Our Friday is starting out sunny with the likelihood that the temperatures will be in the mid-to-upper 60s so I think I will get some digging done.  I have a short stack of seeds to get started on the heating mat.  Otherwise everything is going along pretty much as planned.  That won't last, of course.  Just planted chamomile, wonder berry, squash lemon, zinnia, lollo rossa lettuce, big ruffles spinach and cypress vine in paper pots in the tray on the heating pad.  I am interested to see how that pad affects germination.  Was surprised to find a couple of pots that I thought weren't going to sprout did.  I think one is a stevia (more than a weed after the other seeds started at the same time).

I agree, Kay.  I rarely get through the reading list without swearing.  I have gotten better at controlling that impulse--but it is still there.  Watching the Cyprus looting I commented that the Cypriots would have been better off opening an account at the 'bank of Sealy.'  Mom just chuckled.  She remarked that we were lucky that we have no where near the insured limits.  However, we both turned a bit pale when I read a story from Ireland where the officials tasked with unwinding one of their large failed banks have decided that any funds depositors left in retirement accounts were not insured for any amount.  How long before we go back a century to when there was no kind of insurance for depositors against bank failure?

The Red Tape Chronicles posted this item.  Isn't globalization wonderful?  On the one hand we are subjected to risks from our globalized too-big-to-fail financial institutions but on the other we face risks from globalized criminal gangs.

AH!!! Jon Walker at Firedoglake thinks the way I do.  If we are all citizens of this Great Republic we should all be covered by the laws of this Great Republic--including the law makers and their staffs.

What a surprise!! (and yes that is sarcastic)  An academic study finds that U.S. companies use overseas workers to drive down wages in the U.S.  The study concerns high-tech jobs and the companies bringing in foreign workers because they complain that U.S. workers don't have the skills they need.  Truth is U.S. workers aren't as cheap as foreign workers and don't kiss their asses with sufficient gratitude.  But another truth is that the whole process of globalization has forced U.S. wages to remain flat or actually go down.  When they moved jobs overseas that hit the lower and medium skilled jobs in manufacturing.  Now higher skilled jobs are on the chopping block.

Alternet posted a piece from Steven Pizzo that asks a good question: Has America Become A Drama Queen Nation?  We have become increasingly disgusted with the over-hyped, drama laden news stories of late.  Sometimes all we can do is laugh at the pathetic pleas on the news from families of shooting victims for the shooters to turn themselves in.  Or for the hit-and-run drivers to do the same.  The 24/7 coverage of the Boston bombing presented (and continues to present) more baseless speculation than fact and do so with as much drama as possible.  I don't know how many stories started with proclaiming 'BREAKING NEWS' only to listen to speculation about what might happen in the next hour, day, or whenever.  Once upon a time I described my self as a 'news junkie.'  Unfortunately the news isn't the news anymore.