November 5

The weather people say we will get a stretch that is dry and a bit warmer than normal. Sounds like a good time to get the plants I hope to keep through the winter mulched and protected.

We had to make a quick trip to Michaels to pick up some yarn I need to finish an afghan (or something else, I haven't decided for certain) done up in granny squares. It is a great way to use up leftovers. But the color is the one I am using to edge the squares and to edge the finished project. Didn't have near enough. Of course, I don't know how long ago I acquired that yarn (or any of the yarns) so there was no exact match but I did find something close. I got the last two large cakes and lucked into a buy-one-get-one-half-off sale. I also found a small quilting ruler (marked in quarter inch measures) in a set with a small rotating cutting mat. I am hand piecing my current project and need to cut some small (or smaller than usual) pieces in a small place (my lap desk).

I found this piece on Crooks&Liars concerning that most cited study on the efficacy of ivermectin. It has been pulled by the authors because the data is entirely bogus. They blame a research assistant for mistakenly incorporating a dummy used to train new assistants set of data into the experimental data. It reminds me of the oft cited study which supposedly showed a link between childhood vaccines and autism. It was also totally bogus.

My first thought on seeing the headlines on this story was a sarcastic "Oh, I guess he has been hanging out with Elvis somewhere in an alternate dimension." That JFK Jr. faked his death is absurd to begin with but to think he would come back to play second fiddle to be the vice-presidential candidate on a new run by  the Former Guy is even more absurd.

Just saw an interesting interview on Morning Joe which supports my gut feeling about the last election. The question concerned why last Tuesday's election results were so dismal for Dems. Susan Del Percio cited statistics which indicated that policy didn't drive the debate; personality did. Her statistics said that about 37% of the Former Guy's voters approved of his policies (I always wondered what policies they perceived in his verbal diarrhea) and another 6% (if I remember correctly) voted for him because he wasn't Biden while 27% of Biden voters voted for him for his policies and another 30% voted for him because he wasn't the Former Guy. First point: more than a third of voters chose based on their dislike of the candidates not because they liked the policies. Second point: the Former Guy wasn't running and was mostly absent from the campaign in Virginia, but the Democrat tried and failed miserably to paint his opponent as "Former Guy lite".

The Rittenhouse case might be with us for some time if this piece by Crooks&Liars is an accurate foretelling.