It’s almost like the real thing

 We put a hummingbird feeder in the middle of a plant; the mandevilla vine on the deck. One great big inexhaustible flower buried in the middle of a bush. They find their way in.   The hummingbird fall migration is on.  Today we’ve got about a dozen hummers buzzing all the feeders. The little ones are ruby-throated, the migrants.  The bigger one with the rufous tail is buff-bellied, a year-round resident.  

Celebrity Foundations

 We don’t get much real information on television about the Clinton Foundation and the Trump Foundation; mostly we get political hype.  It turns out there are big differences between the two. There is a source for nonprofit organization tax returns; GuideStar.org.  (Really, they’re information returns, since nonprofit organizations don’t pay taxes.)  These are the returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service, but they’re different from income tax returns; nonprofit information returns are public records; available to anyone who wants to look at them.  We look at them every day at work, since that’s the only thing we do; work with nonprofit organizations. At GuideStar, they’ve gotten asked about the two foundations so much, that they wrote this independent analysis.  No taking sides.  No spin.  Just adding clarity to the conversation:    

Crises averted

 Car all rigged to tow.  Engine turned off.  Transmission in neutral.  Pop the hood release from inside the car.  Shut the doors.  Open the hood.  Throw the battery disconnect switch.  Drop the hood.  We’re good. Problem. The car doors are locked.  I don’t know why they’re locked; they’re never locked when we tow; but this time they’re locked.   I pull out the fob. It does nothing.  I can’t unlock the doors.  The battery is disconnected.  The front doors, the side doors, the rear door, nothing is going to work without the battery connected.  The only way to open the hood and reconnect the battery is to open the car door and pull the hood latch.  But I can’t open the car door because the door is locked.  All I have is a digital fob with buttons to push.  I’m going in circles… Finally. The aha moment. The digital fob has buttons to lock and unlock doors, make the sliding side doors open and close, and open and close the rear door.  None of them work because the battery in the car is disconnected.  But there is one more button on the fob.  Push that button and the fob separates.  Cleverly hidden inside the fob is an emergency key.  Who would ever need anything so primitive as an actual physical key? Me.  Thank you Chrysler.  The key worked.  The door opened.  The hood opened.  The battery reconnected.  And the car alarm didn’t even sound! Crisis averted. We’re home, safe and sound. 

Wednesday

 Lunch at Juan’s.  It was packed, as usual. Now THAT is a shrimp cocktail!  Poor Judy had to make do with crummy fajitas again. We didn’t see Juan while we were there, but we did get to catch-up with his oldest son Guadalupe.  They opened a second restaurant in Aransas Pass a couple years ago.  They’ve just now opened another! A doctor’s visit in the afternoon for the cast-off. And in place of the cast…  A removable splint! She gets to take the splint off when we’re around the house and her hand is safe.  I think rehab should consist of shoulder rubs for me, but the doctor says no, not yet.  For now, she practices touching her thumb to each finger in turn.  That’s it.  Range of motion rehab only for the next six weeks.  (None of her fingers reaches her thumb at all yet.) Met up with Miguel and John for dinner at a pizza brew pub in Corpus.  Stopped by Gulf Waters and interrupted Tom and Gloria-Ann’s dinner for a quick visit. It’s all good.