Sunday, November 22, 2020

 From Associated Press:

'Justin Levitt, a Loyola Law School professor who specializes in election law, called the Trump lawsuits dangerous."It is a sideshow, but it’s a harmful sideshow,” Levitt said. “It’s a toxic sideshow. The continuing baseless, evidence-free claims of alternative facts are actually having an effect on a substantial number of Americans. They are creating the conditions for elections not to work in the future.”

 

The entire democratic process is being stalled by crazy men and women who apparently have no regard for electoral systems. Two voters in Pennsylvania sued to delete nearly 7 million votes in Pennsylvania because they said the county they live in did not treat them the same as all other PA voters. It is small wonder that the judge was astonished by their complaint. That wasn't even the craziest suit nor was it the craziest suggestion. Sidney Powell said that a late South American leader was responsible for engineering permutations and algorithms that changed votes in electronic voting systems. Rudy Giuliani had something running down the sides of his face, many people charitably said that it was hair dye.

 

I can't think of any water soluble hair dyes--not that I have any vast personal experience. Laughing at the messengers is usually not a sign that their message is serious. Even Tucker Carlson made fun of Sidney Powell though he was roundly excoriated for it.

At the same time, Trump was supposed to participate in a video conference of the G20. He lasted 13 minutes before he started tweet ranting and then went to play golf, again. Simultaneously  nearly 200,000 Americans were diagnosed with Covid19, while Trump was playing. Does that image supplant Nero fiddling?

Tuesday, November 17, 2020

 If you have never heard of Chairish or 1stDibs, you owe it to yourself to at least check them out. We haven't gotten a ton of stuff from either, but we have certainly gotten enough that I don't feel weird touting them. I have no financial interest in them so I don't get any sort of compensation but we have gotten a variety of goods from art to furniture and so far everything has been reasonable in price and as described.

 

The four poster beds in our second guest room are a case in point. I have already written about our current house having been a stable in its first life but in 1979 it was converted to two separate residences. Because it wasn't always a house, some of the features are a little odd. Most of the bedroom floor is one long rectangle with the master bedroom taking one end and therefore being bigger and the other three bedrooms arranged alongside a hallway so those rooms are smaller. The ceiling heights vary dramatically as well. One room has 12 foot ceilings, one has 8 foot ceilings, and one on the first floor has 16 foot ceilings. So this guest bedroom where the new beds are is small but it does have room for both beds and some other furniture so it suits its purpose. These beds are from the early 19th century. They have some small areas of wear but are still in very good shape.

The quilt on the right is complete, finished about six or seven years ago. The quilt on the left is the current project and is just a top, a flimsy. I haven't quite finished marking it either but I wanted to show everyone what our cute little room looks like. Given the virus situation and all I am not expecting house guests but I will be ready if any ever come. I still have to hang the art and I will need to get some new sheets too.
 

Monday, November 16, 2020

 Trump lost the election by multiple millions of votes. Believe it or not that is what happened. Believe it or not, that outcome will not change despite Trump filing lawsuit after lawsuit where in most cases the lawyers presenting the suit have to apologize or equivocate about what they are doing. One of my favorites was from here in Pennsylvania where the judge questioned the lawyer who was claiming that Republicans weren't allowed to watch the votes being counted. The judge was shown videos of the procedure and he asked the Trump lawyer if any of the people who were there were Republican observers and the lawyers admitted that the numbers of Republican observers was not zero.


As amusing as that exchange was, the comity in a courtroom is not achievable in public spaces. Trump has carefully taught all of his followers that reality isn't and what matters is how you feel. If you are pissed, it is someone else's fault in the Trump universe. I don't have a clue what the end game is. Trump lost by multiple millions of votes. More importantly he lost by dozens of electoral college votes. There is no lawsuit nor any constitutional relief for that. Ordinarily a concession speech would happen before now because ordinarily anyone who lost a national election would understand the gravity of refusing to accept the results. The gravity goes beyond wounding Trump's apparently fragile ego and moves toward the US suffering lingering and lasting damage from foreign actors and from ongoing crises. While there were many people disgruntled by the outcome in 2016, Hillary Clinton did concede within three hours of the vote being called. Three hours rather than weeks. Trump's minions seem hellbent on destroying the Union.


What happens when all of those angry people continue to fulminate against what should be the normal procedure in a US election is still a mystery. What does Trump expect from the trouble that is brewing?


On a cheerier note, we got delivery of our new mattresses today and my husband will take pictures of the beds, one with a completed Dresden Plate and one with a flimsy, and I will post them tomorrow.

Sunday, November 15, 2020

 Although I did not get any responses to my query about ice cream cone border corners (what an awkward assemblage of words), I did figure out something that works to my satisfaction.



The instructions in the very old book I used simply said to sew three of the colored pieces together for the corner but that did not make a good corner. Now it's entirely possible that I was misunderstanding what was needed but this method that I devised made a good corner that actually turned a corner so I am satisfied.

Now the "flimsy" is done and ready to be marked and layered but the batting doesn't come until tomorrow and I haven't marked anything at all so it will still be a couple of days before I am quilting. One thing that being in quarantine has done is increase my production of quilts which is good since I keep chipping away at my stash. Sewing  by hand usually means I am slow but even that is getting faster.

Friday, November 13, 2020

 I have finished making the Dresden Plate blocks for the twin sized bed and I have also finished making the four side borders for the classic ice cream border, but the old book that I am using is more than a little hazy about the corners for the borders. I have not found any how-to instructions online though I have found a variety of photos of ice cream borders. I am reasonably sure I will be able to figure something out but if anyone knows a site online that has clear instructions and information, I will be very grateful. 


Thank you in advance.

Saturday, November 7, 2020

 Given the havoc that Trump deliberately thrust on the US,  Biden's win to be the 46th leader of the country is cause for hope but not cause for celebration. It's hard enough to be POTUS without having a pandemic, an economic collapse, and deep divisions facing the new inhabitant of 1600 Pennsylvania. It is unseemly to celebrate when people are still dying daily from Covid19. It is irresponsible to think that all will now be well simply because Trump lost. Trump taught people that lying can be rewarded, that arrogance is a virtue, that just being a jerk is a life skill that all children should learn. I don't expect rainbows in the sky, but I do hope that gears will engage and progress out of our morass will happen.


Good luck to Biden and Harris. Remember how you got here.

Wednesday, November 4, 2020

 My husband and I moved from Utah for several reasons but chief on the list was that our vote would never matter. Since voting for any office is a core activity in the United States, we wanted to either go somewhere we couldn't vote at all and therefore wouldn't feel the anxiety and strain, or go to a state where our vote might have an impact on the election. When the UK turned out not to be a possibility, we chose Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is a basket case as far as politics. It has two big cities, one on either end of the state, and a broad swath of country in between those two cities that doesn't reflect much of the political concern of the two cities. Cities are drivers of elections and drivers of political decisions but they are not necessarily drivers of cultural norms.

Anyway, Trump's election team is now opening legal action against Pennsylvania because there is a very good chance that Trump won't win Pennsylvania. The votes in question are "mail in" ballots. I put that in quotation marks because I am pretty sure that many of those mail in ballots aren't mailed in at all but placed in drop boxes. Since one of the Trump complaints is that the ballots don't have postmarks on them, I can personally attest to why. My husband and I, both elderly citizens, chose to use a drop box. We filmed ourselves doing so. Now Trump claims that because my ballot doesn't have a postmark on it, it cannot be counted.


I voted. I have voted in every single election since I turned 21 (the voting age changed just after my birthday), including county bond elections and local issue elections.  If the state, the county, and the local election board say that drop boxes are kosher, my vote counts.


MY VOTE COUNTS