March 30, 2020 Night

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Good evening! Heavy rain and 41 degrees in Delmar, NY. โ˜” There is a east breeze at 6 mph. ๐Ÿƒ. Temperatures will drop below freezing at Wednesday 2 am. โ˜ƒ๏ธ

Today was a pretty dreary โ˜ day with on and off rain. Never even left the apartment as I had my work laptop to do work, which was pretty darn quiet I must say. I really hate conference calls ๐Ÿ“ž although at least the Pine Bush one wasn’t about Coronavirus for a change. I thought I never say this but I think I’d rather do in person meetings. I think most frustrating ๐Ÿ˜ค is just not knowing how it ends or if there is a real endgame with Coronavirus๐Ÿ‘พ. As said as it will be to loose a lot of love ones and friends, I kind of hope it’s over sooner than later so we can move on with life, rebuild the economy and so forth. ใ€ฝI also worry about putting so much more money on federal debt and what it means for our future ๐Ÿ”ฎ.

Tonight will rain showers likely before 2am, then a chance of rain and snow showers. Cloudy ๐ŸŒง, with a low of 35 degrees at 5am. Four degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around April 8th. East wind around 7 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%. Little or no snow accumulation expected. In 2019, we had partly cloudy skies in the evening, which became light rain by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 35 degrees. The record low of 12 occurred back in 1923.

Tonight will have a Waxing Crescent ๐ŸŒ™ Moon with 37% illuminated. At 10 PM, the moon was in the west (268ยฐ) at an altitude of 38ยฐ from the horizon, some 240,380 miles away from where you are looking up from the earth. ๐Ÿš€ At the state speed limit of 55 mph, you’ll make it there by September 29th. Buckle up for safety! ๐Ÿ’บ The Pink ๐ŸŒธ Moon is on Tuesday, April 7. The darkest hour is at 1:00 am, followed by dawn at 6:13 am, and sun starting to rise at 6:41 am in the east (84ยฐ) and last for 2 minutes and 55 seconds. Sunrise is one minute and 44 seconds earlier than yesterday. ๐ŸŒ„ The golden hour ends at 7:18 am with sun in the east (90ยฐ). Tonight will have 11 hours and 18 minutes of darkness, a decrease of 2 minutes and 53 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have a slight chance of rain and snow showers before 1pm, then a slight chance of rain showers between 1pm and 3pm. Mostly cloudy ๐ŸŒฆ, with a high of 48 degrees at 3pm. Three degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around March 25th. North wind around 6 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning with a few breaks of sun the afternoon. The high last year was 60 degrees. The record high of 89 was set in 1998. 14.6 inches of snow fell back in 1997.โ„

For a while now from time to time the toilet ๐Ÿšฝ has been dripping and the float sinking, causing the tank to fill during the night waking me up. I was going to call the landlord and let him know but I figured I would switch off the fill for the toilet in the mean time so it would only fill when needed. But fiddling with that switch seems to have reset the float for some unknown reason and now it hasn’t come on and refilled since. Maybe partially closing the valve caused the water pressure to drop slightly and that made everything happy. No dripping any more. Nothing plumbing wise ever works hundred percent in this apartment.

I am going to put my weekend plans on hold for now. โ›„ There is still quite a bit of snow up north and I’m not sure if I want to go to Schoharie if the roads are soft. While I doubt I’ll interact with many people I always worry about something unexpected happening and breaking down – and it’s probably hard to get a rental car home. Plus, how to wash my truck when it’s covered with mud? All the car washes are closed. But I’ll keep watching the forecast. Easter Weekend if it’s mild and nice I might go to the Adirondacks. ๐ŸฐIn some ways I don’t worry about the Adirondacks as much as the roads – especially NY 8 is a lot less rough than the roads out in Schoharie County.

I do want to get that alignment issue taken care of on the truck while I’m working at home ๐Ÿš˜ but I’m not sure how essential it is to do right away – that wheel has had a funny wear pattern on the tires for two years now. Apparently I’ve heard most repair shops are open and it might be a good time to have service done ๐Ÿ”ง when they’re less busy but I’m always a bit freaked out about any social interactions with the risk of Coronavirus. But it sure would be nice to do while I’m working at home with a stimulus check in the mail. โœ‰

In four weeks on April 27 the sun will be setting in the west-northwest (290ยฐ) at 7:51 pm,๐ŸŒ„ which is 31 minutes and 53 seconds later then tonight. In 2019 on that day, we had rain showers, partly cloudy and temperatures between 50 and 40 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 63 and 41 degrees. The record high of 91 degrees was set back in 1962.

Looking ahead, Arbor Day ๐ŸŒณ is in 4 weeks, 8 PM Sunset ๐ŸŒ‡ is in 5 weeks, Flower Moon ๐ŸŒ• is in 7 weeks, Memorial Day ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ is in 8 weeks, June ๐Ÿน is in 9 weeks and Average High is 80 ๐Ÿ– is in 12 weeks.

๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ๐Ÿฆ…Only 52 days remain until the start of Memorial Day Weekend!๐Ÿฆ…๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ

Mountains

Repeal the Electorial College?

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Repeal the Electoral College?

The Electoral College is one of the accidental oddities of our political system, created in a different time with different laws and concepts of civil society. Back when our founding fathers were more skeptical of democratic power, where they wanted to give state-elected officials the ability to choose the chief executive — the president — rather then the voters. Since then, all states have adopted laws that allow citizens in their states to cast a vote to choose the state’s electors, although that’s not explicitly required in the constitution.

The US Constitution could be changed either by one of ways — the legal process set out by requiring adoption of a majority of both houses of Congress along with 2/3rds of the states — but that would give veto power to 1/3rd plus one of the states. Many rural and smaller states would likely loose power under direct-elections, assuming they aren’t swing area. They would reject the amendment, it would be bound to fail. The other-way would be extra-legal — Congress with adequate public support could declare the US Constitution null and void, an enact any law they please. Indeed, they did with that the Articles of Confederation — they didn’t repeal it in a lawful manner, Congress just replaced it. But it seems unlikely the public would support such a power grab, and institutions such as the courts would halt such an action.

The truth is neither way of repealing the Electoral College is unlikely. But I think people are wrong in thinking that the repeal would mean cities get all the attention by Presidential Elections. I think in contrast, the areas of interest to candidates would be the marginal areas, namely the suburbs and other very competitive areas. Cities are going to go overwhelmingly Democratic, while rural areas would go Republican. The battleground would be the exurbs and outer suburbs, and other areas that are competitive. Cities might get little more attention then they do now. And it’s not clear that battlegrounds would change that much — maybe Westchester County or Long Island might get a visit or two more by leading presidential candidates — but it hardly would be the change that proponents of repealing the electorial college would expect.

The Social-Distancing Culture War Has Begun – The Atlantic

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The Social-Distancing Culture War Has Begun – The Atlantic

As an immunocompromised cancer survivor, Trahan said he’s familiar with commonsense social-distancing practices. But as a conservative, he’s become convinced that many Democrats are so invested in the idea that the virus will be disastrous that they’re pushing for prolonged, unnecessary shutdowns in pursuit of vindication.

Public policy is supposed to be political, reflect local conditions and values. Science can inform but can't tell us what is right or wrong.