Voted by hand delivering absentee ballot to city registrar's office. They were limiting the number of people who could go inside the very tiny office, so one of the poll workers, seeing that I had my absentee ballot already filled out, came out and dated it, and put it in the drop box for me. Workers were masked, some folks in line were not, but were required to put on masks before entering the building. One gal coming out (one way traffic through the building) had already removed her mask. I was in line for about 5 minutes. I hope they keep these options open. That was the quickest, easiest v

Friday *bump* 🙏

Congratulations! 🎉 I wrote a couple of cozy mysteries this summer to distract myself from the bleakness of the pandemic, but probably won’t pursue publication. My knitting circle enjoyed them, though! (Gee, you know things are bad when dreaming up a murder is cheerier than thinking about real life! )

I left a “support” group back in 2008 because of a sort of similar issue. The state leadership of the group sent out emails telling us who to vote for in the primaries- because, you know, if you are a member of this group, it is assumed that you are also of a particular political persuasion. I was extremely uncomfortable about it, and sent out an email to members of my local chapter suggesting (nicely) that we should all vote our conscience instead of being told who to vote for. The president of my chapter sent out an email in reply lambasting me for speaking my mind, and telling me that we we

Giving this thread a bump. Dona nobis pacem.

One word: Hibernol

If they are both in their 50’s, chances are that they have enough cr@p already. I’d send a card of congratulations and make a donation in their name to a charity they both support. That way, even if you were snubbed by the happy couple, you at least feel like you have done some good, rather than feeling resentful that you “had to send a gift” to someone who was rude to you.

I was doing a bit of Christmas shopping just now, and stumbled across what I believe should be the official mask for the hive. Feel free to disregard this post if you are neither Team Cupcake nor Team Mask. I might just order one of these for myself, because I am firm members of both teams. https://mechanicalgifs.com/maribels-masks/cupcakes-face-masks

Give a listen to some early Chicago. 25 or 6 to 4 should be a simple tune to learn. Here's a live performance with some smashing hair action from Terry Kath. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uAUoz7jimg

I love my old SE! My hands are on the small side, and I like having a phone that actually fits in my palm without feeling like it’s going to slip and fall. Mine is almost 3 years old, and I have never had any problems at all with battery issues. (Of course, now that I have said that...) I do have to say that I use it as a phone and for texting. I don’t watch videos, play games, or have a bunch of different apps running all the time. My parents have the 7, and after using it a couple of times, I will say that it is easier to text on a larger keyboard, but that’s about my only complaint.

One of my favorite images from around page 12? 13? of that thread : https://www.flickr.com/photos/josh1/2530420210/ I would love to go back now and reread the whole thing from beginning to end. For a whole weekend, I was checking the board every 5 minutes to see what had happened next. My family thought I had lost it! Thanks for the trip down memory lane, Quill.

Two years ago, we had a 25-30 foot maple tree cut down. It was leaning precariously over a brand new roof. They cut it and left the whole thing, including the stump, in our backyard. It took one full day, and cost 1k. Thankfully, my in-laws all heat with wood stoves, so they came and chopped it up and took it away. Hauling it away and grinding the stump would have been an additional 2k!

I used to believe as you do. But I have seen ugliness on this board in the past 6 months that I never in my wildest imaginations thought would happen. It makes me very sad. 😞

Thank you. I was going to post Sir Patrick Stewart earlier today! I mean, ok, so he’s not American, but what the heck! And be honest, people. Deep down, don’t we all want to believe that there’s just a little bit of Jean Luc Picard in the man? And while I’m being all geeky, since this stupid thing started, I get up in the mornings, read the news, and feel very much like doing a Will Riker. “Will someone tell me what the h*ll is going on?”

Pre-pandemic, I was regularly able to recall my dreams, and although I had the occasional nightmare, most of my dreams were just vivid and goofy. But since March, I have experienced the opposite. I very rarely remember anything about my dreams, and I wake up with a stiff neck almost every morning. I think this is probably a bad sign, and I really miss the days of having strange but entertaining dreams.