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 US government keeps telling people what a "healthy diet" is. For years, they wanted 11 servings of carbs daily. Now they want "fruits and vegetables." Why?
Looks deserted, but the cafes of Lourmarin are packed for late supper and drinks, and the piazza is full of kids playing games in the dark in front of the ice-cream shop.
Good last-minute Christmas idea: a hike, bike, or otherwise, tour around the villages and vineyards of Luberon. You might decide to move there, like Camus.
Not all Baroque is cheery, but lots of it is. Not lots of catchy tunes or riffs, so a lot of it sounds like inventive ornamentation. Filigree. Must be great fun to play, if you can.
Mrs. BD and I have been attending a Baroque Chamber Concerto series (Handel, Vivaldi, Bach) at Lincoln Center this month. It helps me greatly to watch the musicians to see who is doing what. With only a handful of musicians at a time, that's easy to see. A few violins and violas, a bass, a harpsichord, rarely a harp, and sometimes bassoon ad/or oboe. Occasional horns too.
In a large space it's hard to hear the harpsichord but it's mostly a continuo. Pianny was a great invention. Big noise. Chamber music was/is meant for small spaces.
A few facts (I am not well-educated musically, and am tone deaf with zero musical talent):
- The famous baroque composers wrote tons of secular music. That was mainly for courts. Lots of the chamber music was written for pedagogical purposes. Through his entire career, Bach complained about the quality of musicians. They seemed to approximate the scores.
At the heart of Bach's pursuit of chamber music in Cöthen was the rare genre of unaccompanied solo works in sonata and suite genres beginning with the violin and cello works, BWV 1001-1012, followed primarily in Leipzig with the duo sonatas for violin, flute, and viola da gamba, as well as 24 transcriptions of 14 of these works for different instruments and the perfection of the solo pieces. During much of this time Bach also composed works for lute or lute harpsichord while focusing on the flute in Leipzig. The music was intended for varied purposes: to teach composition to family members, students, and friends; to develop a repertory to reflect emerging genres and tastes, and to meet the needs of a growing general public to experience music first-hand.
We’re only beginning to figure out how AI will change society, and I will leave the prognostications to others for now. What I’m interested in is how humans have been laying the groundwork for bots to take over, even in areas where we are meant to be inimitable - in ideas, music, storytelling and democratic discourse. AI-generated culture and human-made culture are converging from both ends. As the machines learn how to emulate us, we are making it easier for them, by becoming more like the machines.
1:18 Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.
1:19 Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly.
1:20 But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
1:21 She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins."
1:22 All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet:
1:23 "Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel," which means, "God is with us."
1:24 When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife,
1:25 but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.
For many Trump supporters, it was his policies that mattered. We suffered and endured his behavior, just as much as anyone else. Indeed, the headline in one Wall Street Journal oped read “The Only Good Thing About Donald Trump is All His Policies.
Now, we can have his policies without his boorishness, and without the unfair vitriolic anti-Trump diatribes from the left, most of the media and from Republican Never-Trumpers. Trump inspired a whole cadre of impressive Republican presidential prospects, someone of whom is likely to carry the day in 2024 and carry his policies into the future, albeit with different possible successors having different notions of “all policies.”
It is almost as though the purpose of the stories we are told is to obscure reality, not to reveal it. Because to observe reality is to trust your own perceptions. You might even start to notice that most stories are not tidy parables with morals. “The world is wilder than that in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant and bright,” Dillard writes. A satisfying true story tends to be complicated and irreducible. Reality is messy. People have obscure and contradictory motives; we misbehave, screw up, and rarely do what we should.
New York Times
The Covid hysterics’ bleak midwinter.
Most medical professionals 
It's Time to