PhineasC

I purposely do not follow any news anymore. I used to be a real news junkie. I would read the major news sites all day, follow people on Twitter, and have cable news on in the background all the time. I gradually started to cut it all off in 2018 when the government silliness and infighting reached a crescendo, and the COVID/SJW nonsense of 2020 was so disgusting I finally just cut it all off. My wife and I do not consume any form of "news" at this point, aside from whatever we sometimes might see online in various places. People know not to turn it on in our house. I think 99% of it is propagandistic, jingoistic garbage designed to make the watcher scared, paranoid, angry, and compliant.

The anti-vaxxers are not talking about variants anymore. They do not take that stuff seriously. Any variant and vaccine fear is coming from the vaccinated crowd.

#StayHomeStaySafe

0.75” of rain so far in June. That’s after 2.73” in May. Definitely need rain in NNE.

Stop letting me live rent free in your head.

Definitely a glimpse at the development of the modern “mommy state” where onerous “public safety” measures turn people’s lives to misery.

At some point, nations need to get over the fear and get off the treadmill.

They will never open up until they dump the COVID zero BS which is an impossible and pointlessly self-destructive goal.

I don’t understand how they will be able to justify not locking down over flu deaths after what they have done with COVID.

Canada and Australia are also chasing a COVID zero goal as well. The people in these places tend to already be compliant sheep obsessed with “civic politeness” so they are not resisting it.

The classic NNE split in action. All good stuff south and some north.

Definitely seemed like the top layer of soil was dry when I left Randolph. It hasn't rained since then, so it's a dry spell for the gardeners I guess. There is a lot of ground water there in spring and early summer so not too worried about the well at this point. Worry will start in September if the rain has not materialized. Sure hope it isn't waiting for Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas again. Everything still looks green, but it is starting to get that baked look a little. The CoC brochure definitely did not say to expect weeks and weeks of bright sun and dry conditions in elevated sections of Coos County during the summer. Winter in San Diego conditions. I definitely never anticipated these extended dry spells when I bought there. The historical record made it clear that regular light precipitation is the norm there. What a run of dry since April 2020.

With 4 kids, speed suddenly becomes the most important attribute.

You sure they were birds and not small alien drones? Oops, not the banter thread…

Damn had a huge Italian dinner at a new place and feel bloated as hell. So glad I am deep in marriage-land and am not expected to come back after a huge drunken dinner date and perform impressive bedroom acrobatics for 3 hours straight.

Based on the numbers from your first link: 10% of white people are using welfare benefits. 26% of black people are using welfare benefits.

Just checking, but you do understand how to adjust statistics by percent of the population, right?

Plenty of people talk shit about the rural poor. LOL It's far, far safer in Berlin, NH than Baltimore, MD, however.

At some level, people have to want to help themselves and their communities. But certain people don't want to hear that line of thinking and shout it down. The government has lately been actively disincentivizing people from trying to pull themselves out of poverty-stricken victimhood, so things will keep getting worse.

The usual suspects don't care at all.

What you do see on a daily basis is the proliferation of urban decay and minor crime: graffiti everywhere with no one trying to clean it, broken windows, huge mobs of teens loitering around stealing bikes and shoplifting, tons of homeless sleeping on the subway cars, people blasting down major streets in broad daylight on dirt bikes and ATVs popping wheelies and screeching tires, open-air drug and alcohol use, etc. Like I have been saying, the DAs decriminalized this stuff so it is out in the open now. It's a visible sign of the huge rise in violent crime going on behind the scenes in the alleys. Although, the violent crime is starting to come out into the open too now.

I once had a woman I know who was really militant about how great Baltimore is tell me that sometimes getting mugged was just a "small price to pay" for all of the "good things" from Baltimore. She even had advice on how to handle the regular muggings to avoid any unnecessary violence... I can tell you that even these diehard types are now moving away from Baltimore. There aren't even safe enclaves there anymore. I realize most here don't know Baltimore well at all and think their stay at the Marriott across from Camden Yards to see the BoSox that one time gives them a good feel of the place, but they are wrong. The shootings in Fells Point recently really rocked a lot of people. Fells Point is a super duper gentrified and touristy area. If the crime is seeping in there, that means it cannot be avoided anywhere in Baltimore. As for NYC, at least that city has a lot of things to offer to offset the crime and grime. I still would never, ever live there, though. LOL

These cities are going to need to crack down again on the "lifestyle crimes" to get this under control. That is a big part of the general rise in lawlessness in the cities. I don't think the police have actually been "defunded" anywhere to any great degree, so that is really not the issue. The police in some cases have pulled back on enforcement, but much of that can be linked back to the policies from the DAs that they will not prosecute these "minor" crimes. The issue is that going soft on these crimes creates an environment of general chaos and lawlessness that then begets more serious crime. What we saw in 2020 was really just a dumb experiment that clearly didn't work.

The only time the stadium is really busy is when the Yankees or Sox are in town. There is very little reason for anyone to bother going to Baltimore just to see the Orioles.

It probably helped that you were there to watch the Red Sox and not the Orioles...