Well, there you go! ;-) Mothers are right more often than they are given credit for. There didn't happen to be any rain yesterday but that was probably just a fluke.

>HI Mike
>
>my mother (from Southern Ireland) told me the cows lie down when its going to rain. So its a fact
>
>Nick
>
>>>>>>Let's face it, our system is screwed up and has been for a long time. Some like to say this is something Barack Obama thought up. It isn't. Every U.S. president in nearly 100 years vowed health care reform. Obama is just the one who got it done.
>>>>>
>>>>>Unfortunately the health care bill was destroyed by special interests because that's who really runs this country.
>>>>>
>>>>>The number one thing we can do to reform our country is to vote them all out of office. Every single Senator and Representative. Why stop there? Vote out State Senators and Reps, Mayors, City Council. Vote them all out and vote outsiders in. How much worse a job could they possibly do?
>>>>
>>>>I am not with you there. There are some bad legislators but also some good ones. Would you want to run a company with all inexperienced employees?
>>>>
>>>>If you want to take one out first, I nominate Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin. This guy is insane. Fortunately the Wisconsin courts are striking down his wackier moves, as I knew they would. Yesterday they invalidated his unilateral move to prevent most state employees from collective bargaining. Given history, I think it's kind of funny that Illinois has a more progressive governor than Wisconsin.
>>>
>>>The judge struck it down based on a procedural violation not on the merits of the law.
>>>
>>
>>I learned that minor detail during a long weekend in Mad Town, from which I returned a couple of hours ago. The strikedown was because there has to be a two hour notice of public votes and the Republicans, thwarted by the parliamentary escape of the Democratic minority to Illinois to prevent a vote, took the roll call half an hour after it was announced and with no Democrats in the chamber. It has now been elevated to the Wisconsin supreme court. That august body also tilts Republican so the reversal may be unreversed. To me it remains fundamentally wrong. The entire basis of collective bargaining, once two sides agree to such an agreement, is that revisions must also be bargained and agreed upon. One side can't just haul out the club and unroll the less pleasing parts unilaterally. Which is what Gov. Walker, Rep. Paul Ryan, and their mind-melders think they can.
>>
>>It may amuse some of those here who have crossed swords with me politically that I find myself in a serious relationship with a woman who is way to the left of me. God love her -- I sure do -- but she is, uh, a little out of the mainstream these days. Not in Mad Town necessarily, where she has lived her entire life, but across the current political spectrum. She is a lot redder than me in more ways than one and in fact more ways than two. (And I better leave that alone before I get in trouble, haha ((c) Victor Anderson). She practically hisses when Scott Walker's name comes up, an emotionally different place from my vantage point. She is not alone. Today we went on a meandering route from her place on the west side to breakfast at a local institution called, imaginatively enough, The Pancake House, which has a long term following, high prices, and sensational food. If you only ever spend $35 on breakfast for two once in your life, spend it there. From there we belched, got back in the car, and headed east on University Ave. through some local shortcuts through evidently middle class neighborhoods with lots of hand lettered Impeach Walker signs. Then a long way south on Midvale to the Blue Mounds State Park. It was a gorgeous day around here and we had a great view of vintage family owned farms, the kind that are disappearing in general, A long amiable conversation with the windows down about how accurate it is to say if the cows are lying down, rain is coming, something we both grew up hearing. Red barns, varying farmhouses, silos, cows and horses and the country smell wafting in through the open car windows. Quaint little Norwegian villages like Mt. Horeb and the one next to it. Our destination was the Blue Mounds peak. You pay your way in to the state park, drive up to the top, climb a wooden tower for an even better view, take some pictures. To my jaded city senses it was a really excellent view for five minutes. She is not so quickly bored. Oh, look at that. Oh, look at that. She is good medicine for me.
>>
>>There may be hope for me. She knows a heck of a lot about flowers, vegetables, bird chirps, mulching, on and on and on, things I was born bored with, and I am learning from her. Slowly. admittedly. She helped me deweed, prepare, and plant the stretch on the way to my front door and a new spot in the back yard. She didn't just float airy thoughts at me, she showed up for her last weekend two weeks ago with her van weighed down with flowerpots, yard tools, hoes, rakes, and so on. We planted mostly flowers in the front and vegetables in the back as a starter farmer system. She showed me how to till, a word I knew only in an evasive context. She told me the history of some of the plants. She has done the miraculous already, LOL, which is make me fall in love again. We are both out of practice and are working on the nuances of give and take again. It's never going to always be a honeymoon.