Thursday.

Another day without Bloglines.  I found a list I made last time this happened and managed to get most of them on Bloglovin but I had a number of sites that I didn't list and don't remember the title off hand.  Damn but the whole mess is frustrating.

I need to make a space for the two scented geraniums inside.  We expect some very cool (in the mid to high 40s) overnight with day time temps in the high 50s and low 60s.  I will also have to bring in my attempts at taking and rooting cuttings.  If the gardens dry out I am looking at a couple of containers to clear.

An interesting essay on jobs from the Contrary Farmer.

I didn't watch Obama's speech last night.  I figured it was going to include wider air strikes and strikes into Syria.  Huffington Post has an account here.  I would say he was trying to "degrade and destroy" IS (or ISIL or ISIS) on the cheap but the missiles aren't cheap.  Nor is the equipment he wants to safe with the Kurds, Iraqi "army," and "moderate" rebels in Syria.  We won't be putting our own boots on the ground which is a good thing.  However, we will be relying on our "allies'" boots to handle the ground fighting.  I have all those words in quotes because the meanings are terribly slippery.  I don't think Iraq has an army in any meaningful definition of the term and as far as moderate rebels in Syria go one has to ask what we mean by that word.  All of the rebel groups in Syria have ties to IS and anything we share with them will, sooner or later, find its way into IS hands. All of our alleged allies have their own agendas and those agendas are often at odd with ours--that is if we have honestly defined our agenda, which I am not at all sure we have done.  It is a miserable mess into which we are about to dump more material and money to create more misery.  Sounds like a recipe for futility to me.

The news last night had an amusing and amazing picture from Calgary, Canada showing a yard full of frowning snowmen--at least a dozen about four feet high surrounded by additional snow.  You can find that picture (well down the page) and others here.  Our weather reporter said the snow storm was at least four weeks early.  The same system is supposed to be here late tonight and into tomorrow but with rain not snow.

Being neither a citizen nor a resident of Scotland the matter of Scottish Independence and the upcoming vote is something I can view placidly from a distance.  However, if I were either and I had money in any bank that published a threat to leave Scotland if the vote went for independence, I would be on my way to taking every penny out and moving it elsewhere--even if that were my mattress.  I dislike blackmail--intensely.