TODAY'S RAMBLINGS
(Editor's Note:  Better late than never).

OMFG the ties are really non-existent now (especially with Jay Howling going full-on cult, but more on that in a later post), but I'll be damned if I don't always enjoy blowing in to my hometown of Albany, New York.  I always do the same things - drive by the house in which I grew up, maybe go downtown and look at what some of us will always call The South Mall, and/or cruise by my high school.  But shocker:  on every trip to my hometown, I always get buzzed and eat wings in an appropriate spot.  And on every trip, I marvel at my upbringing and how things turned out.

I landed at around 6PM, grabbed my cool ride for the next two weeks, and I was off in to the electricity that is The Capital District.  JT Maxie's may never be the same again, but what a dive.  At least it was across the street from my hotel.  And, at the actually not bad Courtyard bar, I met a Trump-y guy from Syracuse, but it all went fine.

Today, I made my way on the beautiful 2.5 hour drive from my usual breakfast spot, The Latham Diner, to the phantasmic yet real Murphy Manor in Tupper Lake, in New York's majestic Adirondack Mountains.  The drive:  Albany - Warrensburg - North Creek - Indian Lake - Blue Mountain Lake - Long Lake - Tupper Lake.  Yeah, I do know it by heart.  I might even share some of what transpires in The ADK over the next 2 weeks.  Alone, in the woods, for two weeks, in luxury?  WHAT COULD HAPPEN?

But I'm still paying attention to the real world.  Of course to the war (I am still adjusting to needing to dust off my books on the topic of "nuclear winter"), but also to yet another travesty in Congress.  I'm done with the US Senate, at least with most of the Republicans that are there and participated in the unwatchable confirmation hearings for Ketanji Brown Jackson.  Defender-of-the-faith, John Cornyn.  My future husband, Ted Cruz.  And my dream grrrl, the Senator (?) Marsha Blackburn, who asked Judge Jackson:

This, from a supposed leader of our nation, a member of the "world's greatest deliberative body".  What a joke.

Back in my day, Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court appointments were snoozers.  Go look it up.  JFC, if you're even in the conversation, you're a mega-badass.  Even Coney "Island" Barrett has a couple of qualifications.  It was not until the Robert Bork thing that it got ugly, and it's only gotten worse, to the point where we have the stupidity we see now.  But there is a particular group I think we can hold accountable?
 
Here is a fact check from the Associated Press.  Why the hassle and why not just approve her?  What a waste of time.   Time I fear we don't really have as a country:  if there real issues about this woman (there aren't), let's hear them.  Otherwise, STFU, Senate Republicans.

AP FACT CHECK: Republicans skew Jackson's record on crime | AP News

FROM THE UNWASHED MASSES
Proud maturing-puppy mom Laura Gonzalez was her normally sunny self, exclaiming over this past Monday's post:

Thank you to any one that is reading this newsletter.

KLUF
Sure, I'm obsessing on this band.  I don't care.  Especially when I'm ensconced in the one-and-only Murphy Manor - a home whose sound system I designed.  Guess what I'm doing now? 

Here is Porcupine Tree with one of their 30 or so incredible songs, "Every Home is Wired".