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.
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...
3:1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
3:2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3:3 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
3:4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
3:5 a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
3:6 a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
3:7 a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
3:8 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.
3:9 What gain have the workers from their toil?
3:10 I have seen the business that God has given to everyone to be busy with.
3:11 He has made everything suitable for its time; moreover he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
3:12 I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live;
3:13 moreover, it is God's gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil.
For 1 million, you do not get much. Supply and demand. You are not paying for the lousy living square footage, you are paying to be here. Like an ocean liner, you do not just get your little rooms. You get the whole enchilada just out your door.It's not for the faint of heart though. Gosh, I love living here but I am saving for a country getaway in northwestern CT or Ulster County. I need my own shooting range, at least, and that is not allowed in Central Park unless you are a crim.
You see hundreds of these mini-trees in pots during Christmas season. I don't mind them in pots and planters, but as landscape plants (which is where they often end up), I feel they rarely fit in and have a tacky, artificial, gas-station appearance. I have two of them next to my vegetable garden, thrown into the ground many years ago for the heck of it after outdoor Christmas use in outdoor pots. They are about 7' tall now. I hate to cut them down, but I don't like them. They are happy misfits.
Dwarf Alberta Spruce is a dwarf GMO of Picea glauca, aka Alberta White Spruce, etc. They are tough, dense, shapely, and can handle temps down to -40 degrees F.
Sugared foods are delicious treats. Cheap and abundant carbs (converted to sugars during digestion) are a blessing for mankind. Historically, only the rich and royalty could be fat. Now, the poor are wealthy enough to get fat while it is the prosperous who tend to be physically fit and trim. The social part has flipped: plebians are fatter, patricians trimmer. It is sociologically interesting.
It is also medically interesting that carbs, including sugars, alter your insulin metabolism. Of course they do, but these issues are only of academic interest unless you have a desire to lose fat.
We seem to order Thai takeout almost weekly. Thai takeout is what Cantonese and Szechuan takeout used to be around here.
In my limited experience with Thais (limited to restaurants in the US only), they are efficient, entrepreneurial, and pleasant polite people with excellent smiles, beautiful gals, and good English. I welcome all immigrants from Thailand, but I am not sure why they come here.
I am ordering a Thai delivery tonight (Penang Curry, Clear Broth Noodle Soup, Thai Salad, extra white rice, extra hot sauce on the side). Cultural appropriation - bring it on!
A close family member has been spending Christmas week in Thailand. My father-in-law, who has visited Thailand, warned them about ordering the amazing food over there: "They give you a choice of Not Spicy, Spicy, Very Spicy, and "Local." He said "Never ask for the "local."" He said the "Not spicy" is hot enough for the average lame American person but if you want to prove your toughness, just order Spicy and take it from there.
An email from a beach in Phuket:
Some of the food pics below the fold - the last one looks mysterious but I'm sure it was tasty -
We mostly post about resistance exercises and calisthenic exercises. Resistance exercises and calisthenics offer plenty of good cardio-pulmonary challenge in themselves, but some almost pure cardio exercise should be part of the fitness mix. The Conditioning or Fitness Triad is what I call it: a total of 2 hrs mostly weights, 1 hr of heavy+lighter calisthenics, 1+ hr of pure cardio.
A few comments about cardio (eg rowing, running, swimming, fast-walk treadmill, stair machine, jump rope, elliptical, bike): These exercises do not build strength. Cardio exercise does nothing to prevent osteoporosis or to strengthen bone. They do help build cardiac power and muscle endurance. These exercises do not help with weight loss in any meaningful way, but keeping your body moving with exertion every day is a good idea, and you can't lift heavy weights every day. We strongly advise against running as a cardio exercise because of joint damage. Sprinting outdoors or indoors is fine, but long runs outdoors are physically destructive (even if mentally beneficial) and offer little fitness benefit.
20-25 minutes of pure cardio, twice or at most 3X/wk, is all anybody needs as the cardio component of a fitness program. It doesn't take much time because it's intensity, not duration, that matters. If you have more time on a given day, spend another 1/2 hr on high-rep weights or calisthenics instead of wasting it on more pure cardio.
There are caveats, however. To be effective, cardio has to be HIIT - High Intensity Interval cardio - approx 1-2 minute sprints alternating with one minute sub-sprints to catch your breath. If you can talk or read during cardio, you are wasting your time. A sprint means around 80% of your max heart rate (unless, like me, you are on BP meds that limit your heart rate in which case you just push it to your max which for me is 120). To get that rate up and maximize the stress, use the max resistance (on a treadmill, for example, an incline of 10 or more) and/or your max sprint speeds and put your heart into it. Otherwise, it's fairly useless unless you are over 80 years old or infirm.
Distance runners (I used to be one) and distance swimmers (I used to swim a mile daily) are not accomplishing very much. It feels good, though.
The other Cardio caveat concerns variety. Continuous repetition of the same cardio exercise increases your efficiency with it and thus diminishes its cardio effectiveness, so we need to vary the cardio exercises to keep the stress up. Mix it up, even within one session. Less boring, too. I always add a few minutes of jump rope at the end - singles, running man, and one-footed, to make sure I finish with nothing left in the tank. Jumping is tough and you will see mostly guys doing it - few if any bouncing gals.
An example of a typical cardio day for me would be 5 minutes elliptical warm-up intervals, set above 10, then a one-minute straight-arm plank, then 15 minutes treadmill fast-walk intervals at a 10% incline, then a minute elbow plank, then 5 minutes jump rope. If I have more free time to fill, I'll do some sets of heavy ball throws, light-weight squats, high-rep curls and press-downs.
An Oregon couple has been told they must destroy a 2-acre pond
on their land — the property’s most attractive feature — because the
government said so.
The question remains, however, why any nation would want to throw out its sovereignty to institutions that are fundamentally unaccountable, that provide no mechanism for reversing direction, and whose only "solution" to problems involves arrogating to itself ever more authoritarian, rather than democratically legitimate, power.
Why kid ourselves? Maintain your self-respect by resolving to meet realistic goals. One cool aspect to these is that, if you fail to keep them, it's a good thing instead of a cause for self-loathing. Samples (feel free to borrow):
1. I will not exercise at all and will avoid all forms of difficult or tedious exertion beyond walking around and looking at stuff 2. I will gain weight 3. I will resume smoking 4. I will watch more TV and movies, and read fewer books 5. I will do more take-out and minimize home cooking 6. I will quit vegetables entirely 7. I will not clean out or sort out a single closet 8. I will have a messy desk and disorganized paperwork 9. I will do more things at the last minute, or tomorrow 10. I will buy one more firearm I don't need 11. I will make the HQ a Sanctuary Space for dustballs 12. I will throw more recycles into the regular garbage 13. I will continue to try to avoid the dentist and doctor 14. I will waste more of my precious lifetime looking at ephemeral, meaningless BS on the internet 15. I will ignore "Check Engine" lights and seatbelt alarms 16. I will work harder on loving myself whether I deserve it or not 17. I will give more credit to myself, and less to God.
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.
You see hundreds of these mini-trees in pots during Christmas season. I don't mind them in pots and planters, but as landscape plants (which is where they often end up), I feel they rarely fit in and have a tacky, artificial, gas-station appearance. I have two of them next to my vegetable garden, thrown into the ground many years ago for the heck of it after outdoor Christmas use in outdoor pots. They are about 7' tall now. I hate to cut them down, but I don't like them. They are happy misfits. 
Image via 
We mostly post about resistance exercises and calisthenic exercises. Resistance exercises and calisthenics offer plenty of good cardio-pulmonary challenge in themselves, but some almost pure cardio exercise should be part of the fitness mix. The Conditioning or Fitness Triad is what I call it: a total of 2 hrs mostly weights, 1 hr of heavy+lighter calisthenics, 1+ hr of pure cardio.
Mead's Yule Blog: 
Why kid ourselves? Maintain your self-respect by resolving to meet realistic goals. One cool aspect to these is that, if you fail to keep them, it's a good thing instead of a cause for self-loathing. Samples (feel free to borrow):
