Good Thursday morning to you all. It is frosty this morning--as in 'damn, we have frost on the roofs and windshields!!!' But we are supposed to get into the mid 40s so I may get some time to work on the patio. I got the shelves put back in the mini-greenhouse and tied them in. As I did that it occurred to me that the tear to the cover may have come when the shelves went flying. Before I put the cover back on I have to repair that tear. I also want to find out how workable the soil in the containers is right now before I get them all covered. My Big Rainbow seedlings are growing like weeds. I made that comment over coffee this morning and Mom asked if I was sure they aren't weeds. The leaves are right so I doubt they are anything but tomato. To transplant them I need to get into the shed which is right now a jumble of things just put in any old way (since I straightened it out last fall.) Yesterday was also productive in that I got the spring wreath put together and hung, sorted the silk flowers for the summer wreath which I will put together at the end of June to hang on July 1st. It took me longer to think about how I wanted to put the wreath together than the time the actual construction took.

I was so disgusted by the news yesterday that I switched to Pandora for most of the day. They simply presented nothing new and they repeated it to the point of nausea.

Well, Kay, I noticed that your Repthuglicans passed that anti-union measure that their Repthuglican governor is expected to sign. You have my condolences. Our Damnocrats in Indiana returned home last week after spending a month in exile in Illinois. They did get some minor concessions from the Repthuglican majority but this story indicates that they didn't get near enough.

Shahien Nasiripour at HuffingtonPost notes the celebration in Washington over the supposed profit the government has garnered from the bailout of the major banks. He also notes the fact that the 'profit' depends on selecting the numbers you want to consider. And not all the 'losses' are financial. We now have a system in which the 'too big to fail' institutions are bigger than ever, are a fragile as ever, and as insulated as ever from their own folly.

Robert Reich, also, makes some good observations on the cherry picking of data to create some celebratory good news that is considerably less than good if other, equally valid, data are taken into account. Interestingly, this morning on CNBC, one of the talking heads actually used the term 'bifurcated recovery.' The stock market is strong, the dollar seems to be strong, and companies are making profits. But what about the rest of us?

I thought that Obama supports 'transparency' in government. This story, which got a slight mention on last nights news suggest that he is for transparency--except when he is not. Another reason not to vote for him next time around. I really am getting tired of all of the distasteful things our various levels of government does in my name.

I love this story on the Cornucopia Institute page. I hope the case goes against Monsanto. I don't think it is fair or just for Monsanto to benefit from its inability to keep its seed from contaminating its neighbors crops. I also love the argument that the benefits from the transgenic seed is much over stated especially when the damages are calculated.

Here is a story which made none of the national news media. The opening few lines are especially sad: nowhere was the disconnect between the political movers and shakers in Washington and ordinary people more evident than at that rally--and nowhere was it more irrelevant. I am not sure what the author meant by 'irrelevant' but I know exactly what it meant to me. Nothing we say and no facts we cite will have any bearing on the issue because most of the Repthuglican and Damnocrat seat warmers will listen.

Just watched a segment on CNBC that trumpeted the 'good news' that people who retire this year will need $230k to pay for their medical care--'good news' because it is down from the projected $250k for retires of previous years. Even the new amount is more than half the money I earned over my entire lifetime. What the hell makes these guys think I had the ability to save that kind of money? Figuring on $10k per year over 40 years (and many years I made considerably less), I would only have received a total of $400k. Uncle Sam would have taken between $80k and $100k--leaving $300k. Renting at (an unrealistically low) $500/month (or $6000/year) that amounts to $240k over the 40 year working life. Which leaves only $60k for forty years worth of food, clothing, medical care, cars and their associated costs. Does anyone else see anything wrong with this situation?? I really get annoyed when those so-called experts start spouting these figures without any consideration of how they translate into real life.