Thursday, October 28, 2021

Herons






 

35 comments:

  1. Docs coming at noon. wish me luck with them finding veins, lol!

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    1. Good luck to all! Experience and skill play the biggest role, but there is always some luck involved.

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    2. puddle, I am assuming you are a "hard stick" like I am. The last time I had blood drawn I ended up with cotton balls and bandages all up and down my right arm. The staff was hoping the waiting room would be empty by the time I left or the state of my arm would scare them all to death and they'd just leave.

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    3. Once giving blood they'd done both arms like and they told me just to go home.
      Said, nope, not after this, you now have to let me give. They found the talented one, and I gave. . . . Now they just use the ones on the back of my hands. . . .

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    4. 🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀
      And I’m more than half Irish, so this should work. 🍀

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    5. Nurses typically use the backs of the hands; there is no doubt that hurts more. And they not infrequently just pull back harder on the syringe when the blood does not come easily, which explodes the red blood cells and interferes with many lab tests. There is typically a large vein just above the wrist, behind the thumb, but it can be curved and shows up best when the tourniquet is applied to the forearm. You might even be able to see it without a tourniquet. It requires some cooperation from the patient: turning that side of the wrist up and lowering the hand to clear the way. Just sayin'.

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    6. Pull back harder on the plunger of the syringe, that is.

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  2. Can the Republican Party Return to Reality? From lying about the last election to embracing authoritarianism, the party’s mainstream seems increasingly addled.
    [Click] From Bloomberg.com, no less. Condensed version here. [Click] This degree of political dysfunction has not, in my opinion, been seen in the US since the implosion of the Whig Party about 170 years ago [I repeat myself]. It is terra incognita for our culture as a whole. The monsters we thought we had securely chained and locked in the national basement have escaped and now walk the land once again; getting them under control again will not be easy.

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    1. In a June 2021 poll, 24% identified as Republican; 30% as Democrats and 44% as Independents. So, partisanship is on the wane and the operatives are desperately trying to be significant. If partisans cannot manipulate the primary process, their only hope is to control the counting. So, that's what the Republican legislation is about.

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    2. Most of those "independents" customarily vote for one of the major parties; they don't switch back and forth, but rather vote or abstain. I suspect they are predominantly low-information voters to boot.

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  3. Done. Just one stick and a whole buncha tests. Gonna bruise badly though. Am looking for the wrist vein. Thx, Alan.

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    1. If the palm of the hand is either up or down, the vein won't be seen. Put the hand in the "karate chop" position. Might have to move the hand up and down a bit to see that vein without a tourniquet, but it is often evident, and it is generally pretty big--bigger on the favored hand.

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    2. Oh, and that vein is better surrounded by supporting tissue than the veins on the back of the hand in people with sun damage to the skin, so less likelihood of bruising. No one is likely to say "Who did THAT to you?"

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    3. SOOOO happy the Irish luck worked for you, puddle! 😉

      Loves at ya!! ♥

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  4. Mid-day opinion piece:

    The Washington Post reports that many members leaving the House Democratic caucus meeting this morning “are feeling dejected that their priorities were cut from President Biden’s new budget reconciliation framework.”

    But no one gets everything they want in a negotiation. And everyone got something.

    If President Biden’s scaled-back framework is accepted, Democrats will have passed nearly $5 trillion in spending on domestic programs — across a pandemic relief bill, a bipartisan infrastructure bill and a budget reconciliation bill.

    All of this would happen just 10 months from the two surprise victories in Georgia that gave Democrats tenuous control of the Senate.

    Literally no one predicted this when Biden won the election a year ago.

    So to use Biden’s own words when the Affordable Care Act passed, it would be “a big fucking deal.”

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    1. A footnote to the Senate elections in Georgia. While Ossoff's seat was fairly routinely decided with party primaries that eliminated quite a few candidates to end up with one Republican and one Democrat in November, the short-term seat to which Warnock was elected and which will be on the ballot again in 2022, had 20 candidates representeing four parties and some independents on the ballot.Then there was a run-off in January between a Dem and a Rep who had each got only about 25% of the vote in what they call a jungle primary. While Georgia makes it harder, candidates not endorsed by a major party can get on the ballot and that is what has the partisans in a tizzy. Warnock was not the GA Dem choice; he was Stacy Abrams choice.

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  5. I tried to get these headlines in chronological order:

    “I think we’re gonna be in good shape.”
    — President Biden, leaving a meeting of the House Democratic caucus where he pitched his new framework for a budget reconciliation bill.


    Democrats Say SALT Relief Will Be In Final Bill [Click] Maybe, maybe not. Personally, I haven’t seen that it made much difference for us, if any. Others’ mileage may differ.

    Sanders Says House Should Wait on Infrastructure Bill [Click]

    Jayapal Says Votes Aren’t [yet] There for Infrastructure Bill [Click]

    Democrats Release Text of Budget Reconciliation Bill [Click]

    Coons Says Manchin and Sinema Back Biden’s Plan [Click]

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    1. re SALT relief: Doubling the standard deduction almost, but not quite, made up for no longer being able to deduct our sales and property taxes and, hence, our charitable contributions.

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    2. Re SALT relief: because I retired between right around the time it went into effect, and our finances went through a considerable rearrangement, I am not at all sure just what happened there. I also turned over the tax return calculation to a professional--it had finally become too complicated for me.

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  6. Replies
    1. Any patience for Manchin has long since passed its expiration date. He is a blight on this nation.

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  7. Facebook announces name change to Meta in rebranding effort [Click] Oh gee— that’s going to make a BIG difference, all right.

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    1. The name change is for the parent company, not Facebook itself.

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    2. I think maybe Alan was speaking tongue-in-cheek. 😉

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    3. I was addressing the potentially misleading headline, not Alan's comment.

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    4. And the point is well taken. Like Google being subsumed under "Alphabet."

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  8. Human species who lived 500,000 years ago named as Homo bodoensis [Click] “Species was direct ancestor of early humans in Africa and discovery has led to reassessment of epoch.” Newly proposed species name intended to clarify Homo family tree—subsumes several previously named species.

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    1. Naming things is so very important!

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    2. Figure 1 in the original article is helpful. Ditto the photos showing the distinctive brow ridges.

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  9. A cannibal was walking through the jungle and came upon a restaurant operated by fellow cannibal. Feeling somewhat hungry, he sat down and looked over the menu.
    *Grilled tourist: $5.00
    *Broiled Missionary: $10.00
    *Fried Explorer: $15.00
    *tRump supporter: $100.00
    The cannibal called the waiter over and asked, "Why such a high price for a tRump supporter?" The waiter replied, "Have you ever tried to clean one? They are so full of sh!t that it takes all day!"

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