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Wednesday/ we have a Speaker 🔊

.. but here is what Washington Post opinion columnist Ruth Marcus writes:
If you are feeling any sense of relief that Jim Jordan won’t be the next House speaker, stop and worry again.

The new speaker, Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), might be more dangerous than the firebrand Ohio Republican. For Jordan’s shirt sleeves demeanor and wrestler’s pugnacity, substitute a bespectacled, low-key presentation, a law degree and an unswerving commitment to conservative dogma and former president Donald Trump.

This is not an upgrade.

Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) gives a thumbs-up after he was elected House speaker on Wednesday, Oct. 25.
[Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images]
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Tuesday/ rain ☔

Uncle Ike’s pot shop on Capitol Hill’s 15th Avenue East.

There’s a steady rain here in the city tonight, and the first winter snow headed for the Cascades (more than a foot expected in some places).
I will grab my scarf from now on as I head out the door.
The daytime highs have dropped to 50 °F (10 °C) or so.

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Sunday/ black and shiny 🖤

The sun came out late this afternoon, and I chased myself out of the house.
I was rewarded with spotting this beautiful 2023 Rivian R1S all-electric SUV here on Capitol Hill’s 15th Avenue.

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Saturday/ another win for the green & gold 🏉

Congratulations to the Bokke from South Africa, coming from behind and notching a 16-15 win against England, in today’s 2023 World Rugby Cup semi-final.
New Zealand’s All Blacks easily dispatched the Argentinian team by 44-6 in the other semi-final on Friday.
The final is next Saturday, in the Stade de France stadium, in Paris.

Handre Pollard of South Africa kicks his side’s second penalty during the 2023 Rugby World Cup semi-final against England. The only try (‘touch down’) of the match came in the 69th minute, when South Africa’s replacement lock RG Snyman went over the line.  
[Photograph: Adam Pretty/World Rugby/Getty Images]
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Friday/ still no speaker 🙃

This Jordan guy is Trump’s guy.
The divisions in a bitterly divided Republican Party where some members have seen death threats over their speaker votes have been on full display, but at least we did not get the Trump coup plotter as speaker.

So what happens now?
Here’s CNN’s reporting:
What Republicans are saying: A number of Republicans left Friday’s closed-door meeting sounding more confused than ever about the path forward and who is best to lead them. Many expressed frustration and some called for reflection after the collapse of Jordan’s speakership bid. “We’re back to square one,” South Dakota Rep. Dusty Johnson said.
The chamber is still in limbo: The House remains effectively frozen as long as there is no elected speaker. The paralysis has created a perilous situation as Congress faces the threat of a government shutdown next month and conflict unfolds abroad. The battle for the speakership has now dragged on for more than two weeks with no end in sight.

House Majority Whip Tom Emmer plans to run an “entirely positive” campaign for speaker and “won’t attack his opponents,” a source close to him says – betting it will be a welcome change in style, following weeks of nasty infighting in a bitterly divided GOP where some members have seen death threats over their speaker votes.

Update Tue 10/24: Tom Emmer was speaker-elect for just a few hours, and then rejected by the Republican conference before there was even a vote on the floor of the House. Are Republicans clowns, all of them?

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Thursday/ ‘I’ in Japanese 🏯

Here is Eric Margolis writing for the Japan Times (just the introduction of a long article):
You may have learned that “I” is 私 (watashi). And while this is a handy all-around term to use when referring to yourself, a 2019 survey showed that over 30% of Japanese women and around 70% of Japanese men don’t regularly use it.
To make things even more confusing, people do or don’t use 私 entirely depending on the situation. While 80% of women in their 50s expected to use 私 to address colleagues or acquaintances their own age, just 30% expected to use it for people they met for the first time. Meanwhile, 60% of men in their 50s expected to use it when meeting a young person for the first time. But that percentage dropped to 40% of the time when they were meeting someone their own age.
Japanese dictionaries and resources list over 30 different words for just one in English: “I”. Every word expresses different nuances about how the speaker views themselves and what their relationship is to the person they’re speaking with. There’s わたし (watashi), わたくし (watakushi), あたし (atashi), 僕 (boku), 吾輩 (wagahai), 俺 (ore), うち (uchi), 儂 (washi), 麿 (maro) and 自分 (jibun), just to name a few. So how to know which one to use?

P.S. I would have loved to be in Japan right now, at the tennis courts watching some Japan Open tennis action.

Posted by The Japan Times on X, today.
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Wednesday/ when trees were mushrooms 🌋

Etching depicting some of the most significant plants of the Carboniferous.
The Carboniferous is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic that spans 60 million years from the end of the Devonian Period 358.9 million years ago, to the beginning of the Permian Period, 298.9 mya.
[Picture: Bibliographisches Institut – Meyers Konversationslexikon]
From the 2021 book ‘A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth’ by Henry Gee:
The Carboniferous* lycopod forests were not like this at all (trees with wood and bark). The lycopods, like their Devonian forebears, were hollow, supported by thick skin rather than heartwood, and covered in green, leaflike scales. Indeed, the entire plant— the trunk and the crown of dropping branches alike— was scaly. With no columns of vessels to transport food, each of the scales was photosynthetic, supplying food to the tissues close by.
          Even stranger to our eyes, these trees spent most of their lives as inconspicuous stumps in the ground. Only when it was ready to reproduce did a tree grow, a pole shooting upward like a firework in slow motion to explode in a crown of branches that would broadcast spores into the wind.
          Once the spores had been shed, the tree would die.
          Over many years of wind and weather, fungi and bacteria would etch away at the husk until it collapsed onto the sodden forest floor below. A lycopod forest looked like the desolate landscape of the First World War Western Front: a craterscape of hollow stumps filled with a refuse of water and death; the trees, like poles, denuded of all leaves or branches, rising from a mire of decay. There was very little shade and no understory apart from the deepening litter forming around the shattered wrecks of the lycopod trunks.

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Tuesday/ mushrooms 🍄

The mushroom spores in the ground in my backyard have started to sprout— the way they usually do in October.
The right kind of soil, and changes in temperature, light and water, trigger them to start growing.

Mushrooms, as living organisms, belong to a kingdom separate from plants (see table below).

KingdomOrganisms
MoneraBacteria, blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), and spirochetes
ProtistaProtozoans and algae of various types
FungiFunguses, molds, mushrooms, yeasts, mildews, and smuts
PlantaeMosses, ferns, woody and non-woody flowering plants
AnimaliaSponges, worms, insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals

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Monday/ a Cybertruck spotting ⚡️

A Tesla Cybertruck was spotted here in the city yesterday, at Pike Place Market.
It is not known if it will stick around for a while, or move on. This one was spotted in Northern California and in Oregon as well.

The picture is a still from a 6-second clip posted by S.E. Robinson, Jr. @SERobinsonJr on X on Oct 15.
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Sunday/ go Bokke! 🏉

South Africa’s Springbokke prevailed 29-28 over the hometeam ‘Les Bleus’ from France in tonight’s 2023 Rugby World Cup quarterfinal. The match was played in the Stade de France, the national stadium of France, located just north of Paris in the commune of Saint-Denis.

Next Saturday the Bokke will play against England.
In the other semifinal Argentina will take on New Zealand.

Eben Etzebeth played in the No 4 lock position, and is scoring a crucial try here, 27 minutes into the second half, to win the game for the Springboks.
[Photo by Associated Press]
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Saturday/ the partial solar eclipse 🌛

The band of area from which the ‘ring of fire’ view of the solar eclipse could be seen ran through the Pacific Northwest, New Mexico and Texas.
Farther afield, the moon passing in front of the sun made it appear as a crescent shape. 
[Source: Eclipse data from NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio]
The ‘ring of fire’ as seen from Albuquerque, New Mexico.
[Photo: PATRICK T. FALLON / AFP]
Here in Seattle, the sun came out from behind the clouds just in time for this morning’s partial solar eclipse.
At about 9.20 am, 81% of the sun was obscured.

Here is my own ‘pin hole camera’ view of the sun, taken at about 9.11 am in Seattle. (The sun’s light passing through three pin holes in a piece of tin plate, catching the crescent shape of the sun not obscured by the moon).
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Friday/ pinball machines 🚨

It was a lovely day here in Seattle (71 °F/ 22 °C).
Four of the amigos played a little pickleball this morning.
Afterwards we had something to eat and drink, on the patio of the dive bar called Twilight Exit, in Central District.

The pinball machines in Twilight are very cool.

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Thursday/ day 6 of the war 🪖

With the war in Israel and Gaza only on day 6, all other news on my TV seem to be in the By The Way/ Not Too Important category.
(The House of Representatives still does not have a speaker, and there are no viable candidates at this point).

The homepage of the Washington Post tonight.
A ground invasion of Gaza seems imminent, says everyone— but what about the Israeli hostages there (including American citizens?), and other civilians, trapped without water, food and electricity, with nowhere to go?
Associated Press: ‘Hamas officials say they are prepared for any scenario, including a drawn-out war, and that allies like Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah will join the battle if Israel goes too far.’
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Tuesday/ got my flu shot 💉

I got my flu shot today, the one branded as the FLUCELVAX® Quad 2023-24.
It’s the first flu vaccine in the United States that was cultured in cells* and not in chicken eggs.

Some observational studies have shown cell culture-based vaccines to provide greater protection against flu or flu-like illness (as opposed to ones grown in eggs).

*From the CDC’s website: ‘Cell culture-based flu vaccine production does not require chicken eggs because the vaccine viruses used to make vaccine are grown in mammalian cell cultures (no animals are harmed by this process)’.

One of several animal posters published by the CDC to tout the benefits of the flu vaccine.
[Source: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/resource-center/shareable-resources.htm]
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Sunday/ the war against the Hamas terrorists 💣

Photo Credit: Eyad Baba/ AFP/ Getty Images

As of Sunday night:
Israeli media, citing rescue service officials, said at least 700 people were killed and 2,000 wounded, making Saturday’s surprise early morning attack by Hamas the deadliest attack in Israel in decades.
At least 232 people in the Gaza Strip have been killed and at least 1,700 wounded in Israeli strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.
Hamas fighters took an unknown number of civilians and soldiers captive into Gaza, a deeply sensitive issue for Israel, in harrowing scenes posted on social media videos.
Among those killed in Israel was Lt. Col. Jonathan Steinberg, a senior officer who commanded the military’s Nachal Brigade, a prominent infantry unit.
– Reported by newspaper Israel Hayom at israelhayom.com

The Palestinian territory of Gaza has been under an Israeli blockade, backed by Egypt, since Hamas seized control of the coastal strip in 2007. The blockade restricts the import of many goods and prevents most people from leaving the territory. – Map and text by the New York Times
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Saturday 🌳

Fall colors, seen on 17th Avenue East here in Capitol Hill, Seattle.

The lack of chlorophyll reveals yellow and orange pigments that were already in the leaves but masked during the warmer months. Darker red leaves are the result of a chemical change. Sugars that can get trapped in the leaves produce new pigments (called anthocyanins) that weren’t part of the leaf in the growing season.
[Source: The Smithsonian Institution]
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Friday/ working hard 😓

The US economy added 336,000 new jobs to payrolls in September: about double what analysts had expected.
The stock market fell at first (the Fed may have to keep hiking interest rates), but by the early afternoon, the stock market decided that the initial sell-off was overdone, and by the end of trading the Dow Jones Industrial Index was up by 288 points (0.87%).

Here’s how September’s job number compares with other months. The unemployment rate is steady at 3.8%, according to the Labor Department. Even though hourly wages have risen faster than inflation, housing unaffordability is still a growing problem.
[Graph and text from the New York Times]