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.
Scenic Venice? You betcha. Food in Venice? Fugettabout it. As someone close to me who knows Italy well commented, "Great food in Venice? No chance." I even tried the Venetian classic, Pork Liver (this was made with suckling pork liver - sheesh) with onions. Barely edible: It's far better in our favorite place in NYC. Mrs. BD tried a seafood lasagna, and was not charmed by it. I tried one pasta - crabmeat. Just not good. OK, the fancy places can do a nice filet of fish.
The Asian tourists (lots of them there) seem to go for spaghetti, but I don't recommend that.
Yeah, we tried very high end, regular tourist, and local dinners (7 or 8 pm, of course). Our fancy old and interesting hotel had lavish breakfast spreads with all cheeses, scrambled eggs and bacon, tons of pastries, cakes, and salumi. I'm just not a breakfast person unless you mean a double espresso from the workingman's joint at 5 AM, watching all the boats come and go and maybe sneaking a cigarette.
I prefer NYC pizza (and maybe New Haven pizza) to Italian, so ignored it. We tried quick daytime breaks for cicchetti and, for me, beer or a spritz (Aperol is the main spritz). Beer was good. Interestingly, I could get not Bud Light. Just kidding - places only have one local beer so you only ask for the size you need. Do not go for a Grande - it's like a pitcher.
Cicchetti are little snacks presented on fried polenta, toast, or bread. They could be like bruschetti, and pretty uninteresting, but with stewed octopus or creamed baccala are ok. Pickled sardines, some pancetta. A little fried baccala makes me happy enough.
In my view, the best Italian food is in Siena. Wonderful and surprising, even in the little trattorias. Doubt I'll be back there again, though.
I'll post some pics from Venice and the Veneto over the next week, where Mrs. BD and I have been for 10 days. I think of Venice as a Disney-type place because it feels unreal, almost designed for tourism. Crowds all day and most of the night. Most lovely at night, hiking through the darkish alleys until you come across a campo with cafes and some trees, and kids playing soccer in the dark until their Moms call them for supper at 8.
Venice itself has only a 50,000 population, but 4.5 million tourists/year. Here's Piazza San Marco last week. Interesting point: that bell tower, the Campanile, was build in 1912. Yes, 1912, as a replacement for previous towers. Venice has tons of towers, most of them leaning because it's all built on a swamp. Most of Venice is 16th and 17th C - it was indeed a Magic Kingdom (but a very wealthy Republic with its own Mediterranean empire) for over 500 years.
I'm not a UFC fan, and I'm not a Bud Light (or even Budweiser) fan. I don't follow extremely violent sports like UFC, though plenty of my friends do. I also don't drink that much anymore, but Bud was never on my "oh, I really like that" list of products. Nor were many of their now subsidiary brands. I have lots of friends who only drank Bud. I use the past tense for a reason, since they no longer do.
The recent attempts by Bud to rehab their image, such as aligning with the UFC, reek of desperation. A friend had asked me if I felt the CEO was aware of the choice to engage this marketing disaster that was Dylan Mulvaney. I simply said "I don't care what they say otherwise, but ultimately yes, in my experience, the CEO had to be aware." I was then asked if I agreed or disagreed with that decision, and I simply replied "Given how much marketing drives my industry, and what I know about how it is engaged, I would have disagreed and warned against it." That said, I didn't really care one way or another. Budweiser tastes awful. Mulvaney barely registers on my radar and what little I know is that he is a annoying twit engaging in idiotic behavior which, if I were a woman, would be insulting. But I'm not a woman, I don't care, and his attempts at humor and "activism" always fell flat with me. My position on this debacle was one of interested but rather disengaged onlooker.
22:15 Then the Pharisees went and plotted to entrap him in what he said.
22:16 So they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, "Teacher, we know that you are sincere, and teach the way of God in accordance with truth, and show deference to no one; for you do not regard people with partiality.
22:17 Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?"
22:18 But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, "Why are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites?
22:19 Show me the coin used for the tax." And they brought him a denarius.
22:20 Then he said to them, "Whose head is this, and whose title?"
22:21 They answered, "The emperor's." Then he said to them, "Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor's, and to God the things that are God's."
22:22 When they heard this, they were amazed; and they left him and went away.
We stopped by the marketplace in Venice last week. Marcella Hazan frequently wrote about her daily morning visits to this only fish, vegetable, fruit, and meat market in town.
Of course it is debatable, but I think so. Partridges are difficult to find, you need a good dog, and you usually need the magic cartouches that can shoot through trees.
The old expression is that these birds are hunted with legs.
Running as "exercise" was a fad in the 70s. There are many ways to improve endurance short of running marathons, or even 3-mile morning runs.
Being able to hike 10 miles is a good thing in life. Makes life fun and interesting. But if your interest is in cardiac fitness, HIIT is the way to go.
Is it worth swimming laps, doing treadmill or elliptical lengths, etc? Certainly, but only as a minor component of fitness. That's my opinion.
"Diet and exercise." Those are the usual suggestions.
Fact is that, with exceptions for situations with hours of vigorous activity daily (eg military basic training), a daily routine of stressful exertion of every sort is for building or maintaining functionality for most people but not for fat loss. It doesn't work.
Building strength is another matter. As readers know, for general fitness we like a combination of heavy weight training, "Cardio" of the HIIT type plus some endurance cardio, and calisthenics. That covers all of the basics.
How Hard Should I Work Out? To lose weight? That's not a thing. For general fitness, a hard hour 5-6 days/week is good.
Singles are excellent, serious cardio. Often, people who get their singles under good control aspire to do double-unders. It's natural ambition.
Where there is some air conditioning in summer, I like jumping for cardio. I enjoy working on my variations, but I still can't get consistent doubleunders.
In the Veneto, outside Venice, we stopped by a few 
Wild New Physics Theory Explains 
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We stopped by the marketplace in Venice last week.
Is the New England Subspecies of Ruffed Grouse the King of Game Birds?