Oh, my Lord!

I hope you've seen the reports from the members of Congress who visited the ICE 'prisons' along the southern boarder.

I will agree with the President Who Will Not Be Named--there is a crisis...CRISIS!...at the boarder, but it is of his own making.

People packed in cages with no fresh water, no toothbrushes, no soap, no diapers for babies, no feminine hygiene products, too little food.

The Statue of Liberty must be hanging her head and burning herself with her torch.

Congress passed a nearly $5 billion dollar bill for relieving the crisis of mistreated detained immigrants, but some Democrats did not vote for it because it was not specific enough about what the money was for--the detainees--and they feared the administration would mis-use it.

Help us Lord, make the this land of the free and the home of the brave again.

Thousands, millions are not free at the boarder, from poverty and homelessness, from too low wages, from eviction, from racism.

And few Republicans are 'brave' enough to stand up to the tyrant in the White House and do what is true and right and just.

Oh, my Lord, how did we come to this?

Being away

Being away has hurt my readership big time. A three week gap takes a toll. My 150+ readers a day is down under 50.

Short attention span, I suppose.

But I miss those folks, though I don't know who most of them are.

I would write only for myself, I really would, but to have people reading is gratifying. It really is.

So, I'll keep writing. I'm getting back into the groove.

And, if people read, it will make me happy.

(Today was another perfect Connecticut early summer day--warm, but low humidity and lots and lots of birds. Brigit was outside a lot, enjoying rolling in the yard and laying in the sun. She tried to catch a bunny in the yard and luckily didn't!)

A lovely day

When I got to St. James in Higganum today, some people came in with umbrellas. "What are those for?" I asked.

Big rain coming, they told me. Saw it on radar, they said. Be here when church is over, I was told.

So, I went out and rolled up my car windows, that were all the way down.

I had to leave St. James during the closing hymn and drive like a crazy person, still in my alb, to Emmanuel, Killingworth. When I got there, still sunny as all get out, I left my windows up since, surely, the rain was near.

Both times, no rain.

I did hit rain--a little--driving home, but passed some places that looked like it had rained hard.

Bern told me, when I got home, there had been a 10 minute downpour.

But the rest of the day was brilliant and cooler--no air conditioning on--and no humidity to speak of.

I read an Icelandic mystery today--very stark and dark. And watched the birds in the back yard.

Lots of birds this year. At one point this afternoon their were 9 birds on the ground in our back yard, plus a bunny and a groundhog--and this is a suburb, not the country!

A lovely day, just right, perfect.

Hope yours was too.

In spite of that....

In spite of our President at the G 20 cozying up to Putin and Saudi Arabia and hinting at a bromance at the demilitarized zone with the supreme leader of the slave state of North Korea, today was a good day.

Our next door neighbors, Mark and Naomi, gave a party for two of their girls--one who graduated from nursing school and the other from high school (on her way to the University of Alabama...a long way from New England!) at Ives Farm on Cheshire Street about 6 miles away.

Cheshire is a suburb of New Haven, Waterbury, Southington, Middletown and a couple of other larger towns.  But Cheshire is also a farm town. There are dozens of farms around. Cheshire claims to be the 'garden center of CT'. I doubt that, but there are lots of farms.

Johanna and Zoe grew from children to young women under our eyes. Great kids and two more to go--a boy 15 and a girl 12, our granddaughters' Morgan and Emma's age.

Bern and I had a long talk with Naomi's parents, who live outside Boston. Interestingly enough, her father and I went to Harvard Divinity School the same year. He later graduated from the now defunct Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge and became a librarian at the Harvard Divinity School library. Lots of shared memories though we never met there. Cambridge from 1969 until 1971 was a place of protest and craziness most of the time. But we knew and loved the same teachers.

A very pleasant afternoon in spite of He Who Will Not Be Named in this blog being an, excuse my language, an absolute asshole half-way around the world.

Wish he'd stay there....

2nd debate

OK, just me talkng.

Kamala Harris ruled! Even though she missed a chance to talk about climate change, she took on Biden and Mayor Pete and had the greatest line of the night when lots of people were talking: "We don't want to have a food fight when people want to know how we'll put food on their table."

Sen. Barret was ok, except he seemed a tad lost.

Bernie held up as did Congressman Swallwell, Sen, Gillibrand and Gov. Inslee. But barely.

Andrew Yang said next to nothing. Former Congressman Delany said nothing that mattered and guru to the stars, Marianna Williamson looked like she was in another dimension and sounded like it too.

Joe suffered. Mayor Pete, Gillibrand, Bernie treaded water and Kamala leaped like a dolphin. Though I'll give Mayor Pete this: when asked about why South Bend's police force didn't have more Black officers, he said, "Because I failed." Not many politicians will be that humble and self-critical. I really like him for that.

Unlike the night before, this shifted the field.

Kamala raised the third most money that night than any.

She's on the rise.

Just me talkin'....

I jinxed the spider

My writing about my favorite spider wasn't a boon to the spider.

I went out of the deck this morning and the spider was gone, just a wisp of web left.

Bern said the spider had been there when she was out earlier. But gone by the time I got there.

I hope he/she is alright. I will miss my favorite spider.

Greener pastures is my desire.

Farewell, friend. (Though I doubt you thought of me in those terms.)

First debate

In my opinion, nobody really won.

The set up was so awkward I couldn't see how anyone could have won. Too many people, too little time, too short answers.

But for me, just me I'll have you understand, Warren, Castro and Booker came out most positive.

Beto and di Blasio were terrible. Most of the others just didn't matter. Tim Ryan, for example, looked like he was caught in an alternative universe. And the woman from Hawaii. though she had that moment with Ryan where she straightened him out, has too much recent baggage about G/L/B/T/Q people to survive.

Looking forward to tonight in 15 minutes or so.

It could really matter.

"Any one but He Who Will Not be Named" is my mantra.

Time will tell who that 'any one' might be.