Bait and switch tactics
14/8/25 10:40![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jhetleyJust back from my walk and glad that I decided against a bike ride. Air temperature 78 F and dew point 69. Have now cooled off enough to change into a dry shirt . . .
jhetleyPrecipitation nil
14/8/25 06:57jhetleyAir temperature 68 F, wind near calm, fog at the airport for visibility about a mile. Not seen here, but the radio towers seem to have vanished. They have offered us a chance of showers or thundershowers, but the only green globs on the weather radar are well north of here. Should be able to get out for a walk.
Evelina again
13/8/25 18:50sartoriasI don't know how many times I've read this, but as my book group is meeting Saturday, I dug it back out of the box and have been rereading it. The influence on Jane Austen is clearer with each reread. Astonishing that it was considered so genteel at the time, with all the thoughtless animal cruelty as well as abuse of the characters set up as comic villains.
The hero and heroine are dull as ditchwater, of course; she is unswerving in her maidenly modesty (and beauty) and purity, and he remains at a distance, regarded by all as a cynosure, and ever ready to rescue her though they scarcely have an actual conversation. But there's too much delicacy to actually get to know one another as people; she has to know that he's a gentleman, and he has to know her virtue before the wedding bells can ring.
The fun is in the secondary characters in all their vulgarity, and in the minute descriptions of life in London in the 1770s.
I'm halfway through, maybe more to come.
The hero and heroine are dull as ditchwater, of course; she is unswerving in her maidenly modesty (and beauty) and purity, and he remains at a distance, regarded by all as a cynosure, and ever ready to rescue her though they scarcely have an actual conversation. But there's too much delicacy to actually get to know one another as people; she has to know that he's a gentleman, and he has to know her virtue before the wedding bells can ring.
The fun is in the secondary characters in all their vulgarity, and in the minute descriptions of life in London in the 1770s.
I'm halfway through, maybe more to come.
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13/8/25 11:18jhetleyWell, the air quality is now up into "unhealthy" at the airport. And air temperature 88 F. Glad I got my walking done already . . .
Hand-basket city
13/8/25 07:10jhetleyAir temperature 68 F, wind south about 3 mph, sunny. Heat advisory continues. Air quality "moderate" with AQI 90. Watered the new salvia plants out front, in an attempt to shake rain out of the chance of thunderstorms tonight and into tomorrow. Walk early or not at all.
Inflated bandshell
12/8/25 14:56jhetleyWe're leading up to a concert by the city band in the park this evening. Wonder if they'll have a supply of iced water for the band members and audience. Digital thermometer on that side of the house reads 94 F at the moment.
Dying of the light
12/8/25 06:51jhetleyAir temperature 66 F, wind near calm, sunny. We languish under a heat advisory again, with forecast of mid 90s F. Air quality "moderate" and AQI 57. Foraging morning, from air-conditioned house to air-conditioned car to air-conditioned store and back. May not get a walk in.
Dante visiting
11/8/25 15:31jhetleyAir temperature 94 F at the airport, 98 on the north side of our house and 100 F on the south side. Heat pumps doing their thing keeping the inside habitable.
Oppressor ruling
11/8/25 06:46jhetleyAir temperature 65 F and dew point 63, wind near calm, sunny. Air quality "good" with AQI 13. Supposed to get up over 90 F today and the next couple of days. Walk early or not at all?
Doldrums summer morn
10/8/25 06:55jhetleyAir temperature 61 F, wind north about 1 mph, partly cloudy. Air quality "moderate" with AQI 74, PM2.5 imported fresh from Canada with no tariff. Walk rather than bike ride, and if I have the energy after I'll snip some more used-up hosta flower stalks. Messy plants, but the bees and hummingbirds like them.
Maine's brief inferno
9/8/25 07:20jhetleyAir temperature 61 F, wind south about 7 mph, sunny. Supposed to get up into the 80s later, so walk early. Next week, 90s and cowering in the breeze from our heat pumps.
2025 52 Card Project: Week 31: Smoke
8/8/25 17:27pegkerrThe weather was so perfect last weekend. Not too humid. No rain. No clouds. Temperature in the upper seventies.
And we couldn't be outside enjoying any of it because smoke from the Canadian wildfires filled the air with choking haze, giving us the second-worst air quality in the entire world. I spent the weekend inside, huddled up close to my HEPA air purifier, furiously resenting that I couldn't be out enjoying my front porch.
The headline in the local paper pretty much summed it up: we're sick of this.
Image description: Background: an urban landscape, barely discernible through a thick layer of smoke. Text reads: 'This summer has been hot, smoky, soggy. Minnesotans are sick of it. Slightly more than half of days since mid-May have featured heavy rain, high heat, bad air or some combination in the Twin Cities. Twin Cities summer weather has dealt miserable conditions.' Below is a graph indicating days with poor weather conditions. Bottom Center: an Oransi air purifier.
Smoke
Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.
And we couldn't be outside enjoying any of it because smoke from the Canadian wildfires filled the air with choking haze, giving us the second-worst air quality in the entire world. I spent the weekend inside, huddled up close to my HEPA air purifier, furiously resenting that I couldn't be out enjoying my front porch.
The headline in the local paper pretty much summed it up: we're sick of this.
Image description: Background: an urban landscape, barely discernible through a thick layer of smoke. Text reads: 'This summer has been hot, smoky, soggy. Minnesotans are sick of it. Slightly more than half of days since mid-May have featured heavy rain, high heat, bad air or some combination in the Twin Cities. Twin Cities summer weather has dealt miserable conditions.' Below is a graph indicating days with poor weather conditions. Bottom Center: an Oransi air purifier.
Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.
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Friday roadkill report
8/8/25 11:07jhetleyCouple of mummified squirrels on my route, one bit of flattened fur that I would call a woodchuck if it wasn't for the pale underside so it could have been a marten, a patch of feathers gray and white that I think was one of my standard mockingbirds. Or maybe a youngster from that family, operating on a student pilot's license . . .
Usual late summer flowers, tansy and goldenrod and chicory and Queen Anne's lace. City has mowed some milkweed, tough luck monarchs.
No interesting metal birds out at the airport/base. Only air traffic was a noisy light plane landing.
Got out on the bike, across town and back over the hills and dales. Air temperature either 77 or 82 F, depending on which thermometer you choose, excessive for elderly cyclists and gonna get worse. Did not die.
15.69 miles, 1:28:34
Usual late summer flowers, tansy and goldenrod and chicory and Queen Anne's lace. City has mowed some milkweed, tough luck monarchs.
No interesting metal birds out at the airport/base. Only air traffic was a noisy light plane landing.
Got out on the bike, across town and back over the hills and dales. Air temperature either 77 or 82 F, depending on which thermometer you choose, excessive for elderly cyclists and gonna get worse. Did not die.
15.69 miles, 1:28:34
Lawns are going brown
8/8/25 06:55jhetleyAir temperature 57 F, wind near calm, sunny. Trash out, to include a fall web-worm nest extracted from our flowering crab tree out back. Bike ride later, last before the heat stomps us with 90s F forecast for Sunday and into next week. We might get some thunderstorms next Thursday. Or might not.
davidlevineI am writing at the airport on the way home from Philadelphia, where I played in the Miskatonic University North America LARP organized by Chaos League in conjunction with Reverie Studio. This was a Live Action Role Play game loosely based on the stories of H.P. Lovecraft, which took place at Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts in 1924.
This report contains SPOILERS.
( Read more... )
This report contains SPOILERS.
( Read more... )
*Clever title here*
7/8/25 07:08jhetleyAir temperature 59 F, wind near calm, partly cloudy. With no rain in the forecast until next week (maybe), have hauled water to the salvia transplants out front. Walk later.
Careful with those captions
6/8/25 17:05jhetleyJust had a bit on the evening news about Border Patrol arresting two "Indians" . . .
Turns out they meant citizens of India. But we have three Native American tribes up here, four if you separate out MicMac and Maliseet . . .
Turns out they meant citizens of India. But we have three Native American tribes up here, four if you separate out MicMac and Maliseet . . .