Wednesday, October 11, 2017

Good morning! Here’s the first shuffle of the news deck for a Wednesday, October 11, 2017. It’s fall, we feel it, the showers are familiar and they’re OK, sweetened up by sunbreaks and rainbows, but chilly; high today 55. We’re rummaging around and finding clothes we haven’t thought of over the hot smokey months; my “Get Lucky” hoody is back in rotation. The winter snowpack is starting to make its bed in the Cascades, with perhaps two feet of accumulation at Timberline over the next few days. Sunrise 7:22 AM, sunset 6:31 PM.

We’re thinking about our neighbors just south who are living through a fearsome time, as fires driven by winds are destroying so much of what makes the California wine country such a special place. The Oregon Department of Forestry has a team of firefighters on the way. At this writing, seventeen are known dead, 180 unaccounted for, and 2000 buildings are lost. One Santa Rosa neighborhood is nothing but chimneys. It’s fascinating to hear from Daily Drip readers with close friends and kin down there, the stories of their peril came up frequently in yesterday’s Comments, and I hope to see updates today. We care and wish them the best. They must feel like we did when we watched the Columbia Gorge burn. Makes me think of Don Henley’s closing words of the last cut on the “Hotel California” album…”You call someplace paradise….kiss it goodbye.”

Puerto Rico is still 85% in the dark. People are beginning to die from water-borne diseases.

A pedestrian was hit by a car at SW 10th and Mill on the PSU campus–then pulled out a gun and fired at the car. Apparently missed.

An overnight crash has caused a power outage affecting almost 2000 customers near SE 122nd and Powell.

The driver who killed those people in a head-on crash near Salem had a blood alcohol level of .318. Multiple repeat offender.

Salt Lake City police have fired the detective who arrested and manhandled a nurse for doing her job by refusing to draw blood from a suspect without a warrant.

Ugh…I just read The New Yorker…and heard the audio tape…detailing just a few of the deeds of that predatory Hollywood creep Harvey Weinstein, the latest pig to be hauled squealing into the daylight, and how he was protected for years by a sycophantic system, like others of his boorish ilk, with victims in such legitimate fear for their livelihoods that they dared not call them out for their crimes. I hope we learn something. I hope more rats are dragged into the sun.

Do you think Sarah Huckabee Sanders, whose fate is to be the White House press secretary doing the daily briefings, is binge-watching “The West Wing?” I could see her trying to emulate CJ Cregg when she explained to the media her boss’s idea of putting his IQ up against Rex Tillerson’s: “He was making a joke. Maybe you guys oughta get a sense of humor and try it sometimes.” Because that’s so easy during these days. She also invited the press to bring their kids to the White House Halloween party, “so we can sugar them up and send ’em home with you.” Great. Lighten up. Let’s just dial back the nuclear threat a little.

On this day in 2002, our 39th President Jimmy Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize “for his untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development.” Ironically on that very same day fifteen years ago, the Congress authorized American military action against Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein’s supposed weapons of a mass destruction, resulting in a war that we’re trying to figure our way out of.

The US Men’s Soccer Team has failed to qualify for next World Cup for the first time since 1986. They were beaten by Trinidad and Tobago 2-1.

Jeez…I just read the Drip so far..pretty grim, no? Let’s see if we can channel our Chaka Khan and tell you something good.

Women in Saudi Arabia who were recently given the right to drive had a secret ally in lobbying for that change: Uber. The company helped persuade the Saudi government that mobility for everybody is a huge economic plus, and has created a training center to teach Saudi women to drive–including for Uber, if they choose.

It’s high time we start thinking about Halloween costumes this year. The floor is now open for nominations. Fox News ran a piece that accomplished the dual goals of stirring up a Foxlike harrumph at marginally inappropriate costumery….while showing rather delightful pictures of it.

Ummm, that’s all’s I’ve got. We’re having a planning meeting for our December 15th Christmas broadcast, so I’m wearing the bright red shirt that I always wear to these meetings. I am told, by the way, that I need a tuba. Anyone have a spare tuba?

It’ll be good to hear updates from Driplandians who are traveling, or have friends in the California fire zone, or are having challenges and adventures, or just want to stay warm!