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.
4:13 But just as we have the same spirit of faith that is in accordance with scripture--"I believed, and so I spoke" --we also believe, and so we speak,
4:14 because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and will bring us with you into his presence.
4:15 Yes, everything is for your sake, so that grace, as it extends to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.
4:16 So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.
4:17 For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure,
4:18 because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal.
5:1 For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
Last I heard, Spanish is from Spain. She is correct about one thing: Spain did colonize the New World. Portugal too. Might be more correct to eliminate Spanish, and Portuguese too.
When I was young, "strivers" were looked down upon. The "natural talents" were most admired, whether in math, using words, athletics, the arts, etc. Before my time, Jews were the "strivers," but in my time they could be anybody.
I believe that the elite schools seek special talents and qualities in a variety of areas. Of course, IQ and academic potential also. Elite schools could easily fill their classes with kids with perfect SAT scores. There is the issue with meritocracy with college admissions.
Asian-Americans are the strivers of today. They, on some average, study twice as hard as "white" kids. I do not know whether they are also "resume-builders" like many kids used to be. The sterotype is that Asian kids are all math and violin geniuses.
With ethnic issues dominating the news these days, I'd like to ask a question. Are people with Indian (India) heritage "Asian"?
In the words of Ibram X. Kendi, the present intellectual leader of the movement, “Racial discrimination is the sole cause of racial disparities in this country and in the world at large” and “to be antiracist is to reject cultural standards and level cultural difference.” Kendi, who is the second holder, after E. Wiesel, of the Andrew W. Mellon Professorship in the Humanities at Boston University and who has recently received numerous prizes and distinctions, also declares, “Capitalism is essentially racist” and “racism is essentially capitalist.” Does that imply that teaching the principles of market-based economy is also racist? Should such courses be banned? Is socialist economy OK, i.e., antiracist? In White Fragility, Robin DiAngelo, the other guru of the movement, claims that “attributing inequality between whites and people of color to causes other than racism” is a form of racism.
I have claimed, rightly or wrongly, that there are no wild-bred Brook Trout in the northeast US. To persuade me otherwise, I'd need to see a photo of some fingerlings in a stream.
There are two main issues:
The foremost is that most streams become too warm in summertime to support a Brook Trout population. That has always been true. (Yes, Brookies are the only species native to the Northeast US. They like cold water). Hatchery trout can survive in springtime, for a while, in non-trout streams.
Second issue is predators, and the worst is the introduced (from Europe) Brown Trout. That fish will eat any baby fish or fish eggs it can find. They prefer meat to bugs. I oppose any stream stocking with Brownies unless they are streams that would never support Brookies anyway. The ordinary fish predators like mink and otters can be put up with but always kept the Brookies at low numbers everywhere they could breed.
Given the popularity of fly-fishing, it's up to states to decide what their stocking programs should be. I get it. Fly-fishing is a beautiful experience and it is assumed that pretty much all stream- stocked fish will either be caught, fall to predation, or die from heat by June or July because they no longer have breeding populations to support hundreds of anglers. Stocking is required to accommodate all of the avid springtime anglers. Even the southern US states have been doing this.
So, the media learned, during the Trump era, to define what is reportable in terms of whether or not it advantages Trump. Obviously, we no longer have a liberal media and we are not dealing with a free and open press. We are dealing with organs of state propaganda...
These guys (why no women?) have so many technical skills that it amazes me. It humbles me, because I have no clue. I am overpaid, due to my credentials.
I asked a guy on the job today how he learned all of this. All of these electronic things, testing equipment, big machines, soldering equipment, vacuum engines, air-handlers. A fully-tattooed hispanic guy. He said "Some guys go to school for this, but I learn it on the jobs." I said "Like an apprentice?" "Yes. Four years, bad pay, but now I make plenty." "Are you union?" "Naw. Great boss. Good job. Plenty of work every day."
"Can I ask you what you do for fun?" "I play with my kids, and I play baseball. We have a team plays 3 days a week. Not too good, but good enough. My wife brings the beer."
A happy guy. Gotta love it. Land of opportunity. I recalled that lawyers used to learn their job by apprenticeship and self-education. Abe Lincoln did, and became prosperous working for the railroads. Railroads were the Silicon Valley of the time.
Linking these sorts of absurdities is becoming tedious, but I will include a quote from the article from some academics, which I feel indicates some mental disorder insofar as it sounds like an argument against testing hypotheses. I know it's really political rather than insane, but whatever:
Abstract: Black thought can help us free science from the white supremacist traditions of scientists. Scientists vs. Science will use Black feminist and anti-colonialist analyses to show that white supremacy is a total epistemic system that affects even our most “objective” areas of knowledge production. The talk hinges on the development of the concept of white empiricism, which I introduced to give a name to the way that anti-intellectual white supremacy plays a role in physicists’ analysis of when empirical data is important and what counts as empirical data. This white empiricism shapes both Black women’s (and other) experiences in physics and the actual knowledge produced about physics. Until this is understood and addressed directly, systems of domination will continue to play a major role in the practice of physics.
I took two White Physics classes in college. A few Chem classes too. There were people of all colors, ethnicities, genders, etc. in them. Tough classes, for me. Besides learning a heck of a lot about the natural world, I learned that I did not have a scientist in me. Fascination, yes. Potential, no.
I see many people doing fairly-aggressive stretching before sports or a weights work-out. Wrong. Except for calf stretches, which are a good idea.
A warm-up for a sport or weights is a 5-minute jog, elliptical, or calisthenics things like jumping jacks. Stretching cold muscle is a bad idea. You can actually hurt yourself that way.
Stretching after a sport, a calisthenics hour, or weights might be a good idea or maybe a waste of time. If you take a calisthenics group program in a gym, you will see that they spend the last 5 minutes or so doing stretches on the floor. That feels good, if nothing else.
Kate Winslet shows 
Photo stolen from 
Climate Cult Study Blames