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.
Yet while a biased media hyperventilating is no virtue, Trump’s great flaw is that he keeps giving them ammunition. One minute he’s riding high, the next he’s running for his life.
On the morning of February 29, 1704, a French and Indian force invaded Deerfield, MA, the northwesternmost outpost of the colonial frontier. During the raid, 47 residents of Deerfield were killed and 112 were taken captive by Indian raiders who forced their captives to March north in grueling conditions to Canada...
Nobody really wants to fall in the "sedentary life style" category, do they? It's like flunking Gym Class. Losers, right?
Sedentary is generally defined as less than 5-7 hours of strenuous physical activity per week. That's a low bar, since many or most adults that I know seem to have a sport they play either seasonally or year-round at least once weekly.
What is "strenuous" naturally depends on the level of fitness, so it is easier to define what is not a strenuous hour, like walking. Basketball is strenuous, Baseball and golf are not. Heavy sweat is one measure of "strenuous", as is heart rate or deadlift weight. For example, many "cardio" exercises can be done strenuously or non-strenuously. Swimming, running, biking/spinning, and rowing can be done one of three ways: semi-comfortably, energetically, and full-out anaerobic sprints. The only way to make them "strenuous" is to do them for time x distance so you can compete with yourself.
When it comes to weights and calisthenics, "strenuous" is fairly obvious: if you can't do any more weight reps or pushups or jumping jacks, and your sweat is dripping on the floor, it was strenuous. "Strenuous" implies "strain," ie going beyond comfort to serious mental and physical effort despite discomfort and stress.
The CDC offers two levels of recommendations for adults, one for "Benefit" and one for "More Benefit". Their "More Benefit" recommendations turn out to be very similar to the sorts of programs discussed on our website: combinations of weights, HIIT cardio + endurance cardio, and calisthenics. Many people are rightly distrustful of government advice, but since it happens to roughly correspond to ours it might give their experts some credibility.
(They have separate recommendations for older than 65-70, but I see no reason for that. There is no necessary or observable correlation between age and fitness in adults).
Nothing scandalizes a leftist like the truth. Point out that women and men are different, that black Americans commit a disproportionate amount of violent crime, that most terrorist acts are committed by Muslims, and the Left leaps to its collective feet in openmouthed shock, like Margaret Dumont after a Groucho Marx wisecrack. This is racism! This is sexism! This is some sort of phobia! I’m shocked, shocked to find facts being spoken in polite company!
I get the idea of that, but don't most of us wish to be admired, valued, appreciated, loved, or at least wanted? Isolation and loneliness are the saddest things to see. Heart-breaking.
As an ex-nerdy science and sports gal who did not sit at the Cool Kids' Table, I am happy to be a relatively sought-after and popular figure in adulthood. People enjoy my company! Yay!
In the American Northeast, winter hiking is not very popular. Winter walking, and cross-country skiing are popular, but 6 hour hikes are not. It's not so much the cold as it is because snow and ice do not make good footing for slopes, especially steep ones.
Still, I had a friend who hiked/climbed Mt. Washington in January because it was the most macho thing to do that he could think of. Kudos to him, because I do not think I could do that. Wish I could. (He had also enjoyed clearing tunnels and caves of Viet Cong back in the day, so he is a different sort of person.)
Thanks to a reader for forwarding the link to this brilliant 1995 article from the Wisconsin Law Review by John Hasnas.
It's not just about "how to think like a lawyer." It's about how political law is, and about how much doublethink is required to understand American law. He makes the case that good laws must be squishy. He offers excellent examples too.
Specifically, I intend to establish three points: 1) there is no such thing as a government of law and not people, 2) the belief that there is serves to maintain public support for society's power structure, and 3) the establishment of a truly free society requires the abandonment of the myth of the rule of law...
In my view, physical fitness is mainly for full-life functionality, energy, and fun - not to prevent death. Delaying death is fine, of course, if the life before death arrives is full, productive, and physically, mentally, and spiritually engaging.
In civilized cultures, generally your odds are almost 50/50 heart disease or cancer unless you are one of those who just dies from decrepitude, feebleness, and general body rot. What's your preference? Mine is to go via a quick cardiac arrythmia or a stroke while doing something fun, and too far from any medical help that might force me to survive with a nasty disability which would damage my dignity and make me a burden on others.
Everybody in western cultures has some degree of arterial disease after age 40 or 50 whether it is diagnosable or not. It's part of ageing, especially in an affluent society with plenty of good antibiotics available to make sure you don't die of pneumonia.
If you care, this study suggests that stressful aerobic cardio exercise 5 days/week is beneficial for cardiac health. That means keeping your heart rate at around 65-70% of your max for an hour. That is neither easy not comfortable because it means to stay intensely aerobic, ie huffing and puffing and sweating - but at a rate to be able to keep it up. In fact, it's a bitch to do. That's why few do it.
More efficient to do anaerobic HIIT in my opinion. They didn't study that.
In a recent article for American Thinker, “Why I Quit Teaching,” I listed three reasons that prompted me to abandon the teaching profession: unscrupulous administrators, degenerate teachers, and incompetent students. Of these, the latter was the most determinant...
I am looking for some good pithy quotes related to the topic of how a world ruled by logic and pure reason would be a terrible nightmare of a world for humanity.
"My very small puppy in this fight says that there is a lot in Science that lets all of us live longer and better lives 
The Boy Captive of Old Deerfield
In my view, physical fitness is mainly for full-life functionality, energy, and fun - not to prevent death. Delaying death is fine, of course, if the life before death arrives is full, productive, and physically, mentally, and spiritually engaging.