearing loss understand? It is one of my favorite stations. Thank you.

    • Don escaped Oklahoma

      stations

      I love how old technology persists in the language and culture.

      • Timeloose

        I’ve got a great New album I’ve been listening to lately. I heard about it from the DJ on SiriusXM.

      • zwak

        Did you dial in to win tickets too?

      • Tres Cool

        +1 phrase that pays

      • Tejicano

        “I love how old technology persists in the language and culture.”

        Maybe it’s a local thing but I get a kick when I hear somebody say “USB drive”

      • Oy the Billy-Bumbler

        I like how software programs still use an icon of a floppy disk for the “save” command.

  14. PieInTheSky

    Warm day 19 high class degrees. Sunny. Would be great for a qalk withought the damn virus. All the trees are blooming and the fucked up thing in there may be a frost in a few days. April frosts suck ass. The chestnut tree in my yard starting to have leafs. Well horse chestnut but whatever. I aint eating the things anyway

    • 61North

      -8 C and clear in Los Anchorage. But we should hit the freezing mark and sunny this afternoon!

    • Tejicano

      We had snow in Tokyo today.

      • 61North

        I saw some English language reports that the resorts are still open, is this true? Vail and the other conglomerate shuttered their resorts two weeks ago.

      • Tejicano

        I saw something on the TV news last week about a ski resort which was closed because of the virus but I guess there could be a few renegades out there.

  15. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Letters to the Local Rag: Without the Schools In Session Who Will Provide Hot Lunches Ass-Wiping Materials?

    Seems to me that there is a stash of toilet paper sitting in the schools. That’s one of the reasons the store shelves are bare. During a normal day, people would be at work or school using supplies. Maybe we should consider opening the schools’ store rooms and giving out toilet paper for these families with children at home. Bag of groceries, roll in each bag. This may help the stores and allow the rest of us get back to normal, too. Helping each other during crises.

    • Don escaped Oklahoma

      reasons the store shelves are bare

      I love how he has this picture in his head of the janitor running to Kroger every day for a 24-pack.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Gotta keep that TP budget line item in place for next year.

    • Tonio

      And tampons, don’t forget about tampons.

      And while this person is obviously trying to steal a base for socialism, he raises a good point. If municipal government (whatever department, not just schools) has stocks of TP that they aren’t going to use for a while, then why not distribute these on an equitable basis since the taxpayers already paid for them?

      • The Last American Hero

        Because everybody would get 10 squares.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Person getting commercial rolls of toilet paper: WTF am I going to do with this wheel of paper? It’s not even separated into sheets.

  16. 61North

    My N=3 story is that my buddy tested negative after his parents in their 70’s tested positive despite him spending a lot of time at their house the past month. He had no symptoms, his dad was slowed down a bit and his mom was really sick but is much improved.

    Good news.

    It should be interesting to see if his eventual antibody test comes back positive.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Good to hear.

      The range of responses to the virus seems to be really wide.

      • 61North

        Indeed, he was worried about his mom but she is slated to make a full recovery down the line.

        He is a healthy enough guy but was knocked on his ass back in January by the flu, but he lives in King County, WA. So maybe he already had it and was immune. Who knows.

      • Tonio

        “The range of responses to the virus seems to be really wide.”

        This. I’m wondering if there’s something else going on, with at least the more serious cases, that we’ve so far missed.

      • 61North

        I think there’s a not insignificant amount of people who had it earlier and chalked it up to a season flu and moved on with life. And there’s probably a similar number of people who had it with no ill effect. All of these NBA guys who tested positive without having any symptoms is telling. Granted, these guys are about as healthy as one can be, but still, Johnny Punchclock was probably in the same boat.

      • westernsloper

        I think there’s a not insignificant amount of people who had it earlier and chalked it up to a season flu and moved on with life. Kind of like we have done with every other new flu virus pre-TrumPutin. There was some real ball dropping in getting a decent test out and that fact alone should bring skepticism to any stats being reported constantly because we are missing a month or probably two worth of data or maybe I am just an idiot and I should wrap myself in clorox wipes and cower in my closet. Buddy of mine was talking to a nurse doing testing and she told him, even in our small communities everyone has been exposed to this by now. You can Leper Length your ass off, but you will come in contact with it. Whether or not you get sick seems to be a crap shoot just like every other flu bug ever.

      • 61North

        If only there was some organization that could have been preparing for this…

        Part of my skepticism stems from the relative lack of cases here. It was spring break for schools here when this whole thing kicked off down in Seattle and a lot of people either were in the Seattle area or flew home via through SEA. Given that airports and airplanes are germ incubators and the subsequent flights of people on to various hubs out in the bush, you’d expect to see way more sickness if this was the plague. Granted, I’d rather not get it or have anyone get it, but it seems to be waayyyyy overhyped in relation to the outcomes.

    • Tonio

      Very good news. Glad for them.

      Also a good omen for the rest of us if some people that old recover without hospitalization.

    • Grosspatzer

      Second what Tonio said. I’m 66; the wife and I picked up a “cold” from #2 son 4 weeks ago (he’s at U of Scranton, took him to dinner for his birthday). I was subsequently laid up for a week with the worst case of bronchitis I’ve had in years. Flu test was negative; I have a suspicion that a coronavirus test might come up with interesting results.

  17. Sean

    So…my sister and brother in law have had fatigue, cough, and feeling crappy. This morning my sister fell getting out of bed and is being rushed to the hospital with possible injury to her hip. She’s not even old. ?

    • PieInTheSky

      Well hoping for the best. At least you don’t have the Romanian healthcare system

    • Gender Traitor

      Yikes! Hope she’s OK! : (

    • westernsloper

      That is no good. Hope she is ok. Have they seen a doc about those symptoms. I have heard of them before somewhere.

    • Grosspatzer

      Sorry, hope she is OK.

    • Tonio

      Hope it’s not broken.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Wishing them well

    • Sean

      Update: broken left hip. She’s being transferred to a better hospital.

      • Gender Traitor

        Crap! That was either one heck of a fall or, I’d suspect, maybe some osteoporosis?

      • Sean

        She’s in her early 40s. She did not look healthy at Christmas.

        I dunno…

      • Fourscore

        That’s often the factor that sends old people on their one way trip. End up in the nursing home for EVAH! Particularly for women, it seems. For my mother it started with a broken collar bone, never left the nursing home for nearly a year.

        Now, what about funerals? Are they going on still? Viewing of an elderly corona victim?
        I haven’t seen anything in the news. Is everyone being cremated now?

        Looks like Trump needs to do something about how people get sent off.

      • Pi Guy

        Attended a funeral for a friend’s dad last weekend (brain aneurisym) in Slower Lower DE.

        He was 75 so a lot of his friends did not attend. And the funeral home asked us not to shake hands or hug but our friend behaved just like always – hand shake-into-man hug – only with tears.

        I get the impression, in another time, there would’ve been dozens and dozens more people there.

      • Shirley Knott

        Damn, that stinks. Broken hip is never good no matter the patient’s age.
        Best wishes to her.

      • MikeS

        Damn. That sucks. I hope the healing process goes as well as can be hoped for and that the other flu-like symptoms quickly fade a way.

    • Mojeaux

      Oh, Sean, I am so sorry.

  18. Atanarjuat

    However, she found that journalists actually manage pressure better than many other fast-paced professions, like bankers and sales executives, because they feel a higher sense of purpose related to their work.

    The purpose, of course, being
    presenting as fact a carefully constructed narrative intentionally designed to keep some very unpleasant people in power.

    • Don escaped Oklahoma

      There’s a pocket of low accountability, and, while I’m not gunning for anyone, I’ll say that group includes not only journalists and government employees but advertising execs and corporate management in general. You can’t tell the difference between when they are doing poorly or well, when they’re working their asses off or taking three martini lunches.

      The rest of us must be on time, under budget, and our product must actually work.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        +1 Carly Fiorina

      • Suthenboy

        You left out academia. Bad ideas and shit talk are rewarded, even celebrated.

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        indeed: no argument here

        regrettably, my government class largely covers the academic class

      • cyto

        Holy crap… anything in the “social sciences” group. How that gets funded is beyond me.

        I can’t even fathom the thought process of an 18 year old facing their new life and saying “I’m going to major in women’s studies!” What possible career path can come from a major in “African American Studies”?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Bureaucrat, HR, community organizer, law degree….

      • juris imprudent

        Bureaucrat, HR, community organizer, law degree….

        In other words all of the sub-types found under Homo parasiticus.

      • Atanarjuat

        Yeah, HR departments are probably only going to expand their share of the productive sector.

        SJW studies degree would lead right into a job at Media Matters troll farms, Acorn, Planned Parenthood, a Democratic campaign or Congressional staff, etc.

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        woah, dude: without HR, who’s going to screw up my insurance card even though none of my details have changed whatsoever in six years

      • 61North

        The collective disdain from the ever-growing gaggle of HR harpies at my last job for me having the audacity to grab a beer from the keg at 2pm was one of the things that pushed out the door. I would get in at 6a. and they strolled in around 9a.

      • Not Adahn

        I wrote a post about “reality based” professions and “opinion based” ones.

      • Suthenboy

        Yes you did. It was one of my favorite articles.

  19. Sean

    I cheated a bit for breakfast and had a cornbread muffin slathered with butter and some applewood smoked bacon.

    • westernsloper

      ? I bought bacon yesterday. Waiting for brunch to cook it though.

    • Timeloose

      A bought a 1lb bag of buckwheat pancake mix yesterday. I understand.

    • cyto

      I ain’t clickin’ on that. Anything about making lite beer has to involve peeing in it.

    • Drake

      Pretty much what I’ve been doing with tonic and tequila. I need to pick up gin on the next booze run.

  20. juris imprudent

    I didn’t realize the state Constitution of California gave the governor absolute power, to delegate as he pleases. Learn something new every day. Sadly, I know far too many Californians that think the Southern Trudeau is just peachy.

    • PieInTheSky

      I didn’t realize the state Constitution of California gave the governor absolute power, to delegate as he pleases. – you should study more

    • Tonio

      It’s a bit of a crap shoot. The mayors and governors know they are going out on a limb by doing this, but seem to be counting on the courts turning a blind eye just like they did in Korematsu.

      Thanks to whoever made the Korematsu comparison yesterday.

      • 61North

        Every state varies with powers delegated to cities and counties, but I asked the municipal attorneys I know about it and their read on it was that, at least up here, the answer is that ‘it depends on their charter.’ Our governor is basing his response on health and safety powers outlined in the state constitution and some cities/boroughs are piggy backing off of that or relying on their charter for authority. We are a new state and there hasn’t been a similar situation to make precedent, other than “Fuck off, slaver!” which always should apply.

      • juris imprudent

        Well, in this case Newsom said – here, I’ll share my unbridled, illegitimate power with the Chief Justice; assuming that would keep the rest of that court in line.

      • Gustave Lytton

        They’ll defer to the executive in the middle of the emergency, and then when things have settled down and sobered up, say ‘shouldn’t do that after all, really sorry’. Korematsu, but also Schenck (fuck you very much OWH).

      • creech

        Yeah, that was the SCOTUS response to most of the Lincoln powertripping during the Civil War.

    • westernsloper

      I didn’t know the US constitution gave governors the authority to stop people at their borders or hunt them down at their vacation homes.

    • cyto

      Yeah, an article about that really should explain how he gets such a power.

      “I hereby bestow the Chief justice with the power to suspend laws!”

      Ok… and I hereby decree a pony for myself!

      What the hell?

      • Suthenboy

        They are getting what they voted for. Fuck ’em.

      • cyto

        Yeah, it isn’t like everyone was in the dark. Newsome was a well-known quantity. I was astonished when he said he was running… even moreso when people took him seriously.

      • 61North

        It’s my understanding that he’s connected the ultra powerful real estate interests in the Bay Area and the LA real estate groups are okay with him.

      • cyto

        Adam Carolla has a series of rants about Newsome from his time as SF Mayor. I mean… if you cant get the human poop off of the streets…

      • Chafed

        That’s exactly right.

      • juris imprudent

        Indeed.

    • Shirley Knott

      The funniest news I’ve seen lately is Cuomo insisting “it would be illegal” wrt Trump’s threatened quarantine of New York. These people lack all self-awareness don’t they?
      Here

      • cyto

        CNN thinks that was the most epic and awesome display of leadership in history.

        They don’t care about being right, or consistent, or even being “not evil”. Team uber alles.

        I guarantee that if someone from DNC land decides that closing down state borders is the way to go, Trump will be evil and incompetent because he didn’t do that.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Just like when Cuomo started talking about opening back up. So presidential and dreamy!

  21. Gender Traitor

    From the Dept. of Spring=Hope: I’ve raked and swept our back porch of most of the winter’s accumulated leaves, pine needles, and other debris. After some recent storms, the pavement’s still too wet to wrestle my old futon onto the chaise-style frame just yet, but I’ve hauled out a folding chaise to take advantage of this morning’s warm & sunny. Tranquility Base is open for the season, and may be the only thing to save what’s left of my sanity.

    In other news, the magnolia in front is preparing to bloom. IF we can manage NOT to get a late frost that wrecks the blossoms, that’ll also be good for what ails me.

    • Suthenboy

      I am keeping my fingers crossed. We had 85 degrees a few days ago, sunny and everything has new leaves and blooms. Last night a front came through and this morning it is 50 degrees.
      I remember ’92….ice storm in freakin’ April that coated everything with an inch of ice for a week. I dont think we had any fruit or nuts that year at all.

      • Suthenboy

        Hmmm. Forecast says 77 this afternoon.

      • Fourscore

        Are the bees a-flyin’? Did you capture any more wild ones?

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        There were 30 bees on the porch last week; I’ve since figured out they were lost in the wind, not homesteading, because:

        a whole, sky-darkening squadron of them flew over Saturday; they were loud, like a drone, but they were just passing by

    • Don escaped Oklahoma

      I diagnosed the red oak with a terminal disease two years ago, but it limped on. Then I didn’t take it down because I’m no arborist and I’d hate to be wrong. Then it wasn’t winter any more and I didn’t want to move a new tree in that wasn’t dormant. Then I decided to get a diagnosis this summer and do something with a proper information.

      Now half the oak isn’t budding out, so, regrettably, I was right: it’s dying. So I get to look at a half dead tree all year waiting for winter to replace it. Cypress is my favorite, and NewWife thought that’s what we should do.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I’ve got a dying saucer magnolia and a dead beech I need to take down. I’ll have to hire somebody for the beech since it’s large and close to the house. The magnolia will be DIY.

      • Gender Traitor

        We have a big tulip tree in our front yard that’s going to have to come down soon. That’s gonna make me sad. I really love its flowers.

      • Suthenboy

        Get another and replace it. They grow fast

      • Gender Traitor

        Thanks! That’s good to know. We’d already lost the redbud on the other side of the yard.

      • R C Dean

        We just took down two orange trees and a lemon tree. The lemon tree had not grown one inch in 10 years, and the orange trees had always struggled and were pretty much half dead. You can definitely grow citrus here, but I think our combination of sand + granite, and the slope they were on, meant they just could not get enough water no matter how much I poured on them.

        On the plus side, removing them got rid of a big food source for the pack rats. I will miss the smell of the orange blossoms in the spring, though.

        As a wee tad of an R C, I lived in the Texas panhandle, which is pretty much treeless. So I hate taking down trees. But these needed to go. We’ll be putting in a couple of Texas mountain laurels, which should do better.

      • R C Dean

        When we took down the orange trees, BTW, they had really good looking wood – snow white, tight grain. I wonder why I’ve never seen it used in furniture?

      • cyto

        Interesting. I didn’t notice when the county came through and took out our citrus trees. We had an orange and a grapefruit. At least I think that is what they were. It was right after we bought the house, so I never got to see any of the fruit. But citrus canker was spreading and they cut down everything in the area without so much as a “by your leave”.

        In my experience citrus trees are fairly gnarly – frequent infections seem to stunt them and twist them. Maybe good clean wood is hard to come by? Plus, they are pretty small for commercial milling.

      • Grummun

        No experience with citrus trees, but lots of apple trees in Ohio. The pruning required to make them good fruit trees mean you don’t have any wood that is adequately long, strait and free of knots to make furniture lumber. You can turn bowls out of them, my father-in-law does that with his apple trees when they fall over.

        I’ve got a bottle of rye that was “finished on American cherry,” which I suppose means chips of wood, not barrels. Even to my poor sense of taste, it seems a little sweet and fruity. I wonder of you could do the same with orange wood. Perhaps someone who is in the habit of barrel-aging spirits could try that.

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        Cherry timber is logged in the wild: we called them “black cherries,” but I grew up backward and inherited a lot of mistaken notions, so I’ll defer to anyone who knows taxonomy better. I just know trees: paper-barked, they’re often well over a foot in diameter with straight trunks often ten feet or better. For a right-of-way for electricity to his house, I helped a buddy clear a couple of acres once, and we took a dozen of these which I think he got over $1,000 each for, so about $6/boardfoot in 1995 USD.

      • R C Dean

        I used to have probably five acres of black (?) walnut trees. Second growth, very packed in. I considered thinning them out and letting them fatten up into timber – because they were so packed in, they were tall and straight as arrow shafts. To my completely uneducated eye, it looked like with a little management they could have turned into a nice little stand of specialty wood.

        Then I moved, and never got around to it.

      • Drake

        Black Cherry can get pretty big if it doesn’t get black knot disease. Good wood for furniture, firewood, and the smoker. Fruit isn’t as sweet as the cherries in the store – good jam.

      • Grummun

        Cherry timber is logged in the wild

        We get a lot of black cherry here. I’ve cut a fair amount for firewood, the stuff in the fencerows only infrequently grows into something worth milling. The chips off the saw have a distinctive smell, and the heartwood is a pink color that quickly oxidizes to the dark red-brown that is “cherry colored”. Aside from the color, cherry also gets some really pretty grain. The wife and I trimmed the whole first floor of the house in cherry: case, base, crown and floors. Beautiful, but cherry really isn’t hard enough for floors, it doesn’t stand up to dog traffic. When the Lab passes, I’ve been instructed that we’re sanding and refinishing the floors.

      • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

        Those mountain laurels look gorgeous.

      • R C Dean

        I know they grow well in this area; I’ve seen them, and they can get pretty big. Supposedly they smell really good when they flower (which they are doing now). We’ll see if they can make it where we are putting them in.

      • Drake

        Why wait till winter? Any time in the next month is probably fine for a bare roots tree. I’ve planted potter trees from a nursery in mid-summer that grow just fine. As long as you don’t try to plant right over the old stump, you should be fine.

    • 61North

      I have to add some sprayfoam to my crawlspace but it’s still too cold for it to adhere to the beams and cinderblock portions that are nearest to the frozen ground. Maybe in a month or so.

      • Old Man With Candy

        Do you know which spray foam you’re using?

      • Fourscore

        There is probably a pro guy in your neighborhood that will do a spray insulation for a price.

      • 61North

        There are, and they are hungry for work, so I need to call around this week to see how hungry they are for work. I can do it myself, but if the price is right, I’ll save myself the hassle.

      • Old Man With Candy

        Drop me a line, omwc at this domain. I may have a suggestion for you.

    • juris imprudent

      Our magnolia is just barely ahead of the cherry trees. Next couple of sunny days are going to be very pretty.

      • PieInTheSky

        my magnolia is on the way out.

      • PieInTheSky

        Meaning losing flowers bot dying

      • Gender Traitor

        When ours drops its petals, we have to shovel them off the driveway.

      • PieInTheSky

        well here is you see the pic they fall on the street… it was already swept a few times since they started falling

    • Atanarjuat

      Just north of America’s Wang, late frosts can be a scourge, but right now I’m enjoying the scent of a satsuma laden with blossoms.

    • cyto

      Ok… Vampire Weekend. Pretty sweet single shot!

  22. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Local survey of businesses just came back with 40% of the respondents have less than one month of cash reserves or none at all.

    That’s nuts.

    • Don escaped Oklahoma

      they’ve all got a 60″ TV, but as long as they got it on 0% interest, what could go wrong?

    • Shirley Knott

      This was linked on another site. An interesting idea and almost certainly better than the “stimulus”. I suspect the logistics of getting this set up and working would be much more difficult than helicopter money, though.

      • Gustave Lytton

        People and businesses with no need for it will not use it. People and businesses that cannot hope to repay a loan if they use it will not draw on it, either.

        The triumph of hope over experience.

  23. Old Man With Candy

    No idea what I did to my back yesterday, but I’m walking around like a fat Lurch.

    • PieInTheSky

      not enough Romanian wine. fixes all back issues

      • juris imprudent

        How did your cheap bottle of American wine turn out?

      • PieInTheSky

        I did not drink it yet.I usually drink a bottle in 2 days and that being somewhat old it may not last overnight. SO I am thinking of waiting for a moment when it will be finished in a day.

  24. JD is Unemployed

    Deanna Troi? That’s a fairly low threshold. I watched a couple of episodes of Discovery; the snarky camp alien bridge officer might be where I’d set the bar, but I don’t even consider ST:D (lol) to be canon. It’s the most shoe-horned, out of place un-Star Trek series I can think of. I liked Picard, but the premise of that is absolute garbage (a supernova blowing up somehow making a big portion of the galaxy uninhabitable?), so I suppose I think of it like a standalone thing.

    The ST canon ended with the final episode of Voyager in 2001. Nemesis was double gay.

    • Not Adahn

      Troi wasn’t even the most annoying character on TNG.

      You’ve got Guinan, Barkley, Ro, Pulaskey, oh, and WESLEY CRUSHER

      • The Last American Hero

        My buddy found Yar to be annoying. Because she exited far too soon in his book.

    • Suthenboy

      *facepalm*

      Star Wars…Star Trek….just let ’em die already. There is nothing left to squeeze out of them.

      • cyto

        I was just thinking that the other day… they had articles about the Marvel Cinematic Universe and I realized… Star Trek is done. So is Star Wars. There really isn’t anywhere left to go in Star Wars…. and Star Trek kinda strangled themselves. Just let it die.

        Between all of the subscription channels (Netflix, cable premiums, etc.) and DUST on Youtube, SciFi is in excellent shape without them.

      • Gender Traitor

        Any Netflix recommendations for someone who’s mourning the murder of Doctor Who?

      • Not Adahn

        Did you ever watch Farscape?

      • CPRM

        As someone who suffers from pupaphobia I had trouble getting into Farscape.

      • Gender Traitor

        Nope, never have. We go for long spells without thinking to fire up Netflix, as we’re old fuddy-duddies who still watch cable. Finally turned it on to watch a one-off documentary we’d heard about – Echo in the Canyon – about the Laurel Canyon music scene in the ’60s. Reminded us that we at least have that option to relieve our sportsless, live entertainment-less boredom.

      • JD is Unemployed

        Farscape may be one of the worst things ever to be televised.

      • cyto

        I think it might be a chick thing. Everyone I ever knew who was all excited about Farscape was a chick.

        I loved Jim Henson and watched everything he ever did. But I never managed to get in to Farscape.

        But people who love it really, really love it.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        As long as it is qualified by ‘one of’. Even in science fiction/fantasy, the Canadian version of Being Human, Galactica 1980, Manimal, The Powers of Matthew Star, and Supertrain were worse than Farscape. Supertrain included because the train is higher tech than they had then or maybe now.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        The other Doctor Who? 1963-1989
        Although The Ark, Revenge of the Cybermen, and Terminus will not get your mind off of the Wuhan fever.

      • Gender Traitor

        The Mister likes Classic Who, but I usually end up falling asleep on the sofa before it’s over.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        Tangled (2010)
        The authority figure lies to the female protagonist about how dangerous it is outside. She is about to turn 18 and has not been outside at least since she was a baby, and maybe never. She runs away with someone she just met. The two are chased by law enforcement, the girl’s mother-figure, and by a pair of crooks after the male lead.
        Tangled takes place in the kingdom of … Corona.

      • cyto

        Wow, amazing coincidence.

        It sounds like “10 Cloverfield Lane” a bit.

        For those who have not seen it, well worth the watch. Woman wakes up in a fallout shelter with a creepy prepper played by John Goodman who tells her that he rescued her from a car accident and it is not safe to go outside. Instant death.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        Tangled (2010)
        The authority figure lies to the female protagonist about how dangerous it is outside. She is about to turn 18 and has not been outside at least since she was a baby, and maybe never. She runs away with someone she just met. The two are chased by law enforcement, the girl’s mother-figure, and by a pair of crooks after the male lead.
        Tangled takes place in the kingdom of … Corona.

      • Drake

        Witcher of course. Just started Ozarks yesterday – seems promising.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        If you trust the markets:
        Gone with the Wind 1939
        Avatar 2009
        Titanic 1997
        Star Wars: A New Hope 1977 In the award winning version, Han shot first.
        Avengers: Endgame 2019
        The Sound of Music 1965
        E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial 1982
        The Ten Commandments 1956
        Doctor Zhivago 1965
        The Force Awakens 2015 Does this count as a Star Wars movie?

        Top grossing movies, adjusted for inflation

      • cyto

        Thanks for bringing that up. They may as well have skipped this last season. What a complete nothing. Jeez people, newly minted writers are graduating by the hundreds of thousands every year. And they’ll all work for peanuts. Just hire a dozen of the most talented to do a script treatment and see if any of them are worth keeping. You could talent scout this for less than a hundred grand.

        Then let that one voice speak for a few seasons.

      • cyto

        In reference to Tangled. Thread fail.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        Current Doctor now just one episode shy of two seasons.

      • Donation Not Taxation

        Tangled (2010)
        The authority figure lies to the female protagonist about how dangerous it is outside. She is about to turn 18 and has not been outside at least since she was a baby, and maybe never. She runs away with someone she just met. The two are chased by law enforcement, the girl’s mother-figure, and by a pair of crooks after the male lead.
        Tangled takes place in the kingdom of … Corona.

  25. Don escaped Oklahoma

    worst McLaughlin Group episode every: save yourself

  26. Grummun

    most annoying Star Trek character ever

    That is a high bar to clear. I will see your Marina Sirtis and raise you Whoopi Goldberg.

    • juris imprudent

      Dunking on an old man normally would be called excessive – but that right there, that is a postering.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      I really hated that guy whose face was black on the right side and white in the left side. The guy whose face was black on the left side and white on the right side was OK by me though.

      • cyto

        Outstanding

    • Timeloose

      Counselor Troi also had the flattest ass on Star Trek.

    • Old Man With Candy

      I stand by my judgement- and worse yet, Troi was in every fucking episode. Why Picard never backhanded her with a snarled, “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” is a complete mystery to me.

      • AlmightyJB

        Still would

      • Grummun

        Troi was in every fucking episode

        Fair enough, if you want to measure aggregate annoying-ness over the lifetime of the series. I still argue there are characters whose local maximum annoying-ness is higher than Troi’s.

        What’s the unit of measure of annoying-ness? I suggest, a “Wesley.”

    • Gender Traitor

      The correct answer is Q.

      • Gender Traitor

        If limiting to regular characters, Chekhov.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        Chekhov? Not even in the top 25 worst.

        For your consideration, a list of more annoying regular characters (not in any order) :
        Neelix
        Voyager’s EMH
        Harry Kim (early seasons)
        Kes
        Tuvok
        Esri Dax
        The doctor on Enterprise
        Wesley Crusher
        Dr Pulaski
        Rom
        Nog
        Troi
        Tasha Yar
        Guinan
        Keiko

      • JD is Unemployed

        Neelix – yes but with a few redeeming qualities
        EMH aka The Doctor – huge dork but a good character
        Harry Kim – yeah kind of a gray man but he aight
        Kes – yes but was very sad when she came back all senile and angry
        Dr. Phlox – eugh, yeah he creeped me out
        Ezri Dax – it was difficult to carve out a strong character in the time they had left but Nicole de Boer did will given the script and screentime

        I happen to like all the other characters you listed. Dr. Bashir was very annoying but he was supposed to be, and ultimately likeable.

      • AlmightyJB

        Nerds! Lol.

      • Grumbletarian

        Q was the best character ever. I would watch Q Trek religiously.

      • Gender Traitor

        Only ever saw him on ST:TNG. Did he mellow a bit in the later series?

      • kbolino

        Well, Sisko decked him on his first appearance in DS9 and he never went back there.

      • The Last American Hero

        Yet another reason why DS9 is the greatest of the Treks.

      • Grumbletarian

        No, he was always delightfully pompous and condescending, even when he got a crush on Janeway in Voyager.

      • RAHeinlein

        OMG- I can’t event with you.

    • Not Adahn

      Obviously the reason you are all not naming Wesley is that he was so terrible you’re suppressing the memory of him existing.

      • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

        Back long before hashtags and memes were a thing, I ran a Citadel-variant BBS (on an Atari ST!) in Edmonton that shared a networked chat area called “KILL WESLEY!” There was zero love for that particular character in our group of nerds.

      • Not Adahn

        At cons, there used to always be someone selling buttons that said “Committee to have Wesley Crusher turned into Styrofoam Dodecahedron.”

      • Gustave Lytton

        alt.ensign.wesley.die.die.die

      • Grummun

        +1 usenet

    • westernsloper

      You people are weird.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      I’d be OK with this if he’d been diagnosed and was flaunting the quarantine (beats getting the cops involved) but this is just people being busybody cunts in the absence of symptoms.

      • AlmightyJB

        I would have been ok with him gunning down his armed neighbors while they were on his property being assholes.

      • leon

        The unrecognized Horrific Irony of a group of people banding together and chopping a tree down to ensure someone is obeying “Shelter in place” and “social distancing” orders, is enough for each of them to be shot.

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        There’s an interesting movement in compensation law: enforce replacement. It comes close to compelling specific performance, but it has a certain value as true justice; in this case:

        Whoever sawed down the tree gets to replace the tree, the entire tree at full height.; whatever that cost, that’s his problem and he should of thought of that before he fired up his saw. I know you can’t get blood out of a turnip, but it’s the kind of justice that sends a proper signal to the rest of society.

      • Suthenboy

        I agree and have had that thought most of my life but we both know the state is not going to forego using criminal penalty to line their pockets in favor of crime victim restoration.

      • The Last American Hero

        Just cut one of that guy’s trees down, and make sure it falls on the house.

    • Hyperion

      “It takes a village”

      You know, you can just see this coming.

      Look at Baltimore as an example. You have a very large segment of the population terminally unemployed. Those people have no sense of purpose and they have nothing but free time on their hand. So what does that lead to? 300 murders annually, a violent crime rate equal to the worst of 3rd world hellholes around the world.

      If this shit doesn’t end soon, it will be unsafe to go outside anyway because of all the people who have lost hope and are going crazy, with nothing but time on their hands.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        A bunch of people with nothing to do is always a recipe for disaster; A nation full of people who are forced to have nothing to do will be a catastrophe.

  27. Private Chipperbot

    Hey, State Farm. This is not the new normal. Fuck off.

    • leon

      I’ve always hated their commercials. They’re Mahomes series were awful.

      • Gender Traitor

        I liked some of the ones with Clay Matthews, but then he had to go and leave the Packers. : (

    • Sean

      There are multiple new commercials from various companies doing this. They *really* set me on edge.

      • 61North

        My work and personal inboxes are full of emails from companies telling me how they’re adapting to this nonsense. I don’t care. Leave me alone.

      • 61North

        To be clear, I care what the trash company and power company are doing wrt to service times and levels. I don’t care that Vanguard or State Farm is allowing telework.

      • R C Dean

        Yeah, everybody, no matter what, has to signal their Deep Concern about the CCP Virus. Sandpapers my ass, it does.

      • The Last American Hero

        How is your car going to get wrecked when you aren’t allowed to drive it anywhere?

      • MikeS

        If some group of vigilantes comes buy, cuts down a tree, and it lands on your car.

    • AlmightyJB

      I fucking hate that term.

      • Q Continuum

        ^^^!!!!!!!^^^

      • The Last American Hero

        Seconded. It implies complete and total despair. Not just that things have taken a bad turn, but that we cannot recover or adapt and most importantly – we shouldn’t even try because it’s pointless.

  28. Don escaped Oklahoma

    I stay several months out with a family calendar. I’ve heard about other ways of collating, but at the end of the day it’s easiest just to key everything to Excel; NewWife and I have been coordinating when we were going to meet in what town or which airport for years now.

    So now I’m finally rolling into occasions that have been cancelled since I posted them. Going to see STL vs ATL in the center of our MLB year; I’ve scratched that off emotionally. UGA vs UT is the first week of October for decades, and one wonders if that will happen; I’m a shit human being, so don’t ask me how many of you should die and get out of the way so that I can have a normal autumn.

  29. juris imprudent

    The derp it burns!

    But there are several problems with this, as anyone inclined to think about it critically (even for a moment) might figure out – problems one might summarize as the mystification of the couple-form; the romanticisation of kinship; and the sanitization of the fundamentally unsafe space that is private property.

    TW – that is the sanest thing you will read. Continue at your own risk.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      An ugly ginger feminist walks into a bar…

      • juris imprudent

        An ugly ginger feminist walks into a barclub

        Unless you don’t want the applause.

      • Not Adahn

        Like a baby seal?

      • juris imprudent

        ^ This guy gets it!

    • 61North

      “You might have heard of me from things I’ve written like “How British feminism became anti-trans” (an op-ed commissioned by the NYT), “Cthulhu Plays No Role for Me” (my essay on the Cyborg Manifesto and Staying with the Trouble).”

      No. No I have not.

      • Ted S.

        That paragraph sounds like Troy McClure.

      • 61North

        I’d rather watch Locker Room Towel Fight: The Blinding of Larry Driscol than read any of her rubbish.

    • Suthenboy

      No matter what the problem is the solution is always the same. Goddamn I hate commie rat-fucking shitweasels.

    • Gender Traitor

      Sophie Lewis (@reproutopia) is the author of Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family, and a free-lance writer interested in queer communism

      Ummm…wut??

      • juris imprudent

        They keep splitting the marginalization hairs finer and finer and they just might end up as individuals.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      In short, the pandemic is no time to forget about family abolition. In the words of feminist theorist and mother Madeline Lane-McKinley; “Households are capitalism’s pressure cookers. This crisis will see a surge in housework – cleaning, cooking, caretaking, but also child abuse, molestation, intimate partner rape, psychological torture, and more.” Far from a time to acquiesce to ‘family values’ ideology, then, the pandemic is an acutely important time to provision, evacuate and generally empower survivors of – and refugees from – the nuclear household.

      And thirdly, even when the private nuclear household poses no direct physical or mental threat to one’s person – no spouse-battering, no child rape, and no queer-bashing – the private family qua mode of social reproduction still, frankly, sucks. It genders, nationalizes and races us. It norms us for productive work. It makes us believe we are ‘individuals.’ It minimizes costs for capital while maximizing human beings’ life-making labor (across billions of tiny boxes, each kitted out – absurdly – with its own kitchen, micro-crèche and laundry). It blackmails us into mistaking the only sources of love and care we have for the extent of what is possible.

      There are some people who should probably just be taken out back and shot before they damage someone else’s brain.

      • leon

        These People hate you, and they hate your way of life. They would gladly see you dead. Millstones and Oceans.

    • leon

      Let us abolish the known unit of stability in society! It is the best chance at DERPA, DERPA, DERPA.

      • juris imprudent

        Can somebody please attached some electrodes to Moynihan’s grave? We’re missing out on a lot of power generation.

    • AlmightyJB

      Speaking of non-essential.

    • juris imprudent

      I think the Brits have a great candidate for zeroing out of it’s taxpayer-funded budget. That’s how this moron got her PhD.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Sorry, I couldn’t make it past the title.

    • leon

      Now is a good time to start thinking about the abolishment of people who advocate for the abolishment of the family.

      • Hyperion

        To me, that entire thing could be reduced down to ‘I’m a miserable cunt and no one can stand to be around me, so I want all of you to suffer the same fate! Let’s make that law!’.

      • 61North

        Oh, I see you’ve met my ex.

    • Juvenile Bluster

      I was wondering when someone would post that here.

      That shit made Everyday Feminism look sane.

    • Hyperion

      Jesus. This is like The Stand, only instead of they guy chanting ‘Bring out your dead, bring out your dead!’, he’s chanting ‘Bring out your nutcases, bring your your nutcases!’.

    • Rhywun

      Commies gonna commie.

    • R C Dean

      the fundamentally unsafe space that is private property.

      As opposed to public property, where people gather in large groups.

      What a complete and utter idiot.

  30. I. B. McGinty

    ” I need help reviving this term from its coma”

    Because of the picture at the top I read this as comma.

    • westernsloper

      You are not alone Señor McGinty. Same.

  31. Not Adahn

    Finished the last of my Santa Barbara estate, and the coffee shop that roasts it it closed indefinitely.

    Damn you panicky coronatards!

    • PieInTheSky

      I am thinking of changing my coffee making and don’t know if I should go for a better moka pot, a v60 or spend the $ for a decent espresso maker.

      Some say this is decent for the price

      https://www.flairespresso.com/

      Others say just get a real espresso machine

      • Not Adahn

        Are those prices in USD? ‘Cause you’re getting onto Breville prices at that point.

        I’m pretty much a drip peasant, but I’ve optimized for it.

      • PieInTheSky

        well yes it is the US version of the site.

        is Breville really that good? I was looking at a Lelit in the 2100 Lei range

      • Not Adahn

        They have a good reputation, but I can’t speak from first-hand experience wrt espresso machines. I do have a couple of their other household electric appliances and they have lasted a while and work well.

      • Tejicano

        I have a Breville that I’ve been using for close to 20 years. Just as good as the first time I plugged it in and still going strong.

      • PieInTheSky

        I just don’t trust an Australian company for espresso

      • R C Dean

        I’m pretty much a drip peasant, but I’ve optimized for it.

        #metoo. Technivorm FTW. I think we’ve had ours for 12 years? Works like brand new. Just had to replace the filter holder thingy – the little on/off spout at the bottom is the weak link.

  32. Not Adahn

    Went out to Broadway yesterday, it appears to be completely closed. Some of the smaller restaurants on downtown side streets are still open, including my creperie and the falafel place.

    • PieInTheSky

      Broadway as in New York or standard name for a main street in various cities?

      • Not Adahn

        The latter, at least out here. When I lived in the middle of the country, it was never used. The term there was “Main Street.”

      • Ted S.

        The original New York Broadway went all the way up to Albany as US Route 9, and 9W on this side of the river is Broadway in most of the cities.

      • R C Dean

        I think the Brit term for “Main Street” is “Broad Street”?

      • Raven Nation

        High Street?

      • R C Dean

        That sounds more righter.

    • Sean

      We got some take out Indian food yesterday to support a local restaurant.

      The gun store next door to them was open “by appointment”.

      • R C Dean

        Can you make an appointment by knocking on the door?

      • Sean

        I ‘d think so.

  33. Q Continuum

    Slutty Sunday is reluctantly going to start doing yardwork.

      • PieInTheSky

        It happens to most. Not me obviously, but most.

      • PieInTheSky

        22 for me. Damn ugly tats on 32

      • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

        “Premature submission.”
        Yeah, we’ve all been there, right guys? GUYS?

        Anyone?

        . . .

        . . . I’ll just slink away now . . .

    • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

      Good for them! They’re probably all depressed right now, what with having to stay inside on your link list until you deign to set them free.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Babushka in waiting is all I see…….

  34. mexican sharpshooter

    the most annoying Star Trek character ever

    Wesley Crusher and the entire cast of Voyager to the white courtesy phone.

    • Q Continuum

      “the entire cast of Voyager”

      I *know* you don’t mean 7 of 9. Cause if so, I’m going to have to unperson you.

      • mexican sharpshooter

        Isnt she a carryover from TNG?

      • Rhywun

        No. She didn’t show up until season 4 of Voyager.

      • mexican sharpshooter

        Whatever, I’m not apologizing for othering the entire cast of voyager.

      • Gender Traitor

        Huh. I could have sworn she showed up in one episode of TNG when they encountered the Borg. I’ve hardly seen any of the series that came after that.

      • mexican sharpshooter

        Upon further review its Voyager only. Still, it reinforces my opinion of the show which is nothing more than a rehash of previous popular characters, they just made them slightly different.

        Female Kirk, Black Spock, Female Warf, McCoy without any snark, Mexican Riker. 7 of 9 is just Data with tits.

      • mrfamous

        She’s the reason Barack Obama became president.

  35. Stinky Wizzleteats

    Wil Wheaton neck and neck with Whoopi for most annoying Star Trek actor, that’s for sure.

    • kbolino

      He mellowed out for a bit, then found Twitter and turned back into a flaming asshole.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Yep, he actually had a silly comic show in the Tosh.O vein a few years ago that was pretty funny but his Twitter brain vomit reveals the twat he is and probably always has been.

    • Suthenboy

      Forget about the character she played. Whoopicushion is definitely on the list of most despicable, annoying people.

      • kbolino

        I cannot take anything she says seriously after noticing she has no eyebrows. You cannot unsee that fact.

      • Crusty Juggler

        Danson fucked her.

      • kbolino

        The 1990s were a hell of a time.

      • Suthenboy

        Gah!

        Quickly types in brainbleach.com

      • Not Adahn

        “hot dog down a hallway”

    • JD is Unemployed

      I have no qualms with Guinan – she’s a good character. I don’t pay no mind to Whoopi.

      • Rhywun

        Agree on both counts.

  36. Crusty Juggler

    Newburgh mayor pleads for calm after fatal shooting and overnight rioting

    While the rest of the world is concerned about the GLOBAL PANDEMIC, New York’s most dangerous city resorts to business as usual.

    Also:

    Hoovler said a grand jury will review evidence and decide whether the officers were justified in firing their weapons. Also, under protocol established in 2015 for officer-involved fatalities, his office will investigate the matter, assisted by state police.

    Harvey said the state attorney general’s office also is planning to investigate.

    Unlike the grand jury proceedings, Hoovler said his investigation is not subject to secrecy, and he will issue a report when it is over.

    Hoovler said that investigation will take at least four to six months to complete.

    lol ok guy

    • R C Dean

      four to six months to complete

      WTF? You know the shooters, you have a bunch of witnesses already identified. I don’t understand why this would take more than a couple weeks.

      Unless, of course, when you release your report exonerating the cops you want everyone to have forgotten about it.

  37. Crusty Juggler

    I watched “Richard Jewell” last night – it is tremendous. I think the most of the Glibertarian crowd would approve.

    • westernsloper

      Thanks for the reminder. That has been on my to watch list for awhile.

    • creech

      Just got it in the mail from Netflix. Sounds like my afternoon is all set.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Seriously? I didn’t realize that the mailing of hard copies was a service they still provided.

      • LCDR_Fish

        Click on “DVD” at the top of the digital version. So many titles they still have available (a lot of OOP DVDs) not on any streaming service – although Prime has been getting better with some old stuff.

    • LemonGrenade

      Same. Really enjoyed Rockwell’s performance in it.

    • 61North

      the lady in the black jacket seems really hype for it. good for her.

  38. mexican sharpshooter

    My kids decided to watch The Mighty Ducks.

    – Excellent use of the vintage goalie mask to make the agony of defeat memory just a bit creepier.
    – Every adult character in this movie has serious psychological issues, and should NOT be coaching hockey.

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      Rent! Car insurance! Yippee!

    • Drake

      You will likely not receive a stimulus payment.

  39. Hyperion

    Foolish Panic

    Hey, look at this, there’s some nutcase guy in Britain who thinks people should actually be able to go outside! Maybe we should cut down a tree and drag it across his driveway before he escapes his confinement unit!

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Interesting that the cops there would hassle lone people walking their dogs on a trail in the middle of bumblefuckegypt. Who other than a church lady chair of a neighborhood association type would give a shit?

    • Suthenboy

      I am beginning to think these stimulus checks should be spent on rope.

      • Hyperion

        Anyone hoarding tar and feathers yet?

    • westernsloper

      Crucially, those who began by claiming that we faced half a million deaths from the coronavirus in this country have now greatly lowered their estimate. Professor Neil Ferguson was one of those largely responsible for the original panic. He or others from Imperial college have twice revised his terrifying prophecy, first to fewer than 20,000 and then on Friday to 5,700.
      He says intensive care units will probably cope. And he conceded a point made by critics of the panic policy – that two-thirds of people who die from coronavirus in the next nine months would most likely have died this year from other causes.
      He tried to claim that the shutdown of the country had led to this violent backtrack, claiming that it was ‘social distancing strategies’ which had brought about his amazing climbdown. How could he possibly know either that this had happened, or that it would happen, or that there was any connection between the two?

      Oh, that motherfucker in an article again.

      • R C Dean

        He tried to claim that the shutdown of the country had led to this violent backtrack, claiming that it was ‘social distancing strategies’ which had brought about his amazing climbdown. How could he possibly know either that this had happened, or that it would happen, or that there was any connection between the two?

        Especially since involuntary social distancing went into effect two days before he issued his revision.

        And it has nothing whatsoever to do with his adoption of the “this has been here awhile and has already spread so that we are approaching herd immunity” theory in order to back down his model. Yeah, the guys from the Oxford Institute of Evidence Based Medicine, who had their articles taken down, those guys turn out to have been right (we now think).

  40. Don escaped Oklahoma

    Bill Mitchell @mitchellvii Trump is like the brave soldier crawling on his belly with a bayonet through the minefield to find the safe way through for everyone else.

    • Crusty Juggler

      He’s trying to get me my diarrhea check – leave him alone!

    • Juvenile Bluster

      Bill Mitchell is a level of sycophant and a level of stupid that I didn’t know was possible in a human being.

    • Suthenboy

      “Trump is like the brave soldier crawling on his belly with a bayonet through the minefield to find the safe way through for everyone else.”

      Yeah. I dont think that is really accurate.

      What the hell is it with people and their compulsion to idealize other people? Lack of principle I guess. Easier to unquestionably follow than to think for yourself.

      • Hyperion

        I think Juvenile Bluster has the word you’re looking for – ‘sycophant’.

      • Gender Traitor
    • commodious spittoon

      I like Douglas Murray’s minefield rocket metaphor better.

  41. Juvenile Bluster

    The CCP is lying out their ass? I’m shocked. SHOCKED! Well, not that shocked.

    Pradheep J. Shanker
    @Neoavatara
    “A resident of Hubei province…said most people there now believe more than 40k people died in the city before and during the lockdown.

    “Maybe authorities are gradually releasing real figures…so that people will gradually come to accept the reality.”

    • creech

      What does our vaunted C.I.A. say?

      • R C Dean

        Orange Man Bad?

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Nah, they’re lying to save face and make themselves look good. Don’t ever forget, the CCP are monsters.

      • Hyperion

        China could lose a billion people and the CCP would still have enough slave labor to get them through.

    • Hyperion

      “The CCP is lying out their ass?”

      If their mouth is moving…

  42. Crusty Juggler

    THEY HAVE SILENCED TRISH REGAN!

    DON’T LET THEM SILENCE THE TRUTH!

    CORONA IS A DEEP STATE PLOT!

    IT’S A HOAX!

    • Not Adahn

      I cannot express how disappointed that you of all people didn’t list Hot Fuzz as one of the best comedies.

      • Crusty Juggler

        Running an essential business while continuing to support my rampant alcoholism means I will make an occasional lapse in judgement, sir.

  43. creech

    I’ve made it through season 2 of “Outlander.” Will there be new naked chicks in season 3 or just more of the same?

    • Suthenboy

      Wife tried to watch that. She made two seasons. The original premise was interesting but it died very quickly. I found it profoundly uninteresting.

      • Tulip

        So couldn’t get through more than an episode and I liked the books

    • Suthenboy

      It’s Portland. I think they have a life sized bronze statue of Lenin.

    • RAHeinlein

      Waiting for the first responder “free shit” packages for the Great Coronavirus War – cue 9/11 playbook.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      I’m appreciative of what the workers are doing but I’m not going to participate in any cringe ass silly bullshit like that. Luckily for me that’ll never happen in my state.

      • JD is Unemployed

        You said what I tried to with less, er, what do you call them? Ah yes, “words”. Much succinct. Very brevity.

    • JD is Unemployed

      We had one of those in the UK for NHS staff. I did not participate, but the reasoning was that I think it’s pretty crass and don’t like stupid collectivist signaling. Of course, my refusal is interpreted as an insult to the poor souls working in the NHS. That’s an age old tactic to smear anyone critical of the NHS – put up the workers as a human propaganda shield. Of course I absolutely appreciate the medical professionals doing their damndest to do the best job they can in the system they have. Of course I’ve nothing against them, but the lefties deliberately conflate sound economic arguments with some strawman sneering and then white knight for the stunning and brave workers.

      • JaimeRoberto Delecto

        Wear the ribbon, JD.

  44. Tres Cool

    My church started streaming service due to Flu Manchu. Im currently in my underwear, eating breakfast, and commenting on Glibs while “at church”.
    We live in the best possible time.

    • JD is Unemployed

      *Jesus narrows gaze*

    • Gender Traitor

      Homey! You need to show up the next time Neph fires up a Zoom meeting. Pants optional, of course.

      • Tres Cool

        I would think that anyone wearing pants to a Glibs meeting would be immediately shamed.

      • Shirley Knott

        Makes notes for Honey Harvest.

      • Hyperion

        Holy … a Zoom meeting full of pantsless Glibs. Ya’ll really are going to bring down the judgement and the end days upon us.

      • AlexinCT

        I am in!!!

    • Naptown Bill

      Son, the Monday all-hands is going to be revolutionized once everyone starts doing the jacket-and-boxers routine on camera.

    • JD is Unemployed

      Do you have to stay logged in for a certain amount of time afterwards for the polite socializing?

    • Drake

      We did virtual church this morning.

  45. JD is Unemployed

    Kind of a throwaway post on the end of a links but I’m not going to hold on for a top-of-the comments post just on the next one, buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut:

    I’m seeing a lot of rationing going on now, on everything from certain basic groceries to the freedom to even leave ones own house. I predict the climate alarmists next move will be to point to this as proof that people can survive under such rationing, and that as such, it should become normal, in order to reduce our consumption/carbon footprint. Like my sister, they probably also will seem to take very much comfort in the fact that people’s movements are severely restricted, and again advocate for some “new normal” wherein our movements are heavily regulated and rationed so as to prevent “non essential” travel, such as going too far away from your own house to walk too often. Maybe people will be aloted a certain mileage on their vehicles (like insurance policies, and manufacturer warranties that already limit mileage), and like now (in the UK) people will face penalties and surveillance for going where they are not approved to go. I can definitely see this being aloted in such a manner as to reduce travel by all methods, except maybe bicycle.

    You will get four rolls of single-ply TP per month and like it. You will be allowed x amount of meat/poultry a month and like it. You will be aloted x amount of canned goods per month and like it. You will be allowed to use a certain amount of electricity per month and like it. That sort of thing. Growing your own vegetables? We’ll have some of that, thank you, for redistribution.

    • CPRM

      Everyone gets a free FitBit!

      • JD is Unemployed

        What happens when I stomp mine into itty bitty pieces and burn said pieces?

      • CPRM

        If you’d have bothered to read the EULA you’d know that it’s 30 years in the pen.

      • Tres Cool

        Protip- take off your FitBit before browsing the pr0nhub. Once, mine thought I jogged 8 miles, but I never left the house.

    • Hyperion

      “predict the climate alarmists next move will be to point to this as proof that people can survive under such rationing, and that as such, it should become normal”

      Take their cell phones away from them for a day and watch their pain and agony, rending of clothing, gnashing of teeth.

    • creech

      Actually, by the time this is over, those kind of climate alarmists will run the risk of tar and feathering. If this is a glimpse of what these ecofreaks want, then most people are going to reject them. Today’s paper had a local columnist advocating that, once this quarantining is over, we all jump in our cars and aimlessly burn gas going wherever we want.

      • Hyperion

        If they really wanted to induce a panic, they’d cut cell phone service for a week. We’d have hospitals overflowing with people gone stark raving mad. Instead of ventilators, we’d need straight jackets and padded cells.

    • RAHeinlein

      Chicago shut that down – the optics of white people running along the beach front was too much. Of course, the dog parks are another story…

  46. CPRM

    I find it kind of scary that all I have to do to stay up for 20 some hours to flip my schedule from night shift back to regular is just not drink when I get home from work. I’m more the bald guy from The Machinist than Tyler Durden though sadly.

    • JD is Unemployed

      Either way, you’re a figment of some other guy’s imagination. I think it’s Crusty.

      • CPRM

        I think I’m a Figment of Billy Bartie’s imagination.

  47. Crusty Juggler

    How to Survive the Blitz

    ocieties that build resilience do not hide behind a wall of happy talk or try to minimize the danger. Resilience does not come from mindless optimism, or from people telling one another to be calm amid the turmoil. Resilience is built when people confront a threat realistically, and discover that they have the resources to cope with it together.

    Resilience is built when people tell a collective story about the danger that places the current terror they are facing within a larger redemptive context. When all this is over, we’ll be better because of it. What was once a scary threat to be avoided, releasing a surge of destructive cortisol, becomes a challenge to be met, releasing a cascade of adrenaline.

    During the Blitz, the British told a story about themselves that shaped their reaction to the experience and that shapes their self-perception to this day: They are at their best when their backs are to the wall, they are at their best when they are alone as a nation, and their national strength comes from their ability to be funny and phlegmatic during a crisis.

    Let’s do it together, people.

    Come together.

    Trump will unite us!

    • Suthenboy

      I am becoming a fan of the term ‘coronatard’.

      I think most of these people are LARPing. It is nearly impossible to gauge the real threat with all of the hysteria.
      And by the way, what the hell is it with people hoarding toilet paper? It isn’t the first thing that comes to my mind when contemplating preparation for the apocalypse.

      • Hyperion

        “what the hell is it with people hoarding toilet paper? It isn’t the first thing that comes to my mind when contemplating preparation for the apocalypse.”

        Herd animal mentality. Someone told someone else, somewhere, that Walmart has no toilet paper and there you have it. If it would have been paper Dixie cups, even though no one uses them, people would be trying to hoard them by the truckloads.

        How easy it is to get people to behave this way is really scary and our benevolent leaders seeing this are getting very bad ideas, we can be sure of that.

      • Suthenboy

        I wonder how much of what we are seeing is deliberate testing to see how much people will dance.

      • Hyperion

        I think a lot of it is just a game of oneupmanship with politicians not wanting to look like the person who didn’t do something.

        There’s also our media, who will continue to carry water for the Chicoms, no matter how much evidence there is that they were the main cause of this by either covering up after they knew, or deliberately ignoring it. When do you think the CCP is going to let journalists and medical experts into Wuhan to assess the situation? I would say that getting into Wuhan in the near future will be like getting into North Korea.

        One thing I know for sure, is that statists and control freaks are liking what they see, way too much.

        Climate change didn’t scare most people too much, but this worked way too well. That’s what worries me, not the virus.

  48. Don escaped Oklahoma

    Dr Pulaski

    It’s funny how I was a nerd in the seventies but ain’t one no more. When we said nerd, we meant bookish (as opposed to athletic), the worst and least forgivable of which was being knowledgeable of the obscure and underpinning tidbits of the real world: knowing π, e, the speed of light, and Avogadro to a few significant figures and how to use them.

    I suppose some nerdy sorts were more into sci-fi than most “normal” folk; I certainly wasn’t, but I don’t project my more practical interests onto others. With Big Bang Theory, I’ve come to see the ultimate conflation of the nerd notions; maybe it’s a progression: from science, to science-ish, to comic books and movies and tee shirts based on wholly indefensible super-characters. When I hear DC versus Marvel, I absolutely don’t think nerd; I still don’t understand what’s interesting, motivating, or captivating about characters that defy the very calculations that the original nerds could make. Watch what you like, but you’re safe from my calling you a nerd over a Rubber Man tee shirt.

    • Suthenboy

      I am currently spending a lot of time thinking about how an economy affects culture and this is one of the aspects I am still in the process of weighing: how an advanced economy removes danger and scarcity and thus people, in the absence of a crucible, become incapable or unwilling to deal with reality.

      • Don escaped Oklahoma

        If I read you right, I have a notion that might sum up the trend: with inoculations and airbags, people have inferred a right to live to 100 in full vigor and trim; corollary: if someone doesn’t live to 100, they should sue someone and recover damages. I am not excusing the liable; if you run over a bus-load of brownie scouts, prepare to pay. I’m just saying that if the normal forces of the world wear you out somewhere in your seventies, that is probably reasonable and natural and not StupidCorp’s fault.

    • JD is Unemployed

      Pulaski was a mean bitch, and I really didn’t like how she treated Data. I think that’s why they canned her.

      • Ambassador Tripacer, A.S. A&P

        I thought she was only there because Beverly had a contract dispute.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Diana Muldaur gets a pass from me for her TOS appearances.

  49. Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

    Canada’s slipped to 16th place for raw case counts of Wubonic Plague. I think we can do better.

    • CPRM

      Heh, now I think we need to start calling adjusted data cooked data.

      • Suthenboy

        According to unnamed sources?

        When I was in school my profs called these “pulling it out of your ass”.

      • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

        “Man, somebody’s really “Wuhan’ed” these numbers.”

  50. Crusty Juggler

    As a bald man I have been cutting my own hair for years.

    hahahahahaha
    hahahahhahaha
    hahahahahha
    hahahhahaha

  51. AlexinCT

    Da Fuq??

  52. Don escaped Oklahoma

    JD:

    In billiards, what do you call it when you put spin on the cue ball ?

    • JD is Unemployed

      Who’s there?

  53. Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

    Here’s a pretty good example of the kind of coronavirus reporting that should be done by the legacy media (or anyone else, for that matter) — a timeline of the Canadian Federal government’s inadequate response to the COVID-19 threat:

         https://edmontonjournal.com/news/national/the-road-to-canadas-covid-19-outbreak-timeline-of-federal-government-failure-at-border-to-slow-the-virus/

    David Staples is one of the few Canadian MSM journos I’d make the time to read.

    • Invisible BEAM of the comment stream

      Huh. Didn’t come through as an active link. Oh well, try this.

  54. Donation Not Taxation

    Elton John hosting concert tonight. Entertainers allegedly performing homes. Fundraiser Wuhan flu. No word on if concert is for or against. Hopefully, the money will go to pay some or all of the $2,200,000,000,000.