Reboarding, woohoo!

To whoever asked about the Brazilian political situation a while back: it's definitely a little crazy, though my particular situation isolates me in a pretty big bubble from a lot of it. My students are majority Brazilian, but mostly from the wealthiest class, and though their parents lean conservative and are not fans, on the whole, of the Workers Party that has had a lock on Brazilian politics for years until their leader was jailed, they also don't seem to be overwhelmingly in favor of the super militaristic far-right conservative demagogue who currently "leads" in the polls. It's possible there is a militaristic revolution waiting in the wings and I'm not in the right places to feel it, but it doesn't feel that way to me. And my wife (who was in Venezuela when Chavez came to power) doesn't think it feels here like it did there, for what that's worth.

Woo! See you soon!

It really was such a huge relief. I didn't know what I was going to find. Fred, we have discussed treatment many times and no luck. He's been tossed into 72 hour hold a couple of times because of bad drug reactions (LSD), but within 24 hours he is fine and best buds with the doctors and gets released. He refuses to consider depression meds.

Gris, that is good to hear. We only hear the worst of it so hard to be objective.

What have we heard from the NCistas?

Timelies all!

Hope the NCistas stay as safe and dry as possible.

The NCistas are all well inland, so we're likely to be facing rain/downed trees/power outages but not the really super scary stuff at the coast.

That said, it could still suck a lot, and people are being really inconveniently people at all the gas stations and grocery stores and such.

Speaking only for my own little household, we're battened down and battery-charged and have junk food and alcohol and cat food enough to last us through it all. Work is already cancelled for tomorrow. We actually know where the headlamps are located, for once. So we'll be okay, but in a few days we'll probably mightily bored and wanting a hot shower. I hope everyone else comes through the same or better!

What amych said. Work was canceled for me today as well as tomorrow, and I've been alternating between weather porn and bingeing Call the Midwife. I'm all set, surrounded by good neighbors, and hoping for the best!

otoh, still super pissed that the Neko Case show tomorrow was cancelled. WAAAAHHHHHHHH!

Gris, that is good to hear. We only hear the worst of it so hard to be objective.

Yeah. And the articles make it sound rough. And maybe it is! Again, I'm solidly in a bubble within a bubble, and I don't speak Portuguese, so I'm hardly connected. But not too many people around me seem truly scared, so hopefully that is what's true.

Personally, I think it's probably a good thing that the former super-popular president Lula, who was jailed either for actual corruption or on a trumped-up charge of corruption depending on who you ask, was not able to run for President again. Maybe he'll be able to let it go and that will result in some calming. His party has chosen another candidate and it wouldn't surprise me if that candidate eventually ends up winning after a runoff election with the crazy authoritarian militarist, though that's still very much up in the air. From a purely analytical point of view, it feels a bit like France - the crazy right-winger has a clear ceiling, so the person who eventually wins after the runoff will probably be somebody not particularly popular but also clearly not nuts, like Macron is/was. Personally my politics line up pretty well with the workers party that has been in power, but the corruption in their ranks is pretty obviously real, so it wouldn't bother me to see another party take the lead for a while, even if I don't agree with that party's ideology as much.

So long as its not the crazy militarist. If he wins, well, things may get much more awful.