Notices by Jeri Dansky (jeridansky@sfba.social)

How about an intense dose of blue for your timeline today, courtesy of some cornflowers?

#BloomScrolling #flowers

Flowers for today: cosmos! I love how cheerful these always look.

#Bloomscrolling #flowers

The latest regarding REI — a company which has proven so dissapointing in recent years regarding unionization efforts.

https://www.cascadepbs.org/news/2025/05/rei-co-op-members-reject-company-board-picks-after-union-campaign

h/t @cascadepbs @BakerRL75 @leapingwoman @wendinoakland

#union

Today is Día de las Madres — which means it’s also the anniversary of my mom’s death, way back in 2007. Mother's Day moves around, but Día de las Madres is always May 10.

She was a pretty terrific mom.

@czarbucks Sadly, things don't look great for future elections in NC.

https://apnews.com/article/north-carolina-election-board-director-republicans-6222e773410c5edf4941ed31f3ff54ca

For #MeerMittwoch, here's Half Moon Bay State Beach yesterday morning. Fortunately the fog bank was staying well offshore.

As I'm going to the local beaches more often recently, I'm reminded how wonderful it feels to open my car door and smell the ocean.

#SeaWednesday #WavyWednesday #sfba

I've stopped my subscriptions to the NYT (years ago), WaPo, the LA Times, and a few more. But that doesn't mean I've stopped funding journalism! One of many places I donate is ProPublica, which just won a Pulitzer Prize, again.

https://www.propublica.org/article/propublica-wins-pulitzer-prize-public-service-2025

#journalism #PulitzerPrize #ProPublica

Excitement my family didn't need:

My 100-year-old dad in Florida has two caregivers who cover his days: one does 4 days, one does 3. The 3-day caregiver is our primary contact, and she's wonderful.

Got a message this morning from the 3-day caregiver that the other one just quit. The 3-day caregiver will now cover all days (11 in a row) until a new 4-day caregiver can start after Mother's Day.

Big thank-you bonus check is in the overnight mail to the 3-day caregiver.

#today #family

Tomorrow is Independent Bookstore Day — a great time to support your local indie if you have one. If not, you certainly have plenty of online options that aren't Amazon: https://bookshop.org, https://greenapplebooks.com and many others in the US and elsewhere.

Amazon is trying to throw some sand in the gears by having its own sale on Saturday. Boo, hiss! More info on that move by Amazon here: https://social.lol/@mitten/114400756702251284

#books

Thank you, BBC, for a story that’s a delight to read:

A man is walking 53 miles (85km) in a homemade bird costume to raise awareness and funds for conservation projects.

Mr Trevelyan said: "Those who know me well know I was eventually going to build a giant curlew.”

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp91knr7ygpo

h/t @sarahdalgulls @BathNature
#birds #uk

Flowers for today: Watsonia!

#Bloomscrolling #flowers

"If you were an ailing pope, one of the metal things you could do is gut it through Holy Week out of sheer force of will and die on Easter Monday. RIP, Francis."

"Pope Francis’s compassion for immigrants came as governments across the world (and now most forcefully in the United States) have turned against them. His calls for ending war (indeed, his last public plea was to stop the violence in Gaza) came as regional conflicts have broken out with regularity."

https://www.thebulwark.com/p/a-pope-who-preached-decency-in-indecent-times-francis

#PopeFrancis #immigration #Gaza

Reporting like this, regarding RFK’s vile comments about children with autism, makes me glad to be a Mother Jones supporter.

“These are kids who will never pay taxes,” Kennedy declared. “They’ll never hold a job. They’ll never play baseball. They’ll never write a poem. They’ll never go out on a date ..."

A crucial slogan of the disability rights movement is “Nothing about us without us”—so it seemed appropriate to get the reaction of an autistic poet. I spoke with Elizabeth McClellan, an award-winning poet, attorney, and legal educator based in Memphis, Tennessee.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/04/rfk-kennedy-hhs-autism-diagnoses-poet/

#autism #RFKjr #poetry

Oh geesh, I missed the whole Golden Dome story until just now. This sucks in so many ways.
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/musks-spacex-is-frontrunner-build-trumps-golden-dome-missile-shield-2025-04-17/

h/t @kims
#uspol #SpaceX #ElonMusk #military #Palantir

In case it's not obvious:

- I'm horrified by the firebombing of Governor Shapiro's residence.
- I'm horrified by all the folks being sent to prison in El Salvador.
- I'm horrified by what RFKJr is doing to our health system.
- And there's so much more I'm horrified about.

But unless I have something to add to the discussion, I'm not posting. I don't see how that would help anything.

What I might post: articles with an illuminating perspective that's being commonly shared.

#uspol

An unsurprising and logical move — but such a sad commentary on where we are today. I expect Chicago won't be the only city cancelling its Cinco de Mayo festivities.

"Our community has faced bullying and prosecution and are not indulging in community activities, therefore we feel that there is nothing to celebrate."

https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news/chicago-cinco-de-mayo-parade-canceled/

h/t @BakerRL75
#uspol #ICE #Chicago #immigration

There were #HandsOff protests all along my part of the coast today, with people lining Highway 1. Instead of going to the larger gathering downtown, I joined a dozen or so people right near my home. So many cars driving by were honking their support!

I know one day of protests doesn't do much in and of itself, but hopefully it's just part of a movement that will get better and stronger over time.

Two men on horseback came over and spoke to someone — probably just wanting to know what this was all about.
#HandsOff #horses #today

And of course there were signs.
#HandsOff

Well, there's a headline that certainly captures the moment: Big banks predict catastrophic warming, with profit potential.

“We now expect a 3°C world,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote earlier this month."

"The stunning conclusion indicates that the bank believes the planet is hurtling toward a future in which severe droughts and harvest failures become widespread, sea-level rise is measured in feet rather than inches and tropical regions experience episodes of extreme heat and humidity for weeks at a time."

"Morgan Stanley’s climate forecast was tucked into a mundane research report on the future of air conditioning stocks, which it provided to clients on March 17."

https://www.eenews.net/articles/big-banks-predict-catastrophic-warming-with-profit-potential/

h/t @ai6yr
#GlobalWarming #Climate #ClimateChange #Capitalism #Banking