So. Doctors Day. Following Pharmacy Night. It's been an education.
First, the pharmacy. For some reason, the tail end of my limited prescription for blood thinner got (lost?), and I was given a whole 'nother 90 days of it. I'll actually need about 20 pills. The bottle is even marked "partial refill remaining." Nope, they won't take the excess back. I decided, since I'm off blood thinner completely on April 8, and there was no charge with the new Medicare schedule, I'd just take it as a win.
But while I was there, I was asked if I'd had/wanted the new shingles vaccine. It's 50-90% more effective than the previous one, and dead rather than live vaccine. It has to be mixed per each dose, and takes about 15 minutes to prepare. There will be two shots of this vs. one of the earlier, and $175 each vs. $600 for the one. And, no, my insurance doesn't pay for this one. It will, however, take the cost of both off my annual deductible. I'm not completely sure what that gets me, as it seems that everything is either free or not covered at all. Maybe I'm just not understanding the terms.
My decision was a simple one. Daddy lived through shingles, and for long long months, his repeated refrain was "I want to die!" My brother got the original shot and shingles. He doesn't speak about his experience with it, but I'm sure he'd rather have avoided it. The pharmacist at the window told me she'd had it three times - in her 20s!
I dug out my credit card. Of course.
I was warned that this shot would reult in a sore arm for a few days. He was ready to advise all kinds of things (heat, cold, movement, etc.) but I interrupted him to let him know I'd heard that about all shots, it was never true, and that compared to (fill in the blank: root canal, childbirth, gall bladder surgery the old fashioned way, bilateral knees 10 years overdue for replacement - due to no insurence, natch) I'm sure I could live through this.
Turns out the arm is actually sore. Oh well, still not that big a deal.
This morning was a visit with my favorite cardiologist's PA. She finds the time to actually talk to you, not barking an order on the way out the room like her boss does. We have balanced many of my medications, changing levels and monitoring reactions, discussing things all the while. She trusts me to change one if (fill in whatever effect is pertinent) happens, allowing for the procedures I went through last year for making changes. I know when something is really wrong, or expected. Nearly everything with an Rx label in my bathroom winds up affecting this specialty, and nobody else cares to monitor or advise in that detail. Again, we discussed both how things went in the past, and planning for the future.
In addition to medication issues, I found out some other things. She recommended I get a document from each of my docs summarizing my current health status, labs, etc. before we travel. When I showed her my 2-column list of medical history she was impressed, but commented I should add the manufacturer and model of my pacemaker and watchman. I was informed in better detail how my pacemaker monitoring works. It contains a memory chip and the plug-in machine on my headboard periodically downloads and records what's been happening. Since I've had it, for example, there was a series of 6 (!) heartbeats which qualified as A-fib. All else is normal. That comes well under the 1% category. But if it happens again, everybody will know. This came out of her taking me to her office where she pulled up my records, showing me a recent EKG sent to their office.
We discussed a flutter I can feel periodically. It seems to get worse in response to caffeine. I've been cutting back, except for occasions like, let's see, Girl Scout Thin Mints sales? She informed me that aging increases sensitivity to caffeine in some people. Other docs have just flat out stated I should quit. Since it had never been a problem, I had seen no reason to suppose things might change. What I had noticed was that my insomnia lessened when I started my day with coffee, and I know that good sleep is important to my heart. I can feel it after a bad couple of nights. So why stop coffee?
In order to help figure out what else might be going on, she's setting me up with another monitor to see what's happening so we can figure out out response. Figure April till it gets approved. Insurance, don'cha know. It would be my 3rd time wearing one, and what she suspects isn't recorded for in my pacemaker, but still, they might balk. I've seen those bills.
She also sent me for a CBC to figure out whether I'm on the right dose of blood thinner. How are my platelets doing? It's seemed like this dose was too large, which is why most weeks I skip one dose. So we discussed interactions with aspirin and ibuprofin, how much of either was I taking? This time she had to figure out how to code it so insurance would pay for the test. I am, for the moment, theoretically anemic. Nobody ever bothered to let me know that some kind of ongoing monitoring or testing might be useful once I'd switched to the plavix, just that I no longer needed INR tests since I was off warfarin.
I also know that I was correct in thinking she was in pain while walking, and she informed me why. We shared ways of dealing with it, since I've been there too. I know where she plans to travel this summer (Europe) and she knows where I do. And she likes the cookies and recipe copies I dropped off on my last visit.
No, it's not a bribe. These are just great friendly people staffing that office. Well, the cardiologist is a stereotypical king of his world, but I only see him once a year. As long as the job gets done, there or by referral, I can deal with his personality deficit.
But I said "doctors" day. Plural. There was a different visit leading to another lesson in insurance and healthcare costs. I need a steroid creme. I can't apply it for a week as it will prevent the two punch biopsies from healing, but after that, 3 applications a day for perhaps 5 months, depending on its progress. The week delay turns out to be a good thing, since what she prescribed winds up costing - gulp! - $210. per tube. Insurance doesn't cover. I know this because before I was half a mile away from this doc's office my pharmacy called with details. And a question. Would I like them to call her and find out if there is a substitute that will be either covered or at least cheaper that will do the job she wants?
Again, the answer was simple, as soon as I verified the details. I'll be waiting to hear the outcome.
Oh yeah, no pool for a week in the meantime. Even without it I've been losing a couple pounds a month lately. I think it's time to find a set of stairs and start strengthening those muscles now. Soon as I remember I wanted to.
Tuesday, February 25, 2020
Saturday, February 22, 2020
My Campaign Spam folder
I've been getting bombarded by email pleas for political donations. In some ways, I'd love to have the kind of income allowing me to contribute to candidates and causes I support by pouring money their way.
I just can't.
I do plan to send a few - really, a few- dollars onward after the primaries are over. But keep your powder dry, all you organizations out there begging now. It ain't happening now. Period. I've already voted and mailed in my ballot for the Presidential primary. It was for the same candidate I supported the first time I heard that name in the list of wannabes this time around. The debates reinforced my opinion, and opinionated TV talking heads haven't swayed me. Really, though, they never do enough research to spout anything other than what everyone else next to them opines, avoiding all the real issues in favor of the horse race and their attempts to be the first to declare the winner before the country has spoken.
Screw them.
The debates pretty well suck as well. Where do these people find such inane questions? Who cares if somebody forgot a name? Doesn't everybody at some time, perhaps more under pressure? Why should any candidate stoop to answering seriously to frivolous questions? Lets have more questions about policy, both what's going on now and what the candidates hope to change/continue? Try healthcare, climate change, education, tax policies, justice, social security, jobs, minimum wage, environment, immigration, race, election security.... In no way a complete list, it would go a long ways toward making any political discussion meaningful.
I don't mind being surveyed. It's happened a total of once, and that was this year. But I did respond to a quick "which do you support?" online survey. Once. I tried to respond to another from the following deluge of them, but whoever was sending them out had a form that wouldn't go through unless a monetary pledge was made.
Screw that too. If my opinion doesn't count unless I can back it with money, well, I can always blog about it. None of you require payment before reading this.
After that, I started getting perhaps 10 emails per day just asking for money for races all over the country. When those didn't get enough response, aka none, the tone of the bombardment changed. They started trying to alarm me with disasters they claimed had happened due to lack of funding, big headlines that had no basis in fact. So-and-so was Destroyed! Somebody else had already LOST their race. When those got all the attention they deserved, they switched to shaming, headlines like So-and-so was begging for help and I (yes, named) wasn't listening.
My patience for simply hitting the delete button had ended. The two most flagrant offenders have now had all their emails marked for the spam folder. Good thing I just cleared it out. I expect it'll be filling up soon.
And when I do contribute something, it'll be directly to the campaign website rather than via any of those fund raisers. Oh, and if anyone in that business reads this, go find another job. Turning off people who haven't the bucks you're looking for is not a good way to collect votes.
Bet you failed telemarketing too.
I just can't.
I do plan to send a few - really, a few- dollars onward after the primaries are over. But keep your powder dry, all you organizations out there begging now. It ain't happening now. Period. I've already voted and mailed in my ballot for the Presidential primary. It was for the same candidate I supported the first time I heard that name in the list of wannabes this time around. The debates reinforced my opinion, and opinionated TV talking heads haven't swayed me. Really, though, they never do enough research to spout anything other than what everyone else next to them opines, avoiding all the real issues in favor of the horse race and their attempts to be the first to declare the winner before the country has spoken.
Screw them.
The debates pretty well suck as well. Where do these people find such inane questions? Who cares if somebody forgot a name? Doesn't everybody at some time, perhaps more under pressure? Why should any candidate stoop to answering seriously to frivolous questions? Lets have more questions about policy, both what's going on now and what the candidates hope to change/continue? Try healthcare, climate change, education, tax policies, justice, social security, jobs, minimum wage, environment, immigration, race, election security.... In no way a complete list, it would go a long ways toward making any political discussion meaningful.
I don't mind being surveyed. It's happened a total of once, and that was this year. But I did respond to a quick "which do you support?" online survey. Once. I tried to respond to another from the following deluge of them, but whoever was sending them out had a form that wouldn't go through unless a monetary pledge was made.
Screw that too. If my opinion doesn't count unless I can back it with money, well, I can always blog about it. None of you require payment before reading this.
After that, I started getting perhaps 10 emails per day just asking for money for races all over the country. When those didn't get enough response, aka none, the tone of the bombardment changed. They started trying to alarm me with disasters they claimed had happened due to lack of funding, big headlines that had no basis in fact. So-and-so was Destroyed! Somebody else had already LOST their race. When those got all the attention they deserved, they switched to shaming, headlines like So-and-so was begging for help and I (yes, named) wasn't listening.
My patience for simply hitting the delete button had ended. The two most flagrant offenders have now had all their emails marked for the spam folder. Good thing I just cleared it out. I expect it'll be filling up soon.
And when I do contribute something, it'll be directly to the campaign website rather than via any of those fund raisers. Oh, and if anyone in that business reads this, go find another job. Turning off people who haven't the bucks you're looking for is not a good way to collect votes.
Bet you failed telemarketing too.
Friday, February 21, 2020
Is It Finally Treason Yet?
OK, after winnowing the old photos down to less than a third, I can finally lift my nose out of my vacation from politics and gather strength to see what Trump and company are doing now.
OMG!
Wasn't it bad enough he was helped by the Russians to win the first election? And worse that everybody this adderall-addled narcissistic idiot in the White House has gathered around him have been busy covering it up, subverting justice, trying to tell the country that black is white and down is up? Or doing everything he can in whatever corrupt way to try to destroy his likely political rival?
Have you figured out yet that Deutsche Bank has been financially supporting him with huge loans that no other bank would sanction because the Russian oligarchs have guaranteed those loans? Or considered that those oligarchs are mostly Russian Mob? Does it make you suspect even the tiniest bit that his loyalties have never lain with this country? Or that this is the primary reason he guards those tax returns so zealously?
Or even worse that those power hungry Republicans in the Senate, while saying privately they don't like what's going on, are quaking in their muddy boots so hard they unanimously support him? (OK, Romney, but....)
Now that those same Senators have reassured the Con In Chief of his absolute immunity, he's charging ahead full steam in his attempt to destroy this democracy. No, that's not an exaggeration, folks. Wake up! He not only pardons everyone he can find who have done the same things which he's just been freed of his own consequences of, he's doubling down.
Yep, he's getting Russian assistance again in this election. Numerous intelligence agencies and sources have confirmed it. What are we doing about it? Well, Moscow Mitch blocked all legislation in the senate which might have addressed fighting their interference, or from any outside source. Once the Legislature was informed of the latest threats, as required by law, our Mandarin Mussolini blew his stack over the "leak" of that information, denying - as always - any truth in it.
Who the hell knows what he's going to do next? He's almost out of intelligent, honest, brave governmental employees to fire and/or disgrace. Who and how will he target next? Will there be anybody left daring to take a stand? Has this already become an intractable train wreck of a democracy?
One can fantasize. Perhaps that awful diet and drug use will take care of him for the country and nobody will have to step forward and figure out how to deal with it. Perhaps somebody will take those assault weapons the extreme right have fought so hard for, and find their way through the protections of the Secret Service, much though I hate to think it would have to come to that. You see, either of those "options" would relieve the rest of us from OUR responsibility to get in the fight to keep this country and return it to our ideals of true freedom from tyranny, of integrity, of justice for everyone, and in the process return this country to something we don't have to apologize for.
WE have to do something. Now. Together.
Are you ready yet?
OMG!
Wasn't it bad enough he was helped by the Russians to win the first election? And worse that everybody this adderall-addled narcissistic idiot in the White House has gathered around him have been busy covering it up, subverting justice, trying to tell the country that black is white and down is up? Or doing everything he can in whatever corrupt way to try to destroy his likely political rival?
Have you figured out yet that Deutsche Bank has been financially supporting him with huge loans that no other bank would sanction because the Russian oligarchs have guaranteed those loans? Or considered that those oligarchs are mostly Russian Mob? Does it make you suspect even the tiniest bit that his loyalties have never lain with this country? Or that this is the primary reason he guards those tax returns so zealously?
Or even worse that those power hungry Republicans in the Senate, while saying privately they don't like what's going on, are quaking in their muddy boots so hard they unanimously support him? (OK, Romney, but....)
Now that those same Senators have reassured the Con In Chief of his absolute immunity, he's charging ahead full steam in his attempt to destroy this democracy. No, that's not an exaggeration, folks. Wake up! He not only pardons everyone he can find who have done the same things which he's just been freed of his own consequences of, he's doubling down.
Yep, he's getting Russian assistance again in this election. Numerous intelligence agencies and sources have confirmed it. What are we doing about it? Well, Moscow Mitch blocked all legislation in the senate which might have addressed fighting their interference, or from any outside source. Once the Legislature was informed of the latest threats, as required by law, our Mandarin Mussolini blew his stack over the "leak" of that information, denying - as always - any truth in it.
Who the hell knows what he's going to do next? He's almost out of intelligent, honest, brave governmental employees to fire and/or disgrace. Who and how will he target next? Will there be anybody left daring to take a stand? Has this already become an intractable train wreck of a democracy?
One can fantasize. Perhaps that awful diet and drug use will take care of him for the country and nobody will have to step forward and figure out how to deal with it. Perhaps somebody will take those assault weapons the extreme right have fought so hard for, and find their way through the protections of the Secret Service, much though I hate to think it would have to come to that. You see, either of those "options" would relieve the rest of us from OUR responsibility to get in the fight to keep this country and return it to our ideals of true freedom from tyranny, of integrity, of justice for everyone, and in the process return this country to something we don't have to apologize for.
WE have to do something. Now. Together.
Are you ready yet?
Wednesday, February 19, 2020
Making Progress In Hog Heaven
It's been a pretty slow week as far as outside appointments and obligations go. I've been taking advantage, doing little things like grooming my pony tail. No, of course not my hair: no way it could have grown that long since any of you have seen me. It's still just long enough to not have to mess with, but still keep a decent shape and a little curl.
No, I'm referring to my (bigger) ponytail palm. It broke my heart a little when the one I'd nurtured for 30 years since buying it in Georgia, moving it to Minnesota via Oklahoma - divorce time, doncha know - and finally planting it in Arizona, croaked on me. Too many years as an indoor plant. So when, back north for a summer, I found a few young'uns with multiple trunks in a WalMart for a cheap price, I bought 3 and planted them when we returned.
Rabbits got one, despite them being something rabbits didn't actually like. Oops, forgot to tell the rabbits, I guess. The remaining two went immediately into chicken wire cages. When the rabbits gave up on eating event the leaf tips sticking through the wire, I removed the cage on the smaller. It worked for two years. Along came a new generation rabbit, uneducated in its supposed dislike of my plant. Earlier this week I plunked a cage back on the remains of the smaller one - in every way, now. But there was a lot of yellow and brown on the big one, the one with 4 trunks and 2 1/2 feet of foliage. With the aid of careful repositioning of a chair, I spent a couple hours and filled two garbage bags turning it back to green. To celebrate my accomplishment, I took several pics of it uncaged, then several caged again. While I was at it, there are a couple of aloes blooming or about to that I allowed to photo bomb my afternoon.
Ahhhh....
Just in the tiniest case you don't know this about me as well, I'm something of a camera addict. It's not that I have two camcorders and two cameras, including a fancy Canon SLR. It's that I'm addicted to using them. Although, lately that means my Nikon Coolpix. Yes, it's not the fanciest one in the arsenal, but it is - literally - handy. And the important bit of the old photographer's adage, "F8 and be there" is "Be there!" This fits in the hand, and a small light case leaves no excuses to leave it home, while it holds camera, charger, spare batteries and sim cards, along with one of those little gizmos with a sim card slot on one end and a USB plug on the other. The case is a hardbody, so I never worry about tumbling around in the car.
Nope, no excuses. It doesn't hurt either than I cam do pretty fair macros with it and it's got a fantastic zoom and a nice level of megapixels.
This brings me to the Hog Heaven part of this post. Back on the 9th, I mentioned reanimating my old neglected laptop, the one holding something around 15 and a half thousand pictures, long neglected. Ten days later I'm well through my first culling. I make a note each time I shut it off of which # picture of how many total I need to find to go back to when I restart. There are about 8400 total on it now, and I'm keeping only 4300 or so. So far.
Yeah, I know.
But there's a reason I'm keeping that many. Memories. These last few days, I've been seeing family members from as far back as 2007 and watched them grow up, or just older, during the time these cover. In addition, I've gotten shots of the house in Minnesota through the seasons and through its changes, as well as places I passed by while in my courier travels when I could snatch a moment for a stop, some of which I'd completely forgotten. Until this project. There was a regular morning run into Wisconsin, for example, where a farm in the fog outlining multiple silos caught my eye, another farm with a donkey, and all the spots in fall where the variety of maples along highways and fields turned them into a progression of spectacular color.
There are well over a dozen trips up to Crex Meadows in western Wisconsin, including fall, winter and spring shots that I can't get any more. The goal was always sandhill cranes, once I'd heard this was a major fall staging ground before they migrated south, accumulating possibly 20,000 before liftoff. While I probably shot a thousand pics, good ones are rare, these birds being shy. I wish I'd had the current camera the year three wayward whooping cranes decided to join in the fall fun, as the pictures I have of those are about 4 megapixels on a poor zoom.
But I got them!
Of course, there were a whole lot of other targets for my camera: trumpeter swans in all stages of family life, hawks, eagles, egrets, herons, owls, a gazillion varieties of ducks, geese, osprey, turkeys, pelicans, songbirds and more as they migrate through. One year a black ibis landed for a couple days before hunting out more appropriate territory. Don't neglect turtles, lizards, otters, deer, insects, wolves (OK, den only), flowers, pussy willows on red stems, and all the landscape and skyscape shots a heart's eye could desire. Once I located something I hadn't seen since 1964, a particular grass we called "speargrass," a barb on one end and a long tail that curled after they dried, assisting them to stick to something and migrate to new territory. We kids, of course, used them in battles. Nobody got seriously hurt, just uncomfortable when one landed. For some reason, that was usually me.
There are at least 3 weddings in there, two nieces and one of Steve's granddaughters. I do candids of the people and include the settings and decorations. By the time I'm finished, maybe half are flattering enough to share with the couple. There is also my granddaughter's high school play, Pirates of Penzance. With a dearth of males, she played a pirate, and my favorite shot is of her holding a fake sword to another character's throat, with the only case of red-eye in the whole set of photos giving her a particularly demonic mien.
The real gold mine is the travel photos. There were the RV trips to Crex, the North Shore, and out west. There were also regular road trips, meaning everything we could cram into our trips between Minnesota and wherever. Think Black Hills, Rocky Mountain National Park, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Tetons, Greys River up out of Alpine, Wyoming. For coastal shots, among others, add Oregon, Jacksonville, Alaska's Kenai Peninsula plus Denali.... I'm sure I'm forgetting some already, and I still have thousands to go through.
Again, my travel eye orients to landscapes, animals and birds, flowers, and anything water, whether reflections, waves, frost patterns, or glacier blue ice.
So how hard is it to cull? Well, I'll never get to professional photographer standards, once explained to me by my son-in-law as shooting a hundred and picking out the one best. But I tend to shoot a subject over and over, this way and that, so it can take me a while to get the best one or two of that bunch. Do the eyes/horns/fur/feathers show? Are road signs photo bombing the shot while the vehicle is in motion? (Oh, YES!) Is the sun from the right side, or is it blurry, is the color true, or is this just another in a widely scattered set of similar shots? How's the focus and depth of field? Is it even interesting? What about composition: does this compel me more than that one? To make it more fun, there are always the ones shot when I had that particular camera on repeated shooting, a frame about every third second or so, and one of however many is plenty. But did enough happen in those fraction seconds to make selection meaningful? Or just blindly pick one?
Now if this sounds a lot like work, keep two things in mind. First, the laptop heats up after an hour or so, plus the battery tends to drain in that time also. Outlets in that corner of my world are maxed out already, so battery power only. Thus the task is broken up into bits, and recharging limits me to three or four sessions a day, depending on what else is going on. Yeah, that is slow too.
Second, and most important: it's all those precious memories! I go to sleep with images stuck in my mind, the best of all those times keeping me company, comforting me, the beauty of the subjects holding me in thrall.
One additional side effect, while watching TV now I analyze scenes by composition as if I were behind the lens and could freeze select frames. Mostly they flash in a fraction of a second and continue on to serve the plot, but if I were just there with a camera....
No, I'm referring to my (bigger) ponytail palm. It broke my heart a little when the one I'd nurtured for 30 years since buying it in Georgia, moving it to Minnesota via Oklahoma - divorce time, doncha know - and finally planting it in Arizona, croaked on me. Too many years as an indoor plant. So when, back north for a summer, I found a few young'uns with multiple trunks in a WalMart for a cheap price, I bought 3 and planted them when we returned.
Rabbits got one, despite them being something rabbits didn't actually like. Oops, forgot to tell the rabbits, I guess. The remaining two went immediately into chicken wire cages. When the rabbits gave up on eating event the leaf tips sticking through the wire, I removed the cage on the smaller. It worked for two years. Along came a new generation rabbit, uneducated in its supposed dislike of my plant. Earlier this week I plunked a cage back on the remains of the smaller one - in every way, now. But there was a lot of yellow and brown on the big one, the one with 4 trunks and 2 1/2 feet of foliage. With the aid of careful repositioning of a chair, I spent a couple hours and filled two garbage bags turning it back to green. To celebrate my accomplishment, I took several pics of it uncaged, then several caged again. While I was at it, there are a couple of aloes blooming or about to that I allowed to photo bomb my afternoon.
Ahhhh....
Just in the tiniest case you don't know this about me as well, I'm something of a camera addict. It's not that I have two camcorders and two cameras, including a fancy Canon SLR. It's that I'm addicted to using them. Although, lately that means my Nikon Coolpix. Yes, it's not the fanciest one in the arsenal, but it is - literally - handy. And the important bit of the old photographer's adage, "F8 and be there" is "Be there!" This fits in the hand, and a small light case leaves no excuses to leave it home, while it holds camera, charger, spare batteries and sim cards, along with one of those little gizmos with a sim card slot on one end and a USB plug on the other. The case is a hardbody, so I never worry about tumbling around in the car.
Nope, no excuses. It doesn't hurt either than I cam do pretty fair macros with it and it's got a fantastic zoom and a nice level of megapixels.
This brings me to the Hog Heaven part of this post. Back on the 9th, I mentioned reanimating my old neglected laptop, the one holding something around 15 and a half thousand pictures, long neglected. Ten days later I'm well through my first culling. I make a note each time I shut it off of which # picture of how many total I need to find to go back to when I restart. There are about 8400 total on it now, and I'm keeping only 4300 or so. So far.
Yeah, I know.
But there's a reason I'm keeping that many. Memories. These last few days, I've been seeing family members from as far back as 2007 and watched them grow up, or just older, during the time these cover. In addition, I've gotten shots of the house in Minnesota through the seasons and through its changes, as well as places I passed by while in my courier travels when I could snatch a moment for a stop, some of which I'd completely forgotten. Until this project. There was a regular morning run into Wisconsin, for example, where a farm in the fog outlining multiple silos caught my eye, another farm with a donkey, and all the spots in fall where the variety of maples along highways and fields turned them into a progression of spectacular color.
There are well over a dozen trips up to Crex Meadows in western Wisconsin, including fall, winter and spring shots that I can't get any more. The goal was always sandhill cranes, once I'd heard this was a major fall staging ground before they migrated south, accumulating possibly 20,000 before liftoff. While I probably shot a thousand pics, good ones are rare, these birds being shy. I wish I'd had the current camera the year three wayward whooping cranes decided to join in the fall fun, as the pictures I have of those are about 4 megapixels on a poor zoom.
But I got them!
Of course, there were a whole lot of other targets for my camera: trumpeter swans in all stages of family life, hawks, eagles, egrets, herons, owls, a gazillion varieties of ducks, geese, osprey, turkeys, pelicans, songbirds and more as they migrate through. One year a black ibis landed for a couple days before hunting out more appropriate territory. Don't neglect turtles, lizards, otters, deer, insects, wolves (OK, den only), flowers, pussy willows on red stems, and all the landscape and skyscape shots a heart's eye could desire. Once I located something I hadn't seen since 1964, a particular grass we called "speargrass," a barb on one end and a long tail that curled after they dried, assisting them to stick to something and migrate to new territory. We kids, of course, used them in battles. Nobody got seriously hurt, just uncomfortable when one landed. For some reason, that was usually me.
There are at least 3 weddings in there, two nieces and one of Steve's granddaughters. I do candids of the people and include the settings and decorations. By the time I'm finished, maybe half are flattering enough to share with the couple. There is also my granddaughter's high school play, Pirates of Penzance. With a dearth of males, she played a pirate, and my favorite shot is of her holding a fake sword to another character's throat, with the only case of red-eye in the whole set of photos giving her a particularly demonic mien.
The real gold mine is the travel photos. There were the RV trips to Crex, the North Shore, and out west. There were also regular road trips, meaning everything we could cram into our trips between Minnesota and wherever. Think Black Hills, Rocky Mountain National Park, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Tetons, Greys River up out of Alpine, Wyoming. For coastal shots, among others, add Oregon, Jacksonville, Alaska's Kenai Peninsula plus Denali.... I'm sure I'm forgetting some already, and I still have thousands to go through.
Again, my travel eye orients to landscapes, animals and birds, flowers, and anything water, whether reflections, waves, frost patterns, or glacier blue ice.
So how hard is it to cull? Well, I'll never get to professional photographer standards, once explained to me by my son-in-law as shooting a hundred and picking out the one best. But I tend to shoot a subject over and over, this way and that, so it can take me a while to get the best one or two of that bunch. Do the eyes/horns/fur/feathers show? Are road signs photo bombing the shot while the vehicle is in motion? (Oh, YES!) Is the sun from the right side, or is it blurry, is the color true, or is this just another in a widely scattered set of similar shots? How's the focus and depth of field? Is it even interesting? What about composition: does this compel me more than that one? To make it more fun, there are always the ones shot when I had that particular camera on repeated shooting, a frame about every third second or so, and one of however many is plenty. But did enough happen in those fraction seconds to make selection meaningful? Or just blindly pick one?
Now if this sounds a lot like work, keep two things in mind. First, the laptop heats up after an hour or so, plus the battery tends to drain in that time also. Outlets in that corner of my world are maxed out already, so battery power only. Thus the task is broken up into bits, and recharging limits me to three or four sessions a day, depending on what else is going on. Yeah, that is slow too.
Second, and most important: it's all those precious memories! I go to sleep with images stuck in my mind, the best of all those times keeping me company, comforting me, the beauty of the subjects holding me in thrall.
One additional side effect, while watching TV now I analyze scenes by composition as if I were behind the lens and could freeze select frames. Mostly they flash in a fraction of a second and continue on to serve the plot, but if I were just there with a camera....
Friday, February 14, 2020
Anniversary Celebration.
I don't know what the rest of you expect on Valentine's Day, particularly adding the fact of this being our 8th anniversary as well. Maybe you plan a big dinner, flowers, romance, a fancy trip somewhere. Or hey, CHOCOLATE!!!
Steve and I are doing it our own way. Presents actually got exchanged several days ago. A card was bought. A meal is being prepared - and if you know us, you're pretty sure that means Steve is cooking. The "big fancy trip" was yesterday afternoon, a short car ride to scope out a couple local "lakes" where Steve can park a very short and horizontal distance to where he can throw a line in. He qualifies for a much reduced permit to do so, and is planning on drowning a few worms soon.
I haven't the heart to tell him worms are actually aquatic and don't drown in water, but shrivel in air. But he loves the expression, so....
The day consists of reading, watching some prerecorded TV, phone calls, napping at will. In my case, it also involves going slowly through the 15,+++ photos on the old computer. It only lets me see about 500 at a crack before it decided it's had enough for the day, but that's enough time to immerse in Alaska. In fact, it's my 3rd day for it, and I'm nowhere near done. There's been a lot of culling, but that is overlaid with the joy of reminiscing, seeing things I'd totally forgotten we'd seen, and anticipating days of viewing to come.
Those are the oldest photos on that computer, so I can tell when I switched to digital. It was for this trip, taking Paul and Jordan to show them some of the reasons I fell in love with Alaska after my late ex-mother-in-law treated me to a trip there, years before. The difference with this trip was no cruise ship was involved, thus no Inside Passage, but much time spent on the Kenai Peninsula, and we flew up to Denali rather than the group trip via train. There was still gold panning, though in a different location. My tendency to take non-stop photos was similar, only increased from 36 rolls of 36 exposure Ektachrome to whatever the sim cards could handle. Plus, there's video somewhere else, also needing much work editing.
After three days working on Alaska, I'm somewhere in Seward. Homer was yesterday's project, along with the horseback ride in Seward. Today's bit was the photographer's small boat cruise up to watch a calving glacier, with all the scenery and wildlife you could shoot including a pod of porpoises escorting the boat for 20 minutes, then Exit Glacier and the Sea Life Center. In other words, I'm in hog heaven.
And any time I come up for air, there is this wonderful guy close by. What could be better?
Steve and I are doing it our own way. Presents actually got exchanged several days ago. A card was bought. A meal is being prepared - and if you know us, you're pretty sure that means Steve is cooking. The "big fancy trip" was yesterday afternoon, a short car ride to scope out a couple local "lakes" where Steve can park a very short and horizontal distance to where he can throw a line in. He qualifies for a much reduced permit to do so, and is planning on drowning a few worms soon.
I haven't the heart to tell him worms are actually aquatic and don't drown in water, but shrivel in air. But he loves the expression, so....
The day consists of reading, watching some prerecorded TV, phone calls, napping at will. In my case, it also involves going slowly through the 15,+++ photos on the old computer. It only lets me see about 500 at a crack before it decided it's had enough for the day, but that's enough time to immerse in Alaska. In fact, it's my 3rd day for it, and I'm nowhere near done. There's been a lot of culling, but that is overlaid with the joy of reminiscing, seeing things I'd totally forgotten we'd seen, and anticipating days of viewing to come.
Those are the oldest photos on that computer, so I can tell when I switched to digital. It was for this trip, taking Paul and Jordan to show them some of the reasons I fell in love with Alaska after my late ex-mother-in-law treated me to a trip there, years before. The difference with this trip was no cruise ship was involved, thus no Inside Passage, but much time spent on the Kenai Peninsula, and we flew up to Denali rather than the group trip via train. There was still gold panning, though in a different location. My tendency to take non-stop photos was similar, only increased from 36 rolls of 36 exposure Ektachrome to whatever the sim cards could handle. Plus, there's video somewhere else, also needing much work editing.
After three days working on Alaska, I'm somewhere in Seward. Homer was yesterday's project, along with the horseback ride in Seward. Today's bit was the photographer's small boat cruise up to watch a calving glacier, with all the scenery and wildlife you could shoot including a pod of porpoises escorting the boat for 20 minutes, then Exit Glacier and the Sea Life Center. In other words, I'm in hog heaven.
And any time I come up for air, there is this wonderful guy close by. What could be better?
Sunday, February 9, 2020
Not A Brick
That's the good news. The rest - good/bad final verdict - will come out after lots of work.
It started, well, way back, when I retired my 1st MacBook Pro. Sort of. OK, probably earlier, when I actually bought it, the next in line after the one with the dome base and swivel-on-a-post screen. (Still working, I think.) This was back when I had little trust for the internet virus protections, particularly knowing I had NO capability whatsoever for dealing with any incursions on my own. My solution? Since I only wanted it for photo/video items, that's the only part of the software OS I uploaded on day one. No internet. No word processing. Nothing else. That was on the other one anyway. I followed up by adding a special video editing package, along with many dreams of grandeur. Not to mention fantasies of my photographical genius.
Done laughing yet? How about if I add I turned this laptop into a $2,000 photo album by those restrictions. Pause.... Now are you done?
Now?
There are about 8 years of photos on it. All those videos, well, they are stored on mini reels of tape, waiting for me to work to reanimate the camcorders they were originally recorded on so the data can be viewed, possibly downloaded. Still, just these photos total over 15,000. I never got around to editing them. Blame ...... life.
Fast forward to now. Having just finished the near-final purge of the photos from then till now, combining 2 laptops, I got nostalgic to see just what I actually had on the old computer. It's been stored in a big clunky vinyl many-pocket briefcase for years, along with cords, cables, plugs, chargers, and even some old depleted bubblewrap. There was so much stuff that it took me two searches to come up with the actual laptop!
As for the charger? As many times as I searched and sorted through that plethora of accessories, other than some things I still can't identify, it all turned out to be for cameras. (Hint: Canon and Sony in fine print turned out to be clues.) I knew that each subsequent issue of MacBooks had a different power port. (I own 2 newer.) The transformer part kept getting smaller while the port got larger. I couldn't borrow one from a newer model. (Does Apple do that on purpose to bump sales?)
My next step was to attempt to read the very very fine print on the back of the MacBook for any numbers that might lead me to finding a replacement. There was at least 1 match on eBay, but the accompanying info lead me to want more information before sending any money their way.
I thought about contacting my son-in-law, my personal computer guru. He's the one years ago who introduced me to the term for a permanently dead computer: a brick. This is what I feared I had, after not even opening the thing since moving south. Eight years? Had that lack of use killed the battery, turning it into a brick? Could a replacement battery be 1: found, 2: installed - since previous history with Apple indicates after just a few years they want nothing to do with your model? and 3: effective?
A quick note here. My son Rich is a computer guru, for not-Apples. He is an enormous help when Steve has an issue. Any issue. My daughter gets insulted when I don't turn to her first for my Apple computer questions, as she is very knowledgeable herself. I get that. So I tried that, after she'd mentioned it. She passed me along to her husband for the answer. I'd try it again, trusting her knowledge base enough to consider that time a one-off, but she almost is never near her phone, and has an uncanny knack for not replying to either voicemails or emails. So Ben remains my go-to guru. Sorry Steph.
The clock informed me that he should likely be asleep, so try again tomorrow. My impatience, however, spurred a distant memory. There are a couple sweater drawers in my bedroom. I look in them about every couple years, mostly looking for additional storage space. One has always had a mixed collection of cords for electronics, one of those matching projects I've put off since the move. Maybe...? One thing I knew about Apple cords is they are all white. This drawer held all black. More camera stuff, no doubt. Maybe phone. I didn't recall any in the other drawer, but I tried anyway.
Yee-haaaaa! White cords, one with the unmistakably huge boxy transformer on the end and a tiny port attachment on the other. Also, a conglomeration of other thick short clunky white pieces with unfamiliar ends for connecting to nothing I recognized, except for several identical ones in that old briefcase. I'll hang on to them all, though I have no clue why.
After setting the laptop up to charge, and seeing the orange light come on to say it was needed, I worked on occupying my mind with something other than impatience. A look as I passed it on a trip to the kitchen or bathroom, repeated over hours, showed no change. Still orange. On the way to bed, still orange. Still? Really?
Unease followed me to bed. If it wouldn't charge, is there any way those files could be retrieved? Who should I consult? How might it happen? What might it cost? I reviewed in my mind what I remembered to be on there. Early Crex photos, but low res, shot with a camera with little zoom, and likely not a tragedy to lose. I do come back there every year after all. Better camera, better pictures. Documentation of the changes to the yard and the seasons: again, much the same conclusion if lost. But oh, the Alaska pictures! It was my second, most probably last, trip, and the best. Paul and Jordan were there, we spent lots of time on sea critters, shot the bore tide in Turnagain Arm while the other two were panning for gold, and we flew up to Denali early enough to see the peak before - just before - clouds closed in. There was horseback riding, Exit Glacier, and a photo-oriented boat trip to view wildlife and see a glacier calving. Irreplaceable!
That's what dragged me out of bed again, down the hall to the laptop, giving one last peek to see had it charged. This time I wouldn't take an orange light for my answer. I opened it, found my photo program actually on (somebody forget to shut it down?), and saw photos displayed.
Success!
Now, of course, I couldn't go back to sleep without a quick peek at them. If you call an hour and a half a quick peek, that is. Turns out another thing I forgot, this thing has a Pentium I or II processor. Speedy for then. I'm spoiled now for the faster stuff. I'd forgotten that little whirling color wheel-of-waiting: "I'm thinking, I'm thinking... oh wait: here's a thought."
Hey, there are wedding pics on here. Airel, Miranda, Meredith, all will have a few photos coming once I clear the crap. I figure 5 out of 70 per wedding might be worth sending on. Alaska... whoa, did I really shoot that? And that? And what on earth was I thinking there? But that one's a beauty!
So. Not a brick. One hell of a lot of pictures to wade through, with an old software program I've mostly forgotten how to use, being barely able to wade through the new(er) one. And, upon zooming in via the computer, finding they rapidly go fuzzy. I'll have to find out if that's the computer or the camera at the root of that. Well, as soon as I can figure out how to transfer the remaining photos to the current computer. Maybe by April?
It started, well, way back, when I retired my 1st MacBook Pro. Sort of. OK, probably earlier, when I actually bought it, the next in line after the one with the dome base and swivel-on-a-post screen. (Still working, I think.) This was back when I had little trust for the internet virus protections, particularly knowing I had NO capability whatsoever for dealing with any incursions on my own. My solution? Since I only wanted it for photo/video items, that's the only part of the software OS I uploaded on day one. No internet. No word processing. Nothing else. That was on the other one anyway. I followed up by adding a special video editing package, along with many dreams of grandeur. Not to mention fantasies of my photographical genius.
Done laughing yet? How about if I add I turned this laptop into a $2,000 photo album by those restrictions. Pause.... Now are you done?
Now?
There are about 8 years of photos on it. All those videos, well, they are stored on mini reels of tape, waiting for me to work to reanimate the camcorders they were originally recorded on so the data can be viewed, possibly downloaded. Still, just these photos total over 15,000. I never got around to editing them. Blame ...... life.
Fast forward to now. Having just finished the near-final purge of the photos from then till now, combining 2 laptops, I got nostalgic to see just what I actually had on the old computer. It's been stored in a big clunky vinyl many-pocket briefcase for years, along with cords, cables, plugs, chargers, and even some old depleted bubblewrap. There was so much stuff that it took me two searches to come up with the actual laptop!
As for the charger? As many times as I searched and sorted through that plethora of accessories, other than some things I still can't identify, it all turned out to be for cameras. (Hint: Canon and Sony in fine print turned out to be clues.) I knew that each subsequent issue of MacBooks had a different power port. (I own 2 newer.) The transformer part kept getting smaller while the port got larger. I couldn't borrow one from a newer model. (Does Apple do that on purpose to bump sales?)
My next step was to attempt to read the very very fine print on the back of the MacBook for any numbers that might lead me to finding a replacement. There was at least 1 match on eBay, but the accompanying info lead me to want more information before sending any money their way.
I thought about contacting my son-in-law, my personal computer guru. He's the one years ago who introduced me to the term for a permanently dead computer: a brick. This is what I feared I had, after not even opening the thing since moving south. Eight years? Had that lack of use killed the battery, turning it into a brick? Could a replacement battery be 1: found, 2: installed - since previous history with Apple indicates after just a few years they want nothing to do with your model? and 3: effective?
A quick note here. My son Rich is a computer guru, for not-Apples. He is an enormous help when Steve has an issue. Any issue. My daughter gets insulted when I don't turn to her first for my Apple computer questions, as she is very knowledgeable herself. I get that. So I tried that, after she'd mentioned it. She passed me along to her husband for the answer. I'd try it again, trusting her knowledge base enough to consider that time a one-off, but she almost is never near her phone, and has an uncanny knack for not replying to either voicemails or emails. So Ben remains my go-to guru. Sorry Steph.
The clock informed me that he should likely be asleep, so try again tomorrow. My impatience, however, spurred a distant memory. There are a couple sweater drawers in my bedroom. I look in them about every couple years, mostly looking for additional storage space. One has always had a mixed collection of cords for electronics, one of those matching projects I've put off since the move. Maybe...? One thing I knew about Apple cords is they are all white. This drawer held all black. More camera stuff, no doubt. Maybe phone. I didn't recall any in the other drawer, but I tried anyway.
Yee-haaaaa! White cords, one with the unmistakably huge boxy transformer on the end and a tiny port attachment on the other. Also, a conglomeration of other thick short clunky white pieces with unfamiliar ends for connecting to nothing I recognized, except for several identical ones in that old briefcase. I'll hang on to them all, though I have no clue why.
After setting the laptop up to charge, and seeing the orange light come on to say it was needed, I worked on occupying my mind with something other than impatience. A look as I passed it on a trip to the kitchen or bathroom, repeated over hours, showed no change. Still orange. On the way to bed, still orange. Still? Really?
Unease followed me to bed. If it wouldn't charge, is there any way those files could be retrieved? Who should I consult? How might it happen? What might it cost? I reviewed in my mind what I remembered to be on there. Early Crex photos, but low res, shot with a camera with little zoom, and likely not a tragedy to lose. I do come back there every year after all. Better camera, better pictures. Documentation of the changes to the yard and the seasons: again, much the same conclusion if lost. But oh, the Alaska pictures! It was my second, most probably last, trip, and the best. Paul and Jordan were there, we spent lots of time on sea critters, shot the bore tide in Turnagain Arm while the other two were panning for gold, and we flew up to Denali early enough to see the peak before - just before - clouds closed in. There was horseback riding, Exit Glacier, and a photo-oriented boat trip to view wildlife and see a glacier calving. Irreplaceable!
That's what dragged me out of bed again, down the hall to the laptop, giving one last peek to see had it charged. This time I wouldn't take an orange light for my answer. I opened it, found my photo program actually on (somebody forget to shut it down?), and saw photos displayed.
Success!
Now, of course, I couldn't go back to sleep without a quick peek at them. If you call an hour and a half a quick peek, that is. Turns out another thing I forgot, this thing has a Pentium I or II processor. Speedy for then. I'm spoiled now for the faster stuff. I'd forgotten that little whirling color wheel-of-waiting: "I'm thinking, I'm thinking... oh wait: here's a thought."
Hey, there are wedding pics on here. Airel, Miranda, Meredith, all will have a few photos coming once I clear the crap. I figure 5 out of 70 per wedding might be worth sending on. Alaska... whoa, did I really shoot that? And that? And what on earth was I thinking there? But that one's a beauty!
So. Not a brick. One hell of a lot of pictures to wade through, with an old software program I've mostly forgotten how to use, being barely able to wade through the new(er) one. And, upon zooming in via the computer, finding they rapidly go fuzzy. I'll have to find out if that's the computer or the camera at the root of that. Well, as soon as I can figure out how to transfer the remaining photos to the current computer. Maybe by April?
Tuesday, February 4, 2020
Keeping The Mind Off The Crap
Yeah, there's plenty of crap these days: politics, health issues, extended family and friends personal issues.... The list can be daunting. I decided to work on another list: Distractions.
1: TV - often mindless, mostly distracting, occasionally enlightening. Steve and I race to figure out who-done-it, provide character lines a second before they do (he's often right), guess "Wheel" and "Jep" answers.
2: Books: One needs to be in a good enough spot to pay proper attention to these, but there's no lack in this house, between Kindle and the library.
3: Mingle - I'm currently watching the clock so I can arrive in time at a new-to-me Thai restaurant to join my best friend. The jewelry club can help, as there's usually somebody there you can find something in common with, whether personal or project related.
4: Work on taxes. Yes, that's not on the problems list, just the procrastinate till April list, but it can be done earlier. Having done my own Schedule Cs most of my working life, the retired-status finances are a snap.
5: Try new jewelry patterns. Note this is distinct from mingling, as much of the actual work gets done at home. In addition, Steve got me an early anniversary present, a book on chain link patterns. Chain link is brand new to me, and the book arrived just as I decided to head in this direction anyway. The first pattern was simple as I already knew the complicated bits of it and have made whole chains of just them. A second bonus is I just found some new design ideas for making wire earrings, and found I'm experienced enough now to look at a photo and figure how to make it for myself. Enough practice and each should be something worth claiming I've done. However, I need some new wire....
6: Plan summer vacation: We've sorted out from the wish list the general idea of where both the routes north and back will go, whom to see along the way, and which sights to spend time at. No 3-day marathon drives for us this year. The plan is to enjoy the trips while we still can, especially after last year when Steve couldn't travel by car. The decision was reluctantly made to forgo Alaska, choosing not to spend that amount of money, making up for it by seeing more of the lower 48. We each got that senior pass for national parks and monuments back when the cost was only $10, and it's time to use them more. So there's lots of internet research to do. Two parks up, three parks back. (So far.)
7: Organize the photo library. Digital, that is. Start by culling 5000+ photos down to 1400, then fight with the software program long enough to figure out its cropping, light balance, and color modifications. Make a mental note to keep fighting to figure out how to organize those into folders and albums. "Help" on the tool bar is useless for that, sending me to places that either do not exist or are maliciously hiding. At this point, the distraction possibilities of this cease and it becomes an addition to the crap list, requiring selection of another distraction.
8: Blog. Yes, always, always blog, either to vent or distract. Both are good. But right now, lunch is calling.
Bye.
(Oh hey, did you notice cooking and cleaning are not on the list? You do know me, right?)
1: TV - often mindless, mostly distracting, occasionally enlightening. Steve and I race to figure out who-done-it, provide character lines a second before they do (he's often right), guess "Wheel" and "Jep" answers.
2: Books: One needs to be in a good enough spot to pay proper attention to these, but there's no lack in this house, between Kindle and the library.
3: Mingle - I'm currently watching the clock so I can arrive in time at a new-to-me Thai restaurant to join my best friend. The jewelry club can help, as there's usually somebody there you can find something in common with, whether personal or project related.
4: Work on taxes. Yes, that's not on the problems list, just the procrastinate till April list, but it can be done earlier. Having done my own Schedule Cs most of my working life, the retired-status finances are a snap.
5: Try new jewelry patterns. Note this is distinct from mingling, as much of the actual work gets done at home. In addition, Steve got me an early anniversary present, a book on chain link patterns. Chain link is brand new to me, and the book arrived just as I decided to head in this direction anyway. The first pattern was simple as I already knew the complicated bits of it and have made whole chains of just them. A second bonus is I just found some new design ideas for making wire earrings, and found I'm experienced enough now to look at a photo and figure how to make it for myself. Enough practice and each should be something worth claiming I've done. However, I need some new wire....
6: Plan summer vacation: We've sorted out from the wish list the general idea of where both the routes north and back will go, whom to see along the way, and which sights to spend time at. No 3-day marathon drives for us this year. The plan is to enjoy the trips while we still can, especially after last year when Steve couldn't travel by car. The decision was reluctantly made to forgo Alaska, choosing not to spend that amount of money, making up for it by seeing more of the lower 48. We each got that senior pass for national parks and monuments back when the cost was only $10, and it's time to use them more. So there's lots of internet research to do. Two parks up, three parks back. (So far.)
7: Organize the photo library. Digital, that is. Start by culling 5000+ photos down to 1400, then fight with the software program long enough to figure out its cropping, light balance, and color modifications. Make a mental note to keep fighting to figure out how to organize those into folders and albums. "Help" on the tool bar is useless for that, sending me to places that either do not exist or are maliciously hiding. At this point, the distraction possibilities of this cease and it becomes an addition to the crap list, requiring selection of another distraction.
8: Blog. Yes, always, always blog, either to vent or distract. Both are good. But right now, lunch is calling.
Bye.
(Oh hey, did you notice cooking and cleaning are not on the list? You do know me, right?)
Monday, February 3, 2020
How On Earth Do We React To This?
We're trying to be supportive, but we're in shock. Anger plays a role. How does a loving parent do this to a baby? Does she hate him so much? Also playing a huge part in our reactions is a combination of fear and pity for the baby who has to go through life with this name. Children are so cruel.
Why do we care? He's our pending great grandson, due late March.We just got the shower announcement, listing his name.
Perhaps we're overreacting and will come to love - no, scratch that - tolerate the name. Maybe we're just too old, too set in our ways. You can make that decision for yourself as you read this. We'll respect any difference of opinion, though it'll be a tough sale to moderate ours. It's not like it's just something ridiculous, like Apple or Blanket, making the child a laughingstock. For us, this is worse.
I mean, really: who would name a baby "Hades"?
Why do we care? He's our pending great grandson, due late March.We just got the shower announcement, listing his name.
Perhaps we're overreacting and will come to love - no, scratch that - tolerate the name. Maybe we're just too old, too set in our ways. You can make that decision for yourself as you read this. We'll respect any difference of opinion, though it'll be a tough sale to moderate ours. It's not like it's just something ridiculous, like Apple or Blanket, making the child a laughingstock. For us, this is worse.
I mean, really: who would name a baby "Hades"?
Explaining Walking Caucuses
Today is caucus day in Iowa. The talking heads either make it sound like THE important event in the election process, or a confusing mishmash of undemocratic practices. It is neither. Almost never do they pick the winning candidates from a crowded field. The fact that it is limited to those who have no conflicts, such as shift-work or lack of a babysitter, for the few hours it lasts, can be compared to most elections in this country where only a small percentage of citizens even bother to vote, hauling out their bucketful of excuses and indifference.
To those who have no idea what caucuses are, I offer the following. Not an Iowan, I have instead the experiences from Minnesota caucuses. My 8 years of being small city mayor made it nearly impossible to turn down the request to chair our precinct caucuses for my party. (Note: Minnesota defines city as all incorporated towns/cities with a mayor/council government, and town as townships with town boards for their governing bodies.) While the city elections are nonpartisan, my political preferences were known.
Our county is long and thin, full of small communities. On caucus night several locations were picked. Ours was held in a neighboring elementary school, having a nice parking lot, no evening activities scheduled, and lots of rooms for every precinct in each party in a larger geographical area to have their own discussions. In practice, this meant from half to a full dozen people in our room. This was back before our population growth spurt, but still pretty wimpy. Once the group included a township as well, and things were much more interesting.
My job was easy. Show up, haul paper to and from the caucus, and follow the agenda. Beyond that point, I had the same 1 vote as everyone else. I wasn’t even necessarily the leader of the caucus, just presiding until the group chose one.
Each segment of the evening started with discussions. First they were about our desires for changes we wanted in the party platform. Perhaps an issue was being ignored. Or we thought something needed to be tweaked. Each person was given paper and a few minutes to write down whatever we wanted to. Then we could advocate for or against each proposal, sometimes combining several similar ones into a single proposal, followed by a vote. Each that passed was handed up to the county for their convention and platform selection, then to state, finally to national. Minor issues got dropped out during that process, and what remained became the party platform.
Then came candidate preference voting. This is where the walking part of the caucus came in at precinct level. County level used this for all the platform suggestions as well. As before, we started with nominations from the floor, then people speaking up for or against each. On those rare occasions where several candidates were put forward, as would be this year in the presidential primary, different parts of the room would be designated as a place to go to stand with any others who supported the same candidate. A spot might be empty, or have several supporters. Assuming no candidate had 50% + 1 yet, those in the tiny groups were encouraged to leave their spot and move to join another group. Literally, walking. Once someone got a majority of the votes, they won the caucus vote. Results would be tabulated and sent up the chain. Then one could go home, trying their luck against those ubiquitous attack deer who jump out of nowhere to kill your cars. (Yes, that happened.)
It got more interesting, more fun, more noisy, and took a lot longer at the county level, usually weeks later. Delegates were chosen from volunteers at the local caucus, with a commitment to vote to represent the majority from their caucus for the first vote in the county convention. Rather than a couple hours, county lasted a day, sometimes even spilling over to a second. I enjoyed the county caucuses more than local, but with the increasing length and distance involved in attending state, and perhaps even getting chosen for national, I declined even trying for a spot.
Caucus results rarely had an impact beyond the local levels, but were important because Minnesota primaries weren’t held until September back then. Now of course, they’ve been moved way up the calendar so we might have some say by national convention time.
If you understand walking caucuses now, you might also understand ranked choice voting. Think same thing but with secret paper ballot on election day. Minneapolis has tried it successfully, and information on that can be easily found.
The process takes effect when more than two candidates are vying for one spot, resulting in the selection of one by plurality, not majority. With ranked choice, the voter marked their first choice, then, separately, their second, and possibly even a third in a large field of choices for a position. Once all ballots are counted, if one candidate does not win by 50% +1, the candidate with the fewest votes has those ballots withdrawn from their name and counted toward those voters’ second choice(s). Still no majority, each next-bottom candidate is dropped and their supporters’ next choice(s) are counted. Most elections have somebody with a majority by the time all the alternate choices are counted, and even if not, somebody with a much higher plurality than before wins.
The benefit is that the most people get the elected official they can stomach. We’d much rather get our second choice instead of our last choice. All too often now we wind up with somebody 37% think is OK but 63% strongly oppose. Ranked choice voting is the best solution, and personally, I hope the country comes to adopt it.
It’s not that hard to understand.
To those who have no idea what caucuses are, I offer the following. Not an Iowan, I have instead the experiences from Minnesota caucuses. My 8 years of being small city mayor made it nearly impossible to turn down the request to chair our precinct caucuses for my party. (Note: Minnesota defines city as all incorporated towns/cities with a mayor/council government, and town as townships with town boards for their governing bodies.) While the city elections are nonpartisan, my political preferences were known.
Our county is long and thin, full of small communities. On caucus night several locations were picked. Ours was held in a neighboring elementary school, having a nice parking lot, no evening activities scheduled, and lots of rooms for every precinct in each party in a larger geographical area to have their own discussions. In practice, this meant from half to a full dozen people in our room. This was back before our population growth spurt, but still pretty wimpy. Once the group included a township as well, and things were much more interesting.
My job was easy. Show up, haul paper to and from the caucus, and follow the agenda. Beyond that point, I had the same 1 vote as everyone else. I wasn’t even necessarily the leader of the caucus, just presiding until the group chose one.
Each segment of the evening started with discussions. First they were about our desires for changes we wanted in the party platform. Perhaps an issue was being ignored. Or we thought something needed to be tweaked. Each person was given paper and a few minutes to write down whatever we wanted to. Then we could advocate for or against each proposal, sometimes combining several similar ones into a single proposal, followed by a vote. Each that passed was handed up to the county for their convention and platform selection, then to state, finally to national. Minor issues got dropped out during that process, and what remained became the party platform.
Then came candidate preference voting. This is where the walking part of the caucus came in at precinct level. County level used this for all the platform suggestions as well. As before, we started with nominations from the floor, then people speaking up for or against each. On those rare occasions where several candidates were put forward, as would be this year in the presidential primary, different parts of the room would be designated as a place to go to stand with any others who supported the same candidate. A spot might be empty, or have several supporters. Assuming no candidate had 50% + 1 yet, those in the tiny groups were encouraged to leave their spot and move to join another group. Literally, walking. Once someone got a majority of the votes, they won the caucus vote. Results would be tabulated and sent up the chain. Then one could go home, trying their luck against those ubiquitous attack deer who jump out of nowhere to kill your cars. (Yes, that happened.)
It got more interesting, more fun, more noisy, and took a lot longer at the county level, usually weeks later. Delegates were chosen from volunteers at the local caucus, with a commitment to vote to represent the majority from their caucus for the first vote in the county convention. Rather than a couple hours, county lasted a day, sometimes even spilling over to a second. I enjoyed the county caucuses more than local, but with the increasing length and distance involved in attending state, and perhaps even getting chosen for national, I declined even trying for a spot.
Caucus results rarely had an impact beyond the local levels, but were important because Minnesota primaries weren’t held until September back then. Now of course, they’ve been moved way up the calendar so we might have some say by national convention time.
If you understand walking caucuses now, you might also understand ranked choice voting. Think same thing but with secret paper ballot on election day. Minneapolis has tried it successfully, and information on that can be easily found.
The process takes effect when more than two candidates are vying for one spot, resulting in the selection of one by plurality, not majority. With ranked choice, the voter marked their first choice, then, separately, their second, and possibly even a third in a large field of choices for a position. Once all ballots are counted, if one candidate does not win by 50% +1, the candidate with the fewest votes has those ballots withdrawn from their name and counted toward those voters’ second choice(s). Still no majority, each next-bottom candidate is dropped and their supporters’ next choice(s) are counted. Most elections have somebody with a majority by the time all the alternate choices are counted, and even if not, somebody with a much higher plurality than before wins.
The benefit is that the most people get the elected official they can stomach. We’d much rather get our second choice instead of our last choice. All too often now we wind up with somebody 37% think is OK but 63% strongly oppose. Ranked choice voting is the best solution, and personally, I hope the country comes to adopt it.
It’s not that hard to understand.
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