We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
The town of Roseto, Pennsylvania, had very low levels of coronary artery disease. The population smoked, ate lots of fat, and mostly worked hard manual jobs. The experts went to study it, and came up with a cultural hypothesis to explain it all.
Tree Sparrow Cardinal Slate-Colored Junco Mockingbird Song Sparrow Blue Jay Downy Woodpecker damn English Sparrows White Throated Sparrow Great Horned Owl (heard early) Mourning Doves Chipping Sparrow Chickadee Carolina Wren
and a new friend, a Brown Thrasher, one of my favorite birds. He's a little early to be here, but using his strong beak to punch holes in the snow to find birdseed.
I never saw the need, or use, for Google Glass. People who had them were weird, a bit stuck-up, and their quirky behavior was not a selling point. It's no surprise to me that the entire project fell apart over differences in marketing, but the addition of an illicit affair just makes the story that much more interesting.
There are a few things to take away from a story like this. First, keep it platonic. I've never felt there is a good reason to get involved with anyone you work with. I have a hard enough time with people in my own industry, having to date someone at the same company would be murder. The old "Don't crap where you eat" are words to live by. Second, it's clear Google is not without its imperfections. Those who think Google is becoming a monopoly or overly dominant have some legitimate fears. Perhaps those fears are overblown, though. Back in the 1980's a friend of mine used to say "Someday, we'll all work for IBM." By 1995 it was "Someday, we'll all work for Microsoft." Today, you can figure out who we're all going to work for. I doubt it. Google is very good at what they do, but there are no guarantees they will take over everything. Finally, while I don't see any reason to dislike the idea of Google Glass, I just don't see the fit today. Apple's Newton was about 10 years ahead of its time, but there is clearly a market for handheld computing. Maybe computing glasses will make a comeback. I wouldn't be hopeful, but I don't see why they can't be the next thing, either.
Want an idea of how big Google is? Submitted for your approval, a video that has a tinge of conspiracy paranoia, but is completely clear in its intent to just show you everything Google is doing without making judgments.
For the first two years, we were just quietly practicing below the radar until we sort-of defined what we are and how this website thing works. I'm still not sure, though, what we are. In the beginning, we used to post a Tractor of the Week.
We still do some birds and animals, quotes, Sunday Lectionary, Yankee food, gardening, fishing, hunting, conservation, Bob news, and all sorts of random things. We have done so many things over these years - including a friend's Aliyah Diary.
I suppose what we do is whatever we find interesting and whatever we think at least one other person on the planet might find interesting or provocative. Clearly, and to our chagrin, we are not for everybody.
I can say is that we are not "boutique" by choice but purely because of our own limitations of time and talent, and because of free market forces. 1.7 million "hits" per month? What does that really mean? Nothing.
I am grateful to all of our contributors and commenters who have come and gone, or stuck around, over these years. Not to mention friends who send me Morning Links. I think Maggie's has been a wholesome hobby and outlet for all.
Thanks also to all of the other websites we beg, steal, or borrow from. Tons of interesting stuff out there to mine, and we do not always acknowledge it properly. Forgive us. It's a time consideration. We all have day jobs.
We have readers from all over the world - mostly the Anglosphere - Australia, Britain, Canada but lots from northern Europe too - France, Germany, Scandinavia, Poland. Minimal Russia - maybe blocked there. Mostly American and Canuck readership. We are blocked in China (why would they bother?), but we have readers in free China, Hong Kong, and Japan. Israel too. Africa and South America? Zero. I think part of the original concept was to share a version of crusty, rebellious Yankee New England life and attitudes, slice of life, warts and all, with people far away. It's evolved.
We like commenters. Please comment at will on our site. No need to agree with us, but compliments are of course always welcome.
We have plenty of bandwidth for new readers, so, if you get something out of Maggie's - likes or dislikes - please share our existence with others. A growing readership is our emotional reward for this hobby.
A "retired" contributor suggested linking some samples of our stuff from past years. I tried to do that, but it's just too hard, most of the links and images have become obsolete, and, just like Maggie (below), our formatting has been corrupted by age.
The Right is finally coming around to the understanding that what mainly distinguishes it from the Left is not its general preference for muscular foreign policy, its not always convincing defense of the Judeo-Christian tradition, or even its relatively faithful reading of the Constitution, as important as those things are. Rather, the fight between Right and Left is about coercion.
Bingo! It's about freedom.King George's yoke was light indeed compared to our current feds, but I guess our current yoke is more or less voluntary.
Do we really need more roads, highways, and bridges? And if we do, what does the federal government have to do with it? In my humble view, most government infrastructure is a disguised subsidy for somebody or something.
These programs are designed by Child Psychologists. Since when are they experts in this? I'd prefer a panel of grandmas, myself. Some kids, of course, are especially challenging if not impossible. Easy kids make parents look good; tough kids make parents look bad.
After seven years of political and legal battles that have grown into one of the ugliest environmental fights in the country, this was the end of the line for Lunny’s oyster farm. "It's been a terrible time," said Lunny, who still lives on the nearby cattle ranch where he grew up and where his grandfather started a dairy farm in 1947. The forced closure of the oyster company marks the end, after almost 80 years, of modern shellfish farming in Drakes Estero, the tidal estuary that lies at the center of the dispute...
Obama made his foolish and condescending prayer breakfast talk a too-easy target for mockery. Surely unintentionally - I believe he thought he was conveying an important perspective about tolerance and understanding to us benighted, ignorant citizens. Our moral and intellectual superiors, of course.
Best comment was from Bobby Jindal: "The Medieval Christian threat is under control, Mr. President."
40:21 Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
40:22 It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to live in;
40:23 who brings princes to naught, and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing.
40:24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when he blows upon them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble.
40:25 To whom then will you compare me, or who is my equal? says the Holy One.
40:26 Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these? He who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name; because he is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing.
40:27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the LORD, and my right is disregarded by my God"?
40:28 Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.
40:29 He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.
40:30 Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted;
40:31 but those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
Thanks, David Warren - Good Health May Be Bad for You- for commenting on our short piece. A bit from him about the Yankee spirit:
Through Robert Frost and many predecessors, poetic and other, I recognize strengths and weaknesses in the species. Currently I am focusing on strengths.
There is a certain rough-hewn spirit of independence that goes deeper than any politics, and is expressed with a laconic drollness that cannot be defeated by the world. You could not enslave these people. They would not cooperate.
Cooperate only when we want to.Often, our bias is not to.
We must strive to be multiculturally tolerant and understanding of different views. Anyway, Christians do it too, right? Heck, we behead adulterers, gays, and blasphemers routinely in our church. It's a lot of fun. The masturbators, we bury alive just like the Muslims but we're running out of space for that in the churchyard and are considering using the Town Dump.
Winter: 
We're ten years old today. Happy Birthday to us.
The Oyster Shell Game:
The Snow Man
Simple and easy: