Tuesday, December 6. 2016
Mrs. Barrister and I update our address book whenever we feel forced to, but only get around to revising our Christmas Card subset of the address book every several years.
Doing Christmas cards is an important tradition, an annual rite of connection. Also, one more holiday hassle. At our house we tend to get around to sending Christmas cards biennially because of the challenge of getting good, full-family photos but we are giving up on that challenge this year. It just didn't happen. We wanted everybody on horses in Montana, but assembling family is herding cats. The purpose of the photo is to prove your continued existence, but all it reveals is your aging and the touch of grey.
Anyway, what I wanted to say was that revising the Christmas list is mostly sad, not cheerful. You see how many have died, moved far away, divorced, or moved entirely out of your lives with no known address. The cheerful side is to stay in touch with those who have moved too far to see with any frequency or at all, and to acknowledge the new good friends you have made since your last revision.
We have been blessed with lasting friendships going back to grade school and prep school, and ones as new as this year. I will never move, as many do, to Florida for taxes or hot weather or, God forbid, California, as many friends seem to do. It pains me when people move away. Some people can not stay put, can live happily with shallower roots. Like restless pioneers, they move on and build rich new lives wherever they go. We do not have that ability or that restlessness; we do not want to rip the relationship fabric or the Yankee territorial fabric of our life however imperfect or highly-taxed it may be - and it is not meaningfully imperfect anyway - just expensive.
This post is my Christmas Card from Connecticut to all of our good readers, site visitors, fellow contributors and friendly bloggers. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Cheery Solstice, and God bless us, every one.
Can organizational professionalism be taught?
People who rise to the top of organizations generally have more important skills than pure IQ. Knowing how to manage people up, sideways, and down is an essential organizational skill. So is knowing how to keep emotion out of it all, how to maintain a professional distance from others without being cold or aloof, how to gain authority without being a jerk, calm social and organizational judgement, and so on.
People who start their own businesses or other organizations often learn such things slowly, by trial and error. In my career, I found Covey's classic 7 Habits of Highly Effective People to be quite useful.
Perhaps professionalism can be learned, but not taught.
Intel is Winning Over Blockchain Critics By Reimagining Bitcoin's DNA
 The cheapest deal is a subscription to Maggie's Farm's website - it's free with instant world-wide delivery, faster than Santa or Amazon Prime.
A slightly more generous gift would be a year's subscription to Yankee Magazine. It's useful, innocent, and wholesome.
Glossier, and not Yankee (more Dixie-oriented) but quite enjoyable, is Garden & Gun magazine.
Malanga: Making high-quality career training central to American schooling
Monday, December 5. 2016
This chemical reaction might creep you out
A nice benefit of Maggie's website management are notifications when posts are shared.
Validation is always welcome. It's great to see someone pick up on your writing and think "I am glad I was able to add to the discussion." I believe this holds when a piece is shared on a site opposing what you've written. I'm not interested in an echo chamber.
Twenty months after writing this post on data, I received notification of its inclusion on another site. Upon reading, one might be inclined to believe I'm not a fan of data. Not true, I just don't put my full faith in everything as it is presented, or simply because it's presented, to me.
Since my post, 20 months have passed and nothing has changed. In fact the 2016 election was an example of organizations simply accepting data, becoming reliant on it, while few questioned its value. The data left me, and many others, inclined to believe Hillary would win. At the same time, it left me angry about how it was presented in a "See? We have more information and you don't know what's really going on" manner. The day of the election, however, the long lines I saw (in New York City) left me with the impression the data may not be telling the whole story. If Hillary voters in a safe city were turning out in droves, I came to the conclusion turnout would be high across the board, and high turnout usually coincides with a desire for change. The data itself may not be 'wrong' but whoever was using it was doing so improperly.
Continue reading "Data and Risk"
Higher Ed today entails so many more things than it seemed to in the elite colleges that I was familiar with as a lad. They were mostly general education/acculturation/cultural transmission schools for gentlemen (separate schools for ladies) with majors which often had nothing to do with any planned vocation.
In my provincial New England bubble-world, there was no awareness of vocational higher-ed other than the Major of pre-med, and Engineering. I guess I had vaguely heard of Ag schools but never heard of a "business major". It might be my ignorance, but it seems to me that a proliferation of vocationally-oriented higher ed programs has altered the historical meaning and purpose of "higher-ed." Perhaps I am a dinosaur.
To what extent does it make sense for higher ed to be vocationally-oriented? Much of it already is. But can educational institutions even judge what sorts of training will be of value in the future? Educating the workplace.
 Good for a morning giggle: I named it Spot
Another morning giggle: Castro’s hearse breaks down
As Double Dutch Wanes in New York, Competition Comes From Abroad
Peng Chang-kuei, Chef Behind General Tso’s Chicken, Dies at 98
Manuel, Andrew Sachs, 'Fawlty Towers' star, dies at 86
Why Ikea Causes So Much Relationship Tension
Fake news update: Newsweek never read their own “Madam President” issue
Op-ed: In this age of internet hate, it’s time to revisit limits on free speech
Inside every do-gooder lies a latent totalitarian
The Insensitivity Police Now Patrol Many Colleges
Snotty, Smug, Know-Nothing Students At Ohio State Decide Now Is A Pretty Good Time To Lecture Everyone On Their Bigotry
Ohio State Student After Attack: 'The Left Is More Scared of Trump Than of ISIS'
Jon Stewart Goes Off: Obama ‘Terrible for Press Freedom;’ Left’s Race-Baiting ‘Has to Stop’
Pielke: My Unhappy Life as a Climate Heretic
Fake News: ‘Climate Change’ Could Maybe Possibly Spark Humanitarian Crisis
There are always and have always been humanitarian crises
Black Lives Matter praises Castro as revolutionary and harborer of cop killers
Why It Will Be Hard to Repeal Obamacare
There is an easy way: Create a better alternative
Big Labor threw tons of cash at Democrats, but workers voted red: report
Sultan: 5 Lessons for Republicans from Trump's Win
Zero: A Very Concise Explanation Of Why The Democrats Lost (And Will Keep Losing)
WATCH Tucker Carlson Take On The New York Times’ Public Editor Over The Paper’s Liberal Bias
Trump Chooses “Mad Dog” Mattis for Pentagon Chief - Leftists foam at the mouth and gnash their teeth.
Surber: "How to Rebuild the Republican Party" after Trump
5 Reasons Barack Obama Will Be Viewed As One Of The Worst Presidents of All Time
Daughter of Top EU Official Raped-Murdered in Germany By Afghan Migrant
She was a "Welcome Migrants" volunteer. Heartbreaking.
Scott Adams: Trump and the Taiwan Call
Iran threatens action if Obama signs bill to extend sanctions
Sunday, December 4. 2016
According to Z-man, They don’t really like black people very much. They like the idea of black people
This is dramatically-illustrated by some college students: How White Liberals Really View Black Voters
Viewed as incapable of handling normal life.
Without heavy regular use, muscle fibers die (never to be recovered) or atrophy (can be recovered with effort). Such is the fate of the middle-aged body. Young people can add new muscle fibers with exertion, old people can not.
In later years, it is easier to improve strength and endurance than bigger muscles. See discussion.
Matthew 3:1-12
3:1 In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming,
3:2 "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near."
3:3 This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, "The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.'"
3:4 Now John wore clothing of camel's hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey.
3:5 Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan,
3:6 and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.
3:7 But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
3:8 Bear fruit worthy of repentance.
3:9 Do not presume to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.
3:10 Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
3:11 "I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
3:12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."
Perfect day for a bird hunt yesterday. The only imperfection is that my car key ended up somewhere in the brush.
Saturday, December 3. 2016
When you have kids and enter middle age, you think about what you will leave behind you for the future, for future generations in your family line. Everybody does that, I think, in their own way. It's the way culture and subcultures are maintained.
Valued (or not) material items and photos are one sentimental part of that, but these things become diluted and dispersed over time, as does any money that is left behind. A family's cultural traditions, habits, and pleasures are the best inheritance to leave behind with hopes that they will carry meaning and value as far into the future as you can throw them. Messages from the graveyards - from your own future graveyard, and those of your ancestors.
The parental job is transmission of genes and culture, and the provision of food and shelter. That's about it, but it's not an easy job in today's world. If you were a serf on a lord's estate in England in 1300, it was an uncomplicated if tiresome job.
What's your opinion?
 It's party season. Everybody has his favorite Eggnog recipe. I prefer Eggnog made with Kentucky bourbon rather than rum, brandy, etc.
Here's the correct, home-made version from Alton Brown. However, I tend to be lazy and to do the wrong thing - to buy the pre-made, and fuss it up with the fixins. Lots of fresh-grated nutmeg.
My Dad always made it the correct way at Christmastime, but I think he made it way too strong, Brit-style like punch. It had a punch.
 Pic borrowed from Salt Water New England
Resurrecting Honor (h/t Am. Digest)
One way to become poor
What I Saw Tracking Down the Mentally Ill in Jail
The truth about the Scopes trial
A mystery: driver decapitated after claiming car's cruise control was stuck
What are the freest countries in the world?
EPA: What's your gender identity?
What is hers?
U. Toronto lecturer: ‘Misconception’ that there’s a thing called ‘biological sex’
Somebody should inform the birds and the bees
Swedish Union Sets Up 'Mansplaining' Hotline - Workers could call in to receive advice from a cadre of gender experts and feminist politicians.
Sweden's biggest problem, no doubt
Professor Says Human Extinction in 10 Years is "A Lock"
Europe’s Protected Forests Chopped Down to Meet Renewable Energy Mandates
Virginia School System Considers Banning 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' and 'To Kill a Mockingbird'
The Keith Ellison Perplex
Althouse and Rush on low-information voters
How Trump Turned the National Media Into Impotent Hecklers
... the media had zippo to do with uncovering many of the major scandals that hit the Obama White House. Were we naive enough to count only on the media to uncover scandal, we would not know about the IRS, the myriad of surveillance improprieties, the truth about Benghazi, Fast and Furious, or the Clinton Foundation. Moreover, instead of uncovering scandal, our media did everything to ensure these inconvenient truths couldn't cripple Obama.
Trump’s Carrier Deal Is Big Problem Or Something
Mexico on Carrier deal: 'Trump is telling the truth' about saving US jobs
CNN Crew Jokes about Donald Trump's Plane Crashing
Barone: So I find myself leaning reluctantly toward the conclusion that no other Republican could have won, at least the way Trump did.
Trumped-up, trickle-down outrage - On the popular reaction to the presidential election.
Trump’s Narrow Win Is Not a Landslide, It’s an Opportunity:
. . . want to make America great again? Then let us be America. Preside over a government that stops telling us how to do it, that pretends its “progressive” pieties are “our values.” Preside over a government that does well the few things we need it to do and gets reacquainted with its limitations. Do that and there will be no need in 2020 to explain how you can eke an electoral victory out of a popular minority
Trump’s Charm of Not Being Obama - The new White House won’t fail to embrace the jobs that fracking and pipelines can bring
Europe: The peasants are revolting
Europe has deplorable voters too
Trumpian "diplomacy" - no rules, no protocol
Friday, December 2. 2016
It is difficult to hold an "adult conversation" with uninformed or uneducated people. When almost anything can be politicized and anybody can become suddenly emotional or indignant, it is often best just to shut up. McInnes humorously discusses Reality Bites.
At first, Trump was just a clown. I thought so. Then he morphed into a dangerous crazy person. Now that he has been elected (I still have trouble believing it, but he has a misunderestimated Talent Stack), we sense that a new fear is emerging - a fear that he may be successful in some ways. Simon notes that Trump's optimism about America is driving gloomy leftoids crazy.
Even the always-cautious Walter Mead sees reason for optimism.
Best reason for optimism? We have Melania. From Dylan's political I Shall Be Free:
Well, my telephone rang it would not stop
It's President Kennedy callin' me up
He said, "My friend, Bob, what do we need to make the country grow" ?
I said, "My friend, John, "Brigitte Bardot,
Anita Ekberg, Sophia Loren"
Country'll grow.
|
