Fog and silence this early Friday on California’s north coast and we finally have the weekend staring us in the face.
Weather is typical summer here — fog in the morning, sunshine and wind in the afternoon, though, yesterday was more fog than shine.
And in new yearly rainfall totals for us was reported this week, and for our area, even at the coast, was 54 percent of normal for the last 12 months — .73 inches for June, while the norm is 1.34 inches.
And speaking of dry — most of northern California is under a Red Flag Warning for right now, at least until about noon today. The big threat, of course, is dry lightning strikes, but still-smoldering cigarette butts could be even more harmful.
Watch them butts, boys! And you gals, just roll your eyes (Mott the Hoople, hey!).
No worries — it’s Friday…
(Illustration: Pablo Picasso’s ‘Musician, Dancer, Goat & Bird‘ found here).
And next week the weather shudders a bit — a summer polar vortex — though not as cold as the one last winter, yet:
Meteorological purists may tell you it’s not a polar vortex at all. However you choose to refer to the looming weather pattern, unseasonably chilly air is headed for parts of the northern and northeastern U.S at the height of summer early next week
Bearing a haunting resemblance to January’s brutally cold weather pattern, a deep pool of cool air from the Gulf of Alaska will plunge into the Great Lakes early next week and then ooze towards the East Coast.
Of course, this is July, not January, so temperatures forecast to be roughly 10 to as much as 30 degrees below average won’t have quite the same effect.
Supposedly, you’ll feel it, though.
And not-so-weather, other than the ugly winter of the soul — the GOP thinks poor people have it better.
Via the Washington Post last month:
More than three quarters of conservative Americans – those in the steadfast conservative, business conservative, and young outsider typology groups – agree that “poor people have it easy because they can get government benefits without doing anything.”
Only seven percent of steadfast conservatives say that the poor “have hard lives.”
Even a not-insignificant share of left-leaning groups say that the poor have it easy.
But overall the widespread agreements among conservatives on this point is what’s really striking here.
There are reasonable, well-intentioned arguments on either side of many poverty-related issues – about the causes of poverty (see the right half of the chart), or whether government benefits provide a leg up or simply perpetuate poverty, for instance.
Yet, the reality:
— Compared to middle and upper-income Americans, the poor are three times less likely to have health insurance coverage, and more likely to put off or skip necessary medical treatment as a result;
— They are three times more likely to be victimized by crime;
— The daily stresses of living under poverty impose a cognitive burden equivalent to losing 13 IQ points;
— Poor children are three times more likely to be affected by food scarcity and obesity;
— Poor children receive a lower quality education in public school, and the ones who make it to college are more likely to drop out;
— Poorer Americans breathe dirtier air, they sleep less, and the even have less sex;
— And in the end all this “easy living” literally shaves decades off their lives.
Fog in the conservative brain makes for a deep-red-flag warning.
And today’s last strange calling — from the LA Times:
Police are asking for the public’s help in finding a man who they say ran up to five women and pulled down their pants and underwear.
Detectives on Thursday released a sketch of the man, who victims described as “someone who blends into the neighborhood not causing any suspicion,” according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
The morning attacks occurred between June 7 and June 29 in Sherman Oaks as the women reportedly walked their dogs, KTLA reported.
The man allegedly made eye contact with the women as he passed them.
Then, he turned around, grabbed their buttocks and pulled down their pants and underwear, according to a department crime bulletin.
Man, watch those butts! What a weird asshole, even for a Friday!