I like Saturdays. I can sleep late if I choose, or get up and watch “Up With Chris Hayes” and, if I don’t feel like staying up to watch “The Melissa Harris-Perry Show”, I can go back to sleep. Yeah, I’m a veg.
This particular Saturday marks the 138th running of the Kentucky Derby, where beautiful, aristocratic Thoroughbreds “Run for the Roses”, as beautiful, aristocratic horse owners in big hats, sipping champagne and mint juleps, look on. Meanwhile, many of the stablehands who made those Thoroughbreds look so beautiful are celebrating Cinco de Mayo, along with millions of Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, other Mexican immigrants, and, frankly millions of Americans who simply like an excuse to get drunk.
How do you like to enjoy your Saturdays?
This is our daily open thread — Happy Saturday!!
I can sleep late and still watch Chris Hayes. I have DVR! I’m about an hour behind real time, right now, watching the show.
I start by reading “The Best of Craigslist”
http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/all/
I like going to the Zoo on Saturdays, but I do that most every day. Other mornings I bike ride or coach girls volleyball games.
I added a bit more to the post, you’ll notice when you refresh.
Ah, Cinco de Mayo, the anniversary of my rotator cuff surgery, which took place on 05/05/05! That’s what I did seven years ago today.
And today is also the day many cats celebrate “Cinco de meow”
And Chinese cats celebrate “Cinco de Mao.”
One of the nicknames for our cat named Mouse (about whom I’ve written here before), was Mousie Dung (Mao Tse Tung.)
On this day in History, 5-5-45, a ship loaded with condiments went down off the Mexican Coast. It was knows as the Sink-o de May-o
*groan*
I just found this cool, easy-to-use tool to see which candidates most closely reflect my views. In my case, it was Barack Obama, followed closely by Jill Stein.
http://votesmart.org/voteeasy/
Same here. Obama 91%, Jill Stein 67%.
Obama and Stein both at 82%. But it was wider spread (favoring Obama) before the national secuirty question — and in afterthought I may have misinterpreted the intent of the question.
I may be a communist/fascist/(fill in the blank):
Stein: 82%
Obama: 60%
86 Obama, 84 Stein
I’m so conflicted…
I’ve watched the Derby a number of times over the years, but the broadcast is something like three hours of lavish and two minutes of horses running. The new HBO show, Luck, sucked me in with brilliant acting and lots of horses. It was canceled by the creators because they lost two horses while filming it. The pilot episode finished with a scene dominated (for me) by the sickening snap of a horse’s leg breaking in mid-stride.
I’m definitely skipping this Derby and possibly future races.
Not to mention what the jockeys do to themselves to stay at “riding weight”. They choose to do it yet is very unhealthy.
-
Some days I get up and do political polls and quizzes (aka the one Wayne posted earlier).
Saturdays are always a free for all for me. Seldom a set agenda. Chores, Photography, Games, Catch Up on TV, Hang out with friends, Surf the Web…
Today, I’ve taken about 300 photos of the birds at my feeder. Yesterday I had spotted a Harris Sparrow, and this morning he was back (with a friend). And I also spotted a White-Crowned Sparrow. And a rare cardinal siting (for my feeders anyway, I don’t many cardinals). The two sparrows are migratory so won’t be around long. I’m hopeful the cardinals will visit more (I’ve changed feeders and seed to try to appeal to the cardinals more). Of course I had the usual compliment of finches, doves, robins, and grackles.
Then headed out to lunch to visit with an old friend to catch up on old times and talk politics. Then after that who knows.
Cinco de Mayo, the anniversary of my dissertation defense, also 05/05/05. (Had the devil’s own time getting everyone on my committee to agree to a date and time, and I was leaving for a confrence in and around Dublin, Ireland on the 6th. By the time I got back, half of them would be out of town. So the chair of my committee sent an email to everyone saying the defense would be on the 5th, and if they couldn’t make it, then they would email their questions to him, he would relay those questions and their responses back. Strangely enough, everyone was able to attend.)
Ha, have you no shame? Just look at the URL for your employer: http://goforward.harpercollege.edu/.
You must be part the conspiracy of our Marxist leader Obama, FORWARD!!
/s
Where’d you come up with the Harper link? Because I haven’t worked there in three years now. (I try to keep my CV and pulbic stuff current.)
Let me see… Saturdays…. I’d like to claim that I do cool stuff (like get out of the house), but for me they are pretty much just longer days of the same things that I do on any other free time when not slogging away at the grindingly oppressive and unappreciative place of work: Chores, stalk Lady Cagey at random points of the day, play games, do crafts, attempt to play guitar (thus driving the cats to run away in terror… except for one, who will curl up by my feet — but she’s the same one that will show up whenever Alice Cooper is being played on the CD machine (or the record player (gasp!))… its uncanny….), and work on “The Game” (Dungeons and Dragons in the “old-fashioned real people together in the same room sharing in a kind of ‘actor’s workshop/ collective storytelling’ atmosphere” way — oh yeah; I’m “old-school uber-nerd”: through grade school I even wore a pocket protector filled with pens).
The weird part of TPM using Facebook commenting, is if I log in at TP, using my hotmail id, I’m logged in at TPM also. Trouble is, I have to log out eventually, block third party cookies again, and delete all the cookies in my temp file. Then all my comments are deleted too.
Does anybody know how to tell which stories at TPM are chronologically the most recent? Any way except RSS? I can’t do RSS any better than I can figure out Twitter.
Saturdays? Oh I spend most of the day building houses for the homeless, handing out blankets, and picketing polluters. Today, though, I’ve got to finish the laundry, bake granola, make “suet” for the birds, walk the dog, watch the dog sleep, feed the dog, feed myself, take a nap, make dinner, make a drink, watch tv. I need a break from all the good works.
And read. Almost forgot the most important part.
I like Saturdays because I can keep working and not have anyone around to grumble that I’m making them look bad.
Today is no exception, other than it’s going to be mostly fun.
Hiking up to a fire lookout at 10,000 or so feet elevation to visit my friend and co-worker Philip Connors. Packing up a 55″ long board to fix the chart table, I expect puzzled glances from other hikers along the way. I’m thinking up a cryptic answer as to why I have a pine board strapped to my pack.
A little bit of trail clearing along the way, and tonight’s “supermoon” from such a vantage point has some photographic potential.
Not missing the cyber skirmishes with righttards on the national level, as I have my hands full fending off such idiocy in my immediate environment.
All is well, cheerfullness to all!
Could the board pass as a walking stick for your friend Paul Bunyan?
The hike to 10K sounds great! When you get there, wave at the world for me, ok?
Curiously enough that’s exactly what the board ended up as, a walking stick!
Today is homemade Mushroom Soup for lunch day (with barley, sour cream, Dijon mustard, dill, marjoram, oregano, thyme, carrots, celery, Vidalia onion, beef broth, coconut oil, and nice piles of fresh [sliced] baby bella and Shiitake mushrooms). A pressure cooker speeds the process, takes about an hour. Yummy! Then there’s the day’s highlight, a ten mile bike ride; only problem is what’s for supper?
Steve Benen finds some Romney lies more blatant than others:
In a speech in Virginia yesterday, Romney blamed “card check” for making things “tougher” on businesses.
— Card check didn’t pass, so it’s impossible for Romney’s argument to be true.
Romney went on to condemn Obama for “shutting down” a “wonderful” school voucher program in the District of Columbia.
— Obama didn’t shut down the school voucher program in the District of Columbia. It still exists.
Majority of North Carolina Voters More Idiotic Than Previously Thought:
http://wonkette.com/471842/new-poll-majority-of-north-carolina-voters-more-idiotic-than-previously-thought#optout.gbpl
Dan Savage agrees to Brian Brown of NOM’s challenge to debate the Bible. Get your popcorn ready, folks:
Posted by Dan Savage on Fri, May 4, 2012 at 2:02 PM
“I will name the time and the place, per your offer, as soon as possible. Looking forward to it, NOMnuts.”
There will be a “Savage” (verbal) beating. That will be a debate not to miss
I’m not getting any popcorn ready until a time and place is finalized. I’ve got a snickers and a pepsi that say Brian Brown will squelch out of actually meeting for a real debate.
FCBD 2012
What is Free Comic Book Day?
I dunno, but on my computer it’s a link that won’t load.
hmm, it works for me.
See if this article from the WaPo will open.
Pretty odd. Here’s an article I read yesterday on comic books:
Brent Cox checks in on the price of print comics and points out that comic books were once the main way to get a superhero-fix:
“[I]n 1945, roughly half of all Americans read comic books, including 95% of all boys, and (and!) 91% of all girls, between the ages of six and eleven. “In 1947,” Van Lente added, “one out of every three periodicals sold in the United States was a comic book. That’s 180 million comics in one year.” To experience market penetration like that, you’d pretty much have to be the Internet.
And if you glance at these lists of circulation figures for the time, you see that by 1946 you have four different comic book titles that were selling more than a million copies per month. (Whereas now, there are only three titles clearing (barely) two hundred thousand copies monthly.) So in comparing the 40s with now, we’re comparing a time when comic books were hands-down no-joke the undisputed dominant paradigm of entertainment for American children to now, a time when the characters and storylines of comics constitute a very American mythology while the vehicles that brought them there, the comic books themselves, sit off to the side.”
http://www.theawl.com/2012/05/how-much-do-comic-books-cost
And part of the difference is that the buyer used to get something for their money. Even though the prices crept up in the 60s and 70s there was much more content. And don’t get me started on the newspaper comics.
Saturday is Market Day! I get up at 4:30AM. I usually get in the wine around 4:30 PM. By dinner time I’m a babbling idiot.
This week’s hate mail is notable for the picture at the top of the page. Is this thing someone’s mailbox?
Love the mailbox.
ALFRED HITCHCOCK IN LA, 1939
So cool.
Ebb loves the Retronaut.
In the photo where Hitch is reading Rebecca, I wonder if that’s Joan Fontaine across the table.
I have more concern about race horses since they cancelled the HBO shoe “Luck” after 3 horses died. Entertainment is under much more scrutiny than most and I wonder how badly are those horses treated. Does anybody here know and have comforting info?
Three horses died. How on earth? Did the necropsies reveal cause of death in each?
That’s very sad.
If Shayne bothered to read comments… I believe that all the horses had to be put down due to injury. And Shayne is correct; it was three horses, not two. I do give credit to HBO and the executive producers for canceling the show.
Given that about 800 horses a year die at racetracks, Cord Jefferson questions the logic of the decision to cancel Luck:
“It’s a strange society in which a television show can’t kill horses with impunity but the more than 50 thoroughbred tracks in the United States can. Perhaps the producers of Luck have more of an affinity for the horses, agreeing to quit after killing only three while people in the racing industry destroy thousands. Perhaps people believe a death on the racetrack is somehow more honorable than a death for HBO. Whatever it is, America’s loyalty speaks volumes about how it prefers its horse deaths: Luck averaged only around 625,000 viewers per episode, but 14.5 million people watched the Kentucky Derby last year.”
http://www.good.is/post/if-we-don-t-kill-horses-for-tv-why-kill-them-for-gambling/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+good%2Flbvp+%28GOOD+Main+RSS+Feed%29
Well, there you go. They breed fragility into the horses.
I see greyhound pets around town all the time. Not too long ago, there was a very popular track just east of Portland and lots of breeders here and all over. At some point, people learned that greyhounds would either run or die: any dog that didn’t excel was simply put down. I used to drive past a greyhound kennel every time I visited my folks, and would stop with my kids whenever the pups were out in their runs. Just about the cutest dogs imaginable.
The track is closed and all of the dogs I see here are rescue dogs, protected from slaughter. They are also some of the sweetest dogs I’ve ever met and it’s a joy just to watch them run free in the park.
I don’t think the dogs were ever dying like the thoroughbreds. They were just snuffed out because they weren’t making anyone any money.
Thoroughbreds must be more fragile than Standardbreds (trotters and pacers.)
When I worked in the Standardbred insurance business, we rarely had any claims, either for a horse simply dying of a disease, or having to be put down at a track. And I don’t remember hearing of many S’breds that weren’t insured by our office having to be put down for racing injuries, either.
I’ve probably mentioned it before, but,: One of my favorite customers back then was Ralph Branca, who threw the pitch that resulted in Bobby Thompson’s “Shot Heard ‘Round the World.” He and his wife are lovely, unassuming people. One of his young horses had some medical problem (I forget what) that, basically, wouldn’t kill him but prevented him from ever racing. I remember a lot of back-and-forth with the insurance company, several veterinarians, etc.. Since the insurance coverage only covered ‘death’, not ‘loss of use’, there could be no claim or payment to the Brancas, and they ended up donating the horse to Cornell. Although I never asked Ralph about it, I always wondered if it was pure bad luck that he had named the horse (as a foal) “One Pitch.”
That’s exactly what I was afraid of badmoodman. Just like kids who are union actors get all kinds of protection while kids doing shit for free have none. It’s a crazy world.
PETA Files New Complaints Alleging Further ‘Luck’ Mistreatment
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/luck-peta-horses-complaints-319954
I guess we can be skeptical since PETA sometimes goes overboard.
There’s a Tumblr for everything:
http://reinholdbieber.tumblr.com/
(via a poster at LGF)
This is beyond dazzling – the accompanying music sets if just perfectly..
Pursuit of Light
http://www.youtube.com/embed/5tE5XJzZ-Rw
Damn, apologies for the long link.
It’s from NASA. Not Retronauts. =;^)
Well, bragged about my sedentry lifestyle and ended up working outside on a pond emergency. Three of our fishies died. Most likely something contaminated the water, so had to completely drain the pond, scrub it down, and refill it. We made pretty good time, actually, but lawdy it is HOT and humid out there today…..
In what part of the country do you live, cagey?
Sad about the fish.
Yes, it was sad about the fish. They were buried in what is becoming our pet semetary. I suggested a viking funeral, but cooler heads prevailed.
I’m in Missouri, the St. Louis-ey part.
Danica just led at Talladega with 40 laps to go. Owner-teammate Dale Earnhardt, Jr. is leading now.
My favorite horse race:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BavRrRNvz8g&w=420&h=315%5D
Under a red flag at T’dega, waiting on a green-white-checker restart. Danica was involved in an eight car wreck that started in front of her. She had it cleared when another car hit her right side because he overcorrected dodging a spinning car. She made the pit, got tires and fender clearancing, and is shown in 18th.
And she made it to 13th at the end. Ran up front all day. Typical restrictor plate race at the end.
Who won?
Joey Logano beat Kyle Busch by half a car length, or less. Both cars are Joe Gibbs’ cars.
My mother is a big time fan of Jeff Gordon.
Gordon will be there tomorrow.
There’s another race tomorrow? I don’t keep up with the schedule like my Mom does.
Oh yeah. Today was the AAA league race. Tomorrow is the major league race.
Uh oh! Looks like Danica will get a little talking to by Nascar after the race. On the last lap, while the cameras were watching the leaders, Sam Hornish, ran Danica up the track into the outside wall, then Danica pushed Sam into the outside wall on the next corner. Sam’s move might not have been deliberate, but Danica’s was for sure.
This Sam Hornish-Danica Patrick Thing Has Some History
Just heard on the Clippers-Grizzlies playoff game, a woman reporter talking about an injured Clipper:
“…he’s been getting treatment on his injured arm in a hyperbolic chamber..”
I think she’s blowing things out of proportion a bit.
You’re punny.
OAK RIDGE, TN—After six grueling years of Herculean research, scientists at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory pronounced EHC-1 Alpha, the new hyperbolic chamber…
Heh, maybe the TV reporter is a reader of The Onion.
Nah, I don’t even buy that.
Wayne, could you Twitter that to Boner?
I could, but I’m sure he would ignore it, just as he’s ignored every other tweet I’ve sent him.
Wow. Just finished a few Twitter conversations (convos) with some Muslims (possibly Arabs) who think my Atheism is wrong. Earlier, I gave some snarky replies to Ari Fleischer. And before that I offered Rupert Murdoch the chance to have a respectful convo with someone who won’t insult him.
Twitter is great!
Sattiday. In honor of National Comic Book Day I watched the latest offering from Marvel. Not too shabby. I’m celebrating Theenko de Mayo with a Corona and a James Rollins novel.
Oh, speaking of Saturdays, below (hopefully it works w/o firewall) is the link to Mother Jones’ review of the Joss Whedon/Marvel “The Avengers,” a “Cripplingly Powerful Nerdgasm”:
http://www.motherjones.com/media/2012/04/film-review-marvel-avengers-powerful-nerdgasm
Interesting review, Gary. It’s almost as if they expected a film adaptation of a comic book to not include things like fantastic concepts and characters and humor and such.
Gummitch (our resident beer and spirits aficionado) decides not to watch the Kentucky Derby, and the winning horse is named ‘I’ll Have Another’. That just seems kinda ironic. I didn’t notice any injuries this year, but I got a phone call and bumped the remote, which changed the channel, so I couldn’t go back and make sure.
I hate Paul Ryan. Steve Benen digs up video and this gem of a quote:
“[Y]ou can’t find another thinker or writer who did a better job of describing and laying out the moral case for capitalism than Ayn Rand.”
You simply can’t believe that and also claim you are in conformity with basic Catholic notions of social justice. Period. And it is to the Bishops’ credit that they called him out on it.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/03/11525222-the-model-of-an-ayn-rand-acolyte
My son and I celebrated Cinco De Mayo by going to a Mexican restaurant we hadn’t been to before in Lincoln City, which, as it turns out, serves the worst Mexican food I’ve ever had in my entire life.
Woo.
The only good thing about finding a bad Mexican restaurant is knowing where hot to go again. Sorry you found one.
Srsly. I really don’t know how they stay open, since they can’t possibly get repeat business.
Are any neighborhood animals missing? (ok, sorry… that was in poor taste.)
That’s so disappointing – especially if you were anticipating a deliciousness.
BTW, the email thing is still not right. I suddenly have started to get emails on comments this weekend.
Try this. Hit reply and see if the comment box has one of the e-mail boxes checked. It seems that somehow the default has become to notify, instead of not.
Good call, House
Just the same, I’m keeping my e-mail open and checking it every so often.
Being logged out of WordPress might help stop it overnight as well.
My experience was that, if I was logged out of WP, the box came back up automatically checked to send email. Once that has been checked, on even a single comment, you’re stuck for the rest of that thread.
Yesterday, Jane wrote she was still experiencing that.
It has cleared up for me. No e-mail for a few days.
I’m still getting e-mail notices of new comments, even with the box unchecked. I think I’m getting notices of my own comments.
Have you tried updating your preferences? Follow the link through one of your emails. I did that the first day and the email notices stopped.
Feliz Cinco de Mayo
Ebb, now that is just mean posting Runtpig.
Saturdays. Brunch for a nephew’s birthday, dinner to commemorate two passings. Life in a big family…
A Harris Sparrow and White-Crowned Sparrow together in one shot.
Too bad it’s not a great shot, but there they are.
http://zxbe.net/plogger/index.php?level=picture&id=14
That’s a wonderful photo – each is slightly bending it head – looking at the one-eyed monster (camera)!
We don’t have Harris’s Sparrows.
Thanks ebb. We don’t have them for very long; they pass through. He’s been eluding me for a couple of years. Thought I saw him before, but then was never 100% sure. Got photos this time, so I know I was imagining things. The White-Crowned was a bonus surprise.
For those who may have missed the “Super Moon“.
More stunning Moon photos from around the world.
My son and I went out to enjoy the Super Moon at the D River. Amazing!!!
Ebb, are you mooning people again?
Always!
We chose to celebrate Cinco de Mayo with old friends and new friends in the Catskill Mountains. Horse racing should be outlawed as it is another form of animal abuse that involves gambling.