Good Wednesday to everyone.  Sunny and mid-80s today.  I think we may have touched 90 yesterday. The patio thermometer read 85 and it is in the shade.  I tried out the little nut/spice grinder this morning. It does a nice coarse grind that is perfect for tea.  We still need to use a mortar and pestel for the finer grind Mom likes for cooking.  At least I don't have to set up the blender to do that grinding any more.  Even with the blender she had to use the mortar.  The little food processor doesn't seal well enough and the fine herb dust flew all over the last time I tried it.  Besides I would rather have something that doesn't require electricity to operate.  I am going more and more retrograde all the time.

I haven't watched any of the coverage of the Convention, as I have said before, and damned little of the lamestream media reports.  This is why.  The Romney people are trying very hard to control things and they aren't showing much grace in handling events and people who upset their little charade.  In a world where some degree of flexibility is required they are showing how inflexible the are.  I wonder how many crises that don't follow Romney's vision of how things ought to be will it take to shatter him.  And we already have a society/political system that has become increasingly intolerant of dissent.  How much farther can that intolerance be driven--and do we want to find out?

I just had one of my very nasty thoughts reading this little essay on the Republican disdain for women and remembering how little has been made of Paul Ryan's comment that 'rape is a method of conception.  How about we redefine castration as a 'method of birth control?'  Think they would go for that?  Sauce for the goose, as they say.

I wonder how long before this becomes standard over here.  We have been complaining about the trend of producers cutting the size of their products while charging the same price.  Recently the brand of juice we buy went from 64 to 59 oz.  Our favorite brand of canned fruit is going from 10 oz to 8.  Unilever thinks 'poverty is returning' to Europe.  Well, I think it never really left.  It has just been hiding in plain sight where we could easily ignore it.