If I could only get an eighteen year old back and knee, all would be well. Have to hit the pool and the hot tub on Tuesdays and Thursdays, to get rid of the aches so that I can dance on Mondays, Wednesdays and for the next few weeks on Thursdays.  We have people in our group who are still dancing in their nineties so hopefully I'll be dancing for a while.

Yeah, as drug thieves go, Thack does not hold a lit match to Nurse Elkins, super freak!

Have to say, though, that in all the years I've been making pie crust, I've never had a problem with it not being light and flaky, so I can't say as I noticed a marked difference using the vodka.

I've always used my hand to work in the shortening - rubbing it between my fingers and thumb, as opposed to cutting it with a pastry cutter.  I use a fork to stir in the water/vodka, one tablespoon at a time, and a deep pastry bowl.  

And once I think it's got enough liquid to hold together, that's it - I squeeze it together into a ball, separate it if it's a two-crust pie and get to rolling.  

Despite this trend, sea ice as a whole is decreasing on a global scale. Researchers say

No proof. Just "say."

lol

So let me get this straight. A cooling trend is just a trend. But let a researcher say trend and it is The End Of Civilization Unless We Give The UN Absolute Control Of Us And Send Lots of Money To Them.

BTW - One of your (giggle giggle)sources went on about wind... Okay fine:

Heresy! Study Shows `Natural Wind Changes' a Contributor to Global Warming

Wha-a-a-a ...? "Natural wind changes" could be responsible for some of the global warming we've seen over the years?

Yes, say researchers from the University of Washington. The lead author of the study (published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) notes,

""What we found was the somewhat surprising degree to which the winds can explain all the wiggles in the temperature curve," study lead author Jim Johnstone, a climatologist at the Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean at the University of Washington when he led the study, told the AP. "So clearly, there are other factors stronger than the greenhouse forcing that is affecting those temperatures."

Link

Ya gotta watch those U W dudes.... First they found water and now wind...

Following rapid warming in the late 20th century, this century has so far seen surprisingly little increase in the average temperature at the Earth's surface. At first this was a blip, then a trend, then a puzzle for the climate science community.

More than a dozen theories have now been proposed for the so-called global warming hiatus, ranging from air pollution to volcanoes to sunspots. New research from the University of Washington shows that the heat absent from the surface is plunging deep in the north and south Atlantic Ocean, and is part of a naturally occurring cycle. The study is published Aug. 22 in Science.

Link

Face it. MMGW doesn't exist. And none of the theories meet the requirements of a scientific theory.

A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method and repeatedly tested and confirmed through observation and experimentation.

The early churches in the US are visual divine emptiness. Visually the idea is to remove the human hand and presence so that the divine presence will fill the space.

Djou has similarly declined to state whether or not he voted for either man, because he knows that the affiliation is poisonous and could prove the kiss of death for his campaign. He doesn't even put an "R" behind his name on his campaign signs and literature!

It's so easy for you to analyze and judge the rest of the country from the D.C. Beltway. But like so many of your neighbors there, both Democrat and Republican, your political perspective from your locale is often the equivalent of looking at the rest of us from the inside of a filled fishbowl.

It's not unlike the Washington Post's gratuitous take on Sen. Daniel Inouye's so-called "dying wish" that Colleen Hanabusa should succeed him in the U.S. Senate. No doubt, it was grand theatre and made for a really great story, and so the Post ran with it and other national news outlets dutifully followed its lead.

Never mind that the senator's "deathbed letter" was likely a concoction of his longtime chief of staff, Jennifer Sabas, who was about to lose an influential job she had held for a quarter century, a post she probably wished to continue holding under Ms. Hanabusa.

And never mind, too, that Inouye just as likely was unaware of that letter's existence when he died in Bethesda Medical Center on Dec. 17, 2012 -- a date which, coincidentally, was also the same day the letter was dated, delivered to Gov. Neil Abercrombie at the State Capitol in Honolulu and then simulataneously leaked to both the local media and the Washington Post. Even throughout most of this recently-concluded primary election season, political beat reporters at the Post continued to push that "dying wish" meme -- probably at Ms. Sabas' request, since she was managing the Hanabusa campaign.

(There are a number of influential people out here who, for obvious reasons, have since rendered any question of the "deathbed" letter's authenticity a toxic issue for local political discussion. Personally, I've long said publicly that I thought the letter was as phony as a three-dollar bill, and even offered that take here at TL two years ago when Inouye died. And quite frankly, the timeline of that letter's release likely supports my contention, certainly much more so than the Washington Post's take.)

For that reason, as tempting as it may be sometimes, I usually decline to comment personally on the fluid state of other political races outside of Hawaii, save for perhaps an occasional mention of California. The simple fact is that those other places are not my home turf, and I really don't know the lay of the land, so it's probably best to defer to the perspective of people who live there. You might consider doing likewise.

I think she wins.  But if she doesn't it won't be because of this.  

Her opponent has been in the senate for decades and has never once answered a question honestly.

Plus. Its complete bullsh!t to try to browbeat someone into saying who they voted for.  Period.  My parents did not tell each other who they voted for.  This privacy thing was once respected.  She is a good candidate running against one of the most powerful and well oiled machines in the business.  

After two polls in his favor, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell again has slipped behind Democratic challenger Alison Lundergan Grimes, according to the latest Bluegrass Poll.

Grimes, Kentucky's secretary of State, now leads the veteran five-term senator 46% to 44% among likely voters, the survey found. While that advantage is within the poll's margin of error, it represents a 6-point swing to the Democrat since the last survey in late August.