Some More Information on Walker's Agenda

From Think Progress

They still aren't answering the phones

at my state Senator's office, so I decided to drive on up to Madison to see it I could deliver my message in person. He's a Republican, so presumably he's still in the state.

It was pretty crowded inside the capitol when I arrived, but good spirits, very positive. It was loud in the rotunda, in a good way. Despite anything you may have seen about the crowds being unruly, this isn't the case. People made way for one another, parents had kids there. It was all very positive. The police had certain areas closed off and nobody challenged them about it.

I decided not to try to find Senator Shultz's office, so just joined in a couple of chants. If he was actually in his office he should have been able to hear them from there.

Went outside and walked around the capitol square a few times and enjoyed the growing company of folks. It was a beautiful sunny day, though the breeze was a bit brisk on the lake side. Stood next to some good firefighters during the noon rally, then headed on home.

If anyone wants more background on what's happening here, Talking Points Memo has had some decent coverage. (I linked to just one of their stories. There are others as well.)

Apparently the Tea Party folks are sending in a group to "counter protest" tomorrow. I just hope that they aren't able to provoke the kind of unpleasant confrontation they are undoubtedly looking for. I'll say this again from my own experience, so far the protesters have been determined but entirely peaceful.

Where in the World is My State Senator?

Wisconsin is going through a challenging time, and I wanted to phone my State Senator to let him know where I stand on some of the current issues. After several (more than 10, more than 20) attempts it became clear that he had shut down his office phones, or rather, let the voicemail fill up and had his staff stop answering. So not only could you not speak to anyone in the office, you could not even leave a message. Pretty sneaky. He'll be able to claim, if he likes, that his constituents weren't that concerned - that he didn't really hear from that many of them. Nice example of representative government, huh?

The last email I tried to send bounced back. So last night I typed up a letter and this morning I'll put it in the snail mail. Though at this point I wouldn't be surprised if his staff is just tossing constituent letters into the trash unopened.

Wisconsin Senator Dale Schultz: I think this is a pretty shabby way to treat the people you are supposed to serve.

I haven't really dropped off the face of the Earth

I just spent several days in Illinois, helping out while my brother was in the hospital. He's had a very nasty infection, will be on antibiotics for quite a while, but is doing much better. I'm back home getting ready to charge into a busy week here.

Done and Drying

I had been putting off working the second thumb, because staying in pattern was rather fiddly.
But today I took the bit in my teeth, finished the thumb, wove in ends, washed and laid out to dry. I'll be mailing these north to our good daughter, who is back in school up at Steven's Point.




The other project I've been working on is also fairly small scale. I won't show it yet as it's a Valentine's gift for my sweetie (and I'd better get cracking - not that much time left).

The Perfect Wave

It was really a shame to destroy this; but, alas, I had to get to work.





Behind the car there was a drift up to the top of the back bumper, but it was just plain, nothing to regret moving.



And where Mr S. is standing, there were two ridges (thrown up by the snowplows) that were as high as the top of his hips. Fortunately it was all pretty dry powdery stuff, not heavy and wet. Between the two of us we had the driveway cleared in about 40 minutes.