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.
Social inequity is the permanent emergency that the left uses to justify its totalitarian state and the perpetuation of social inequity is the means which the left uses to maintain a state of permanent emergency. If one form of social inequity diminishes, the left finds another. And another. This endless search leads to a deconstruction of every aspect of society and the destruction of every human system. Human ways of living are replaced with grafted on artificial modes that fail and destroy their users. And the worse the society becomes, the more the state of permanent social emergency is justified.
In civil societies, showng weakness can be a power play. In uncivil societies, signs of weakness are suicidal.
The Real Housewives of Isis:"Another woman models her new suicide vest for her fellow jihadist wives. “What do you think?” she asks. “Ahmed surprised me with it yesterday.”"
This is mainly for guys, because women generally lack the upper body power for unassisted pull-ups and chin-ups. Guys under age 30 can usually do at least ten, and fit guys can do more with varied grip widths.
Guys over 40, regardless of weight issues, commonly have more trouble due to muscle disuse and decay. The US military considers 20 pull-ups or chin-ups to be a perfect score for that exercise. Few Generals can do that, but I bet Mattis can.
Like all of the Big Functional Exercises, a pull-up stresses many muscle groups. Pull-ups stress upper-body muscles from hands to abs, but the greatest stress is on back muscles - the lats.
To do a pull-up correctly, you do not focus on using your arms but you focus on driving your elbows down. It's not primarily a biceps exercise except secondarily.
To work towards doing some pull-ups if you can't, here's how:
- work on raising the weights on seated pull-downs - jumping pull-ups - pull-ups with those rubber bands
and perhaps most important, Hangs. If you can't hang on, you can't pull yourself up. To work on hanging, you hop up to the bar with an overhand or underhand grip with your elbows down at your sides or as close to that as possible. Suspend yourself as long as you can. Your muscles will slowly (or quickly) give way, but keep suspended as they collapse.
One or two sets of three of those weekly will help you move forward towards the goal of doing just one lousy pull-up with chin above the bar. I do three sets of hangs/wk and three sets of either jumpers or band-assisted weekly. If I can get to 10 pull-ups again, I will be proud of my achievement but I doubt that I will get there. When I was young I could do 15 or more.
Instead of picking apart mistakes by Trump, let's focus on the damage the Democrats have done. It's legion. In the guise of economic "fairness," they gave us the worst economic recovery since World War II. They simply ground to a standstill our economic engine, causing massive unemployment and a job market that gives no hope to Americans for the future. They ruined our alliances and fed our enemies under a horrifyingly stupid, feckless president and secretary of state. They laid the groundwork for ISIS to become a power and were virtually useless in dealing with that organization. They destroyed our borders under the idea that it is racist to have them, flooding us with illegal aliens who don't care a whit about American values of the past, and they steal from our kindness. They were on the way to destroying health care, paving the way for massive government control of doctors, insurance companies, and yes, us as patients. The evidence is in: Obamacare was a failure. They lied to get it passed, they lied to keep it, and they are lying about how good it is now. Thankfully, most people understand they now have a pig in the poke that costs a ton, and they can't use it. They corrupted our bureaucracies in Washington, destroying the faith the American citizens had in their government.
They did a lot more damage than this short list, but the point is that they ruined everything they touched.
People babble on about how “Trump will never do anything about illegals” and “He’ll never repeal Obamacare.” Yeah, put your money on Trump failing – I did, and the guy I wrote checks to lost. News Flash: Donald Trump is not only going dance with the ones who brung him but afterwards he is going to take them to his limo to make out. This guy is interested in trying to please the people who elected him, not the urban swells who write for or read the NYT or WaPo – he knows they will never stop loathing him even if he somehow simultaneously cures cancer, brings world peace, and convinces Coldplay to disband.
No, he’s going to do what he said he will do – and I expect that when we hear the name of his Supreme Court nominee (Please, for many reasons, make it Judge Willet!) every conservative in America is going to seek a cigarette and a cuddle.
Good essay. Trump is no Conservative. I see him as a moderate pragmatist and probably an old-style Liberal at heart. I still can not understand why progressives and lefties hate him so much. He seems to love America and Americans, and he is entertaining. And character flaws are de rigeur for politicians because normal people avoid that game.
I received a link this morning to an article which suggests readers should more or less 'be afraid' of a certain group of technology companies. Over the course of time, many firms have acted in an amoral or immoral fashion. These tech firms have all probably also behaved poorly at various points. But the value they provide is significant. Fearing them is not sensible. There is good reason to not fear them. History indicates they are likely to all be undone or greatly diminished at some point in time. For most of the 1980s, the 'company' I was supposed to fear was the entire nation of Japan. For most of the 2000s, it's been China. Funny how Japan has been in a 20 year funk while China is just now dropping like a stone (apparently, Bitcoin prices are soaring over there - a sure sign of instability).
I consider articles like the above link to be a form of fake news, because it's an emotional appeal based on faulty logic. Articles of this nature appear every 10 years or so about various companies. Aside from China and Japan, I've read articles like this about GM, GE, Exxon, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, Bank of America, Citibank, AT&T, Coca-Cola, ITT, and a host of other large firms who, in total, represented large and innovative firms at various points in time. They were firms which happened to benefit from temporary blips in demand and consumer behavior. Point is, almost all are still fairly large firms, but their dominance has diminished, our fear subsiding as our interests and spending patterns change.
In every case, consumer behaviors shifted, innovation moved in different directions, or smaller more competitive firms caught up with these firms. But in almost every case, the dominant positions they claimed were lost. I see the same thing happening with Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon, Apple and Microsoft at some point. In fact, Microsoft is no longer the dominant company it once was - it, too, was part of the group mentioned above back in the 90's as a potentially dangerous 'monopoly'. I guess being downgraded from 'monopoly' status is just as frightening as being part of a group of large firms which all compete with each other?
The idea that there is something new and different happening with these tech firms is misguided. Railroads dominated the economic scene for many decades in the 1800s, then oil companies, then car manufacturers. Each one was demonized in similar fashion. Tech offers greater opportunity than any of these firms did, as well as great potential for abuse. But you take the good with the bad, and the good usually outweighs the bad in an overwhelming fashion. I'll take my chances with these firms as opposed to any government oversight and regulation, thank you. Their fear and dislike of each other will keep them on a far more even keel than any pinhead politician.
We made an Italian supper for great pals Sunday night. It's fun to cook Italian; it takes four hands so it's handy to have a spouse.
- Antipasto: Zucchini boats stuffed with shallots, onions, chopped zucchini, with Bechamel sauce and parmesan on top - Primo: Straw and Hay (white and spinach fettucini with chopped mushrooms and mortadella with cream-parmesan sauce) - Secondo: Pork tenderloin braised in wine vinegar with a ton of peppercorns and a bunch of lauro leaves, and sauteed spinach with oil and garlic as a contorno - Dolce: Strawberries with balsamic vinegar
1. If the USA is the mostest evilish oppressive imperialist country in the world, why do so many want the federal government to have more power over the states and the people?
2. Is Washington Rome? The federal city looks like Rome, a hideous statement of power and the smallness of the individual citizen. Are the states of America just Roman colonies, creating the goods and food and money for the wealthy imperial capitol and its power people?
Our hard-exercise friends know that results require working in pain; that "pain is the feeling of weakness leaving your body." We all know that if you stop when it begins to hurt, you get nowhere. That is why so many people avoid it.
Same applies to weight-loss plans: it hurts. Indulgence is briefly rewarding, pain and deprivation are painful. Good pain, but pain.
It turns out that resisting the deterioration of age requires stress and pain - mental and/or physical. It is no surprise to me that much-maligned "stress" is what can keep us physically and mental fit until something inevitably cuts us down: How to Become a ‘Superager’
In the United States, we are obsessed with happiness. But as people get older, research shows, they cultivate happiness by avoiding unpleasant situations. This is sometimes a good idea, as when you avoid a rude neighbor. But if people consistently sidestep the discomfort of mental effort or physical exertion, this restraint can be detrimental to the brain. All brain tissue gets thinner from disuse. If you don’t use it, you lose it.
Interesting that the brain deteriorates also with lack of physical stress. Who knew? Up here in Yankeeland, many of us still view "leisure" and "relaxation" with Puritan suspicion, and the notion of retirement the same. Maybe we are right to seek challenge, discomfort, and stress and to avoid leisure and passive recreation. Learn piano, or a language. Get a hard job. Lift heavy weights. Let's all get deep into life this year to try to slow down Time. I will.
The American people are sick unto death of liberals. They are sick of a lousy economy; they are sick of Hillary Clinton’s grating voice. They are sick of worrying whether a careless word will get them hauled up before the lame feminists in HR. They are sick of being called racists sexists homophobes. And they are sick of their adult kids living in the basement.
But never mind about all that. The real reason for the crisis of 2016 is that liberalism and globalism have been tried and found wanting. The truth is that the nation state is still the best -- although flawed -- way of conjuring up that abstract notion we call human community, and ordinary people feel it in their bones.
This flawed race trapped in a cycle of cascading pain and wrong is what, and who, God is bound and determined to love; the question is how can He do it?
From the Christian point of view, this is not a trivial problem. People aren’t just messy and incomplete. We are actively evil. As Reinhold Niebuhr puts it, we place ourselves at the center of the moral universe instead of God and our neighbors. We aren’t just victims of an unjust society and a tragic history; we make choices that perpetrate and even deepen injustice and add new dimensions to unfolding tragedies of our time...
I tend to be birding, if only casually, anytime I am outdoors. For those purposes, I do not need binocs because I have learned the gestalt of common bird shape, behavior, sound, and flight patterns. I am far from expert, but better than most casual amateurs. For example, my birding friends can readily ID a flying Cooper's from a flying Sharpie, but I can not. Nor am I any use at all with fall warblers or rarities - I tend to guess for the regulars to be safe.
I have been doing an inventory of my binoculars this weekend. No reason, really. Closet-cleaning. Also because planning a cool birding trip to South Carolina barrier islands this Spring. Turned out I have 13, from handy-dandy minis through mid-range birding binocs to marine very long-distance binocs which I have also used for hawk-spotting (bad idea - it's impossible to find the spot in the sky and the wobble is a problem).
I have to give some of them away.
What I usually have on hand when outdoors for any length of time is one of my minis, but if I intend to do some serious looking my go-to is my Minox 8X32. It's waterproof. They make an 8X33 now, but I don't need that. I bought a binoc harness from Cabelas.
Experts can and do ID pretty much anything with bare eye or with the inexpensive Nikon mini in their pocket, but when you are looking for the one Glaucous Gull in a flock of 2000 gulls, you need more. If you sport a Swarovski you had better be at pro level or you're a poseur. Firearms, cameras, binocs - an amateur like me does not need the best because it's just for fun. I have also observed, over time, that the best talents never need the best kit. I rarely use my good birding scope anymore because of the hassle.
What do you use for birding? (Some wise guy will comment "12 gauge". In a duck blind, I tend to have binocs and a 12 ga.)
Thanks for this, Gerard, and HNY to you and yours - and to all readers. Lots of people can use this today (listen to both performances if you have a minute): Fight Song
The first scuff on a nice new pair of shoes, or the first scratch in the paint of a new car, is a disappointment. You knew it was coming, but the first one hurts. But there are other scuffs and scratches soon enough. Every new pair of wingtips is destined to be a scuffed-up pair of old shoes, every new car is destined for the junk pile. But years are different: The first lost year hurts the least. Then they hurt more. Sometime around 30 or so we approach one New Year’s Eve and, meditating on the year that is past, think: “Well, didn’t make much of that.” We resolve to amend our ways...
Drudge announces that 
Boudreaux: 
Lightning activity around the globe, 
An Ancient City 
Another myth demolished, finally: 
I tend to be birding, if only casually, anytime I am outdoors. For those purposes, I do not need binocs because I have learned the gestalt of common bird shape, behavior, sound, and flight patterns. I am far from expert, but better than most casual amateurs. For example, my birding friends can readily ID a flying Cooper's from a flying Sharpie, but I can not. Nor am I any use at all with fall warblers or rarities - I tend to guess for the regulars to be safe.