Eleanor Arnason's Blog, page 116

Weekend Report

Yesterday was cold and damp with an iron-grey sky. Patrick was feeling under the weather, due to his sciatica. We stayed in most of the day, Patrick dozing in front of his computer, while I read economics, trying to prep for revising my Wiscon essay.

I need to find a brief and forceful way to describe the housing and financial bubbles and their current collapse -- though Wall Street is rebubbling at the moment, which will likely lead to another crash.

We need to rebuild the country and the pl...

Jobs Lost in September

This is a long post by Meteor Blades at Daily Kos, with some editing because it's so long:

Another 263,000 jobs were lost in September, the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced this morning, far above the consensus of experts. Last month, the revised figures show, there were 201,000 jobs lost. The unemployment rate rose from 9.7% to 9.8%...

The latest figures reversed what had been a steady downward trend in job losses since spring. In the 21 months since the downturn began, there has been a...

Statement of UC Santa Cruz Occupation

I found this on the Econospeak blog:

"Let's be frank: the promise of a financially secure life at the end of a university education is fast becoming an illusion. The jobs we are working toward will be no better than the jobs we already have to pay our way through school. Close to three-quarters of students work, many full-time. Even with these jobs, student loan volume rose 800 percent from 1977 to 2003. There is a direct connection between these deteriorating conditions and those impacting w...

Another Photo, Just Because It's Cute

The Mississippi in St. Paul is Still Industrial

per Patrick, who sent this photo:



This is the far side of the river from the walking path and the plantings. Not all the far side looks like this. There is Harriet Island, which is a park, and Raspberry Island, which has a boat house and a band shell.

Life During Unemployment

I went to the Farmers Market with a friend on Saturday. It's full of late summer foods: heaps of tomatoes, peppers, squashes, melons, apples. I couldn't find any cucumbers and the cauliflower looked moth eaten. But I did get some chard, which I really like.

On Sunday I went to Mary Poppins with another friend. It's a Broadway musical. I can't remember when I last saw one, and I'm not sure I have ever seen one on stage. The music was okay, though not up to opera. The production and the dancing...

Walk

I went to the main library in downtown St. Paul today. It was closed for (a sign on the door said) a customer service day. I then thought briefly of going to the Science Museum, which is right next door. But it was closed also. I don't know why.

Finally I went to a coffee shop down by the river and wrote. I especially like this shop because it has foot stools in the shape of bears. I like to settle down in an easy chair, rest my feet on a bear, drink coffee and read or write.

I'm working on se...

Health Care

I had a doctor's appointment on Tuesday. During it I mentioned that I'd spent the summer obsessed with the health care bills going through Congress. My doc said, "It seems pretty certain we are going to get some kind of health care reform, but the details change every day. So maybe it's not a good idea of focus on it so closely."

I think this is good advice. I have written my Congress people and the White House with my opinions. Maybe it's time to ease back and enjoy the autumn. It's still to...

Ships at Anchor

From an article in the Daily Mail, quoted by Yves Smith in her Naked Capitalism blog.

Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers - all should be steaming fully laden between China, Britain, Europe and the US, stocking camera shops, PC...

Autumn

The weather is still summery, too warm as far as I'm concerned. But the trees are starting to turn color; and the late summer/early autumn flowers -- goldenrod and sunflowers -- are blooming along the highways.

I think sunflowers are my favorite flower, but I also like goldenrod.

Like the unemployed people described in the previous post, I have been feeling depressed. Late July and August sort of vanished. I have no idea what I did: looked for jobs that didn't seem to exist, got a little writ...