This year, she was able to double the amount of food collected; carefully organizing, weighing and storing the donations by category, she wound up with a literal ton of food. Realizing she couldn’t split it all out by herself, she organized a volunteer effort on Saturday morning to divide, repackage, and move it into vehicles for delivery Monday morning.

One of the deliveries filled every available inch of the Scout. The other delivery was split between three normal cars, because a quarter-ton of food made the springs in the CR-V sag to the bump stops.

We are all exhausted from the logistics, planning, execution, and delivery, but I couldn’t be prouder of Jen and the work she put into this. And please, donate to a food pantry near you if at all possible; kids can’t learn or study when they’re hungry.

Apparently they don’t play it much live, which is a crime; this is a clip from a 1985 performance during the Unforgettable Fire tour.

“Broadcast is an ice cube that is melting, OK?” Mr. Bilton said, saying the show had to adapt. “Bari loves this institution,” he added. “She loves ’60 Minutes.’”

At that, Mr. Pelley interrupted.

“She is murdering ‘60 Minutes,’” the correspondent said. “She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and she’s been doing exactly that.”

Bari Weiss, the controversial new head of CBS News, who was hired with no previous broadcast journalism experience, hired a controversial new producer for 60 Minutes: Nick Bilton, a writer with no previous broadcast journalism experience. In an all-hands meeting with 60 Minutes staff (directly after firing the previous executive producer and two longtime correspondents) he was challenged by Scott Pelley, longtime senior correspondent, who challenged him to explain why these changes were made. Thankfully, he didn’t pull any punches. For 6 years, senior officials facing challenges by MAGA or DOGE have quietly resigned in “protest” without doing or saying anything else, as if just leaving is going to make a difference. Bullies do not like when there is pushback. It’s about time someone actually pushed the fuck back.

Bravo, Mr. Pelley. Thank you for showing us the way.

Update: Predictably, the stooges fired him.

Update to the Update: Dan Rather weighs in:

Going forward, every interview, every story, every shot should come with an asterisk superimposed on the screen right next to the CBS eye: *“This story was approved by Donald Trump.”

In the scathing post, there is also a brief glimmer of hope:

The “60 Minutes” formula is replicable, with the right people, enough money, and a platform willing to air it. We have heard from a former “60 Minutes” insider that such discussions are in the works. Fingers crossed. Until then, we are left with a sanitized “60” that will play well for an audience of one.

The weather here has been absolutely perfect since the rain broke last week, and I spent as much time as possible outside not sweating and not freezing. I can see why people visited California and never left. The tomatoes in the greenhouse continue to thrive, which makes me stupidly happy. I took advantage of the weather to rent a tow dolly and swap the Scout 800 for the CR-V at Brian’s garage, and I’m happy I didn’t have to sweat my ass off to get it done.

Along with that, I dropped another, heavier package off at the post office: I was contacted on the Binder Planet about some of my spare soft top hardware, and made a deal to ship a bunch of duplicate steel to a nice guy in South Carolina so that he can make one good top out of a bunch of parts. With that, I’m headed to Nats with $600 in my pocket for any shiny parts I might need.

I heard Regret by New Order at the pharmacy earlier this week and haven’t been able to shake it. Back in the day I had no idea this was the same band that released Blue Monday or had any connection to Joy Division; they were completely off my radar until I was in college. (Remember, I was raised in the State of Classic Rock, in the county of Hair Metal). This song features Peter Hook’s bass melody prominently, which is As Things Should Be, but another great song off this album is World (Price of Love), where he’s conspicuously absent.

Related: one of the books on my library list is Shadowplayers: the Rise and Fall of Factory Records, which chronicles the birth and death of their music label—and the Manchester club they essentially underwrote.

The number 21 is burned into my brain for some reason. I don’t understand why. For as long as I can remember, my neocortex has insisted that my wedding anniversary is on May 21, NOT May 22, the correct date. Thus, I went out last night to find proper flowers for my bride, and after some dead ends I found tulips in a lovely shade of coral and surrounded them with alstroemeria. I had to do this on the bench in the basement quietly so as not to alert Jen; I still have a long way to go in my career as a flower arranger, but I think the overall effect comes across OK.

In any case, Happy Early Anniversary, blondie.

I wrote about my Boy Scouts finds a few weeks ago, and yesterday I hit a community yard sale a little north of here. Within a couple of minutes I scored a free(!) steel wheelbarrow from a couple who’d just sold their house and were looking to get rid of stuff. I’ve repaired our plastic wheelbarrow twice now and it’s on its last legs, so I can make one good solid unit out of two easily. Up the street I found a brand new portable Manfrotto tripod, which will replace my larger travel tripods, and a set of stainless steel restaurant steam pans. Those are great for car fluids of different kinds. As usual there were a lot of clothes and glassware, but I was happy with the stuff I found, and Hazel snoozed patiently in the passenger seat while I walked around.

My tomatoes are going nuts in the greenhouse, which is a pleasant surprise. All I did was mix some new soil in with the old stuff left over from a couple of years ago, add Tomato-Tone, and drop the plants in. Each one is growing fast, they’ve all started flowering, and three of the four have set fruit as a result of my hand-pollinating. It’s all I can do to keep myself from buying more plants to put out there, but after reading that tomato prices are supposed to spike upward, I’m second-guessing my hesitance.

Meanwhile, the peach tree I bought Jen last fall is covered in fruit, which is a great sign. We planted it on the top of the hill at the west side of the backyard and surrounded it in deer fence over the winter. It came back bigger and greener, and our nightly visitors haven’t been able to nibble on it, which means it’s going to grow big and strong, and my girl will have fresh peaches to make her happy.

Later in the day I dusted off my black suit and got myself churched up for a trip into DC with the family: my sister-in-law’s PhD hooding ceremony was scheduled for the same day as the Pimlico horse race and a Nationals/Orioles game along with about twenty other graduation events, so traffic was heavy. We got there just in time for the start of the event, and met up with the family at a Fogo de Chau to eat lots of delicious meat until we were all stuffed.

I stopped in to Hopkins today for my 18-month checkup, which is the second-to-last one I need to do before they declare me completely clear. Everything is looking good so far; my overall numbers are down most likely because I gave blood about three weeks ago (I did the Power-Red donation, which is geared towards NICU and cancer patients) and that brought my numbers down. Jen was able to come with me this time, and we stopped at Trinacria for our traditional celebratory lunch.