#UTpol
RantWoman's first impression of UT governor Spencer Cox was to cringe when he admitted he prayed for days that the person who allegedly shot Charlie Kirk was an outsider. Sorry. The problem appears to be inside the house.
Will RantWoman add his book to her Mean to Read list? Probably not, but RantWoman will definitely cover the situation with prayers for continued dialogue.
#Russia #China #NorthKorea #immigration
Who controls the territory?
The Russian Far East is emptying of people and growing lots of homes--in ports involved in trade with North Korea and China
As an aside: Happy Ukraine Independence Day.
How to be a good friend in the face of tragedy has been on my mind, and undoubtedly on the the mind of many who have friends affected by the Spokane Complex fires. It was the inspiration for this column.https://t.co/EehLbzjKxm pic.twitter.com/fW9U22yAD6
— Sue Lani Madsen (@SueLaniMadsen) August 16, 2026
RantWoman had been wondering about Suelani's experiences in connection with the Spokane wildfires. Please appreciate these comments in that spirit.
What? No Blue Angels on Saturday?
Blue Angels air show canceled Saturday at Seafair due to wind | The Seattle Times
Wind gusts of up to 15 mph?
Neither RantWoman nor Little Sister has EVER heard of the Blue Angels being cancelled because of wind.
Was it REALLY wind?
Not grumpy citizen chatter about noise or surface to air missiles?
Not hacking by the IRGC?
Not a sudden urge to cut back on things like fancy air shows so that the #DoD really truly can afford all the latest war?
Not reticence about whether we even need fighter planes if everyone is busy hitting each other with better and fancier drones?
Shush RantWoman. Settle down and enjoy the peace and quite.
But Wait, videos for people who really LIKE air shows.
This must have been the Friday show.
Blue Angels July 2026 Seattle SeaFair
For anyone who might actually think a ride-along is FUN
KOMO's Molly Shen takes flight with the Blue Angels over Seattle
A few seconds here and there that might evoke motion sickness.
Listening to some of the details of the different maneuvers, RantWoman will NOT comment about the 15mph wind cancellation
Seattle Seafair Blue Angels Airshow 2026
But wait! Couldn't we put some of that flying talent to work fighting wildfires? Just wondering.
#SimpleMeal #AI
Dear Readers
RantWoman has plenty of tirades available. First though, RantWoman invites readers interested in very down-to-earth projects supported by a Quaker organization to go straight to
Right Sharing of World Resources | Equity & Community Development
sign up for the email list and find the link to donate.
From now on, RantWoman is probably going to repeat this exhortation every year when NPYM Annual Session invites Friends to a "simple meal" of beans, rice, and this year greens.
RantWoman eats beans and rice all the time. RantWoman eats beans and rice enthusiastically, with lots of variation. RantWoman just cannot get into the idea of making a special effort to eat beans and rice. Bon Appetit to all Friends drawn to this exercise.
The main subject of RantWoman's tirade: CoPilot. The Microsoft AI powered search engine. Other perpetrators of AI do the same thing. Somewhere down a couple paragraphs, if one is lucky and persistent, one can find the actual link one precisely asked for. BUT FIRST, please enjoy at least two paragraphs of slop to WASTE ONE'S TIME. And for this we are supposed to want to assign all our land and water and ... to big tech companies to build more data centers? Absolutely Freaking NOT!
As the US stumbles into the 251st year since the signing of the declaration of independence, RantWoman offers the following half-formed reflections:
1. Whatever one thinks of the whole text and circumstances of the Declaration of Independence--and there is a lot to think--it matters to take at least one day a year to reflect on where the country has been, where it is, where it is going. We are not required to LIKE the reflections but it matters to do them.
2. RantWoman is a grownup and is perfectly capable of using a search engine to round up some videos of celebrations in the small communities of this country, the kind of celebration where the volunteer of the year rides in a convertible ahead of the portable toilet company and the elementary schoolkids pedaling their kid bikes along the route, where there is a high school marching band and assorted kind of homely floats. RantWoman definitely thinks this would be a valuable addition to notes of a fireworks setting the Brooklyn bridge on fire, a plane flying into Chicago complaining about fireworks interference, and arrests of 400 people in LA.
3. Sleep is resistance. RantWoman woke up too late to make it to the worship outside the federal building. RantWoman does not, unfortunately, foresee a shortage of reasons to need to stand in silent witness and is glad to hear glowing reports of Saturday's event.
4. Friends generally are not down with the concept of divine smiting, but Mother Nature definitely does not approve of this year's celebration. It's summer. Thunderstorms happen and so do heat waves. But ping pong sized hail just in time for the President to visit Mt. Rushmore: that is just ...timing. L
ikewise the horrific heat dome and last-minute thunderstorm blessing the President's Fourth of July speech and fireworks. The nation is, perhaps, supposed to be grateful that the thunderstorm probably cooled things off enough to save #DementiaDon from cooking himself with his determination to give his speech no matter what.
After all is said and done, RantWoman is permitting herself a measure of snark: RantWoman's favorite social media swamp prominently features voices talking about how God spared the President and the whole weather thing is the result of "geoengineering" by antifa all suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome, TDS. That idea, to RantWoman, is giving the nonexistent antifa organization WAY too much credit. If anyone is "geoengineering" the perpetuation and increasing severity of summer weather patterns, could it POSSIBLY be the President's petroleum-guzzling cronies and bizarro efforts to undo all the measures people are taking to address #ClimateChange?
Just wondering.
Anyway, please "enjoy" the following videos and any videos YouTube may lead readers to besides the ones featured here.
The 1963 March on Washington where MLK gave his "I have a dream" speech did not have people falling out and fainting from the heat--despite the fact that people came in their good clothes. The sartorial standards in 1983 for the 20th anniversary were, um, looser. The planning was also a lot more realistic.
AfterParty The SemiQuincentennial a day later.
The Short Version:
Happy 250th Birthday USA
It's the Party after the Party!
Please join RantWoman and friends for an After the party Zoom open house
Sunday July 5,
5 pm-9 pm Pacific.
Zoom info by request: please leave a comment.
Has it really been 50 years since the bicentennial?
(Will there be guests who were not alive in 1976? Please come.
Can we stare down our nation's current mess and possibly contemplate a few more centuries?
YES dang it.
The RantFamily observance of the bicentennial involved a lot of schlepping things around for a Billings Symphony concert in the park, a certain amount of helium balloon sales, and a thoroughly satisfying family picnic the next day.
In that tradition, time for a Zoom party!
Also, family circumstances got in the way of my customary holiday procrastination-themed Zoom open house so family time as needed.
Put on your best patriotic gear, irreverent or ironic T-Shirt or at least come dressed appropriately for Zoom.
Come meet characters from many parts of RantWoman's life
Bring a recipe or at least a vivid description of a favorite picnic food.
Bring something tat makes you laugh.
Bring a reason to be hopeful, outraged, or just perplexed.
Bring a story of a memorable Fourth of July.
Come as you are for as long as you like.
There will also be a couple breakout rooms if people find something they want to chat about in a smaller group.
Readers who would like to attend and have not received an email invite, please leave a comment and Zoom info will arrive.
#GROK #Iran #AI #MSpol #TNpol
Ai ai ai. The events described here are just GROSS on so many levels.
Let's see: the US government admits in a court filing in the NAACP case against a Musk data center in MS that the grok.gov ai model is absolutely necessary for national security including the drone swarm that, among other things, bombed the girls' school??
RantWoman is inclined to double check the court filing and other sources before absolutely pinning the bombing on AI alone, but the suggestion sounds really plausible.
And OF COURSE the people of MS are entitled to a clean environment.
So please help RantWoman out: HOW exactly is untrammeled dumping of pollutants in racially biased patterns #AmericaFirst?
#NTSB #Russia #Ukraine #DarkFleet #LNG #Vladivostok #Venezuela #CarbonFree #GreenCorridor #ShippingRates
Top 5 maritime stories of the week
Worth the listen for lots of background
#Albania #Ivanka #Jared
#Albania #Jared #Ivanka #Qatar #corruption Lack of Transparancy
"The Flamingo Revolution"
Why Ivanka’s Albanian Dream is a Protestors Nightmare • FRANCE 24 English
Can Trump's family do business abroad without controversy? | DW News
And even coverage from TVP World
Albania erupts over Kushner-backed mega resort | Debora Kolgegaj
Albanian Prime Minister breaks silence on €1.4B resort protests | World News Tonight
#Iran #StraitOfHormuz #China #India #Japan #Pakistan
Posted without further comment beyond the title.
#UnitedNations #Indigenous
This seems like a good item to post on #EarthDay just on principle
#Iran #Israel #Dimona
YouTube has multiple reports from Al Jazeera, the BBC and other sources about missile strikes two weeks ago about the Israeli nuclear weapons complex at Dimona. RantWoman does not remember this coming up in the media streams RantWoman consumes most regularly. RantWoman thinks it may be too early to expect other reporting about the incident discussed in the video below.
This video contains reference to automatically generated audio, a point which always makes RantWoman treat the content with caution. That said, RantWoman can also easily see the point about governments not necessarily wanting to advertise strikes like the ones outlined here. Finally, RantWoman observes that former inspector Ritter has acquired the kind of black mark which sometimes comes to someone known for telling too much of the truth.
The basic points:
--After 3 rounds of missile strikes, containment around the Dimona reactor is almost certainly damaged.
--There is a serious question about whether missile strikes could result in wide dispersion of radionuclides even if there is no reactor meltdown.
--One indicator of damage would be increased presence of radionuclides in the atmosphere around the area. Apparently, Israel is doing nothing to warn there population but Jordan is distributing potassium iodide prophylactically to border towns.
#Ukraine #Russia
Daniel Lytton Obituary (1954 - 2025) - Whidbey Island, WA - The Herald (Everett)
Daniel Lytton: 1954-2025 - Mukilteo Beacon
Two Friends folded 1000 paper butterflies. There were strands and loose free ones to tak home. These came home with RantWoman.
 |
| Folded paper butterflies in honor of Monarch butterflies |
Content warning: circumstances of Daniel's death, about which there was one interesting and maybe also incongruous message.
Tenant accused of murdering Everett landlord pleads not guilty | HeraldNet.com
 |
| Image from High Mowing Organic Seed Company |
As luck and providence would have it, RantMom and Nasturtiums in Salad Friend lived in the same retirement community for a number of years including the years of #pandemic lockdown. Nasturtiums in Salad gardening proclivities were still going strong, though not on quite as grand a scale as when Nasturtiums in Salad Friend was working on a composting toilet project at the large community garden where she devoted a lot of time.
Nasturtiums in Salad Friend also continued her lifelong gift for growing community by creating space for people to make beaded jewelry, napkin rings, and other craft products in the retirement community where RantMom also lived. This fact makes RantWoman smile, all the more since Nasturtiums in Salad Friend evoked the kind of patient confidence that carried RantMom through the adventure of making a set of napkin rings in spite of RantMom's fingers not working well for quite a while.
RantMom's body has reached a point beyond the reach of magic wands to fix all that is not working. Today, after two rough days of changes, RantMom's hands flutter as if she is trying to do something though RantWoman cannot tell what. Maybe in addition to Christ among us here and now, there is an afterlife where both lovers of flowers can garden freely with no more pain and joyful results.
Posts
All Comments
