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.
It's basically government day care, isn't it? Progressives relentlessly pursue their cradle-to-grave programs to turn all Americans into wards of the State (or serfs - we're already serfs, given the % of our labor we have generously voted to offer to our morally- and intellectually-superior Lords).
We wonder why we serfs do this. Perhaps we have so many immigrants with serf and slave heritages that they are comfortable with it or comforted by it, but not even Marx would have imagined Democratic Feudalism.
40:1 I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry.
40:2 He drew me up from the desolate pit, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.
40:3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the LORD.
40:4 Happy are those who make the LORD their trust, who do not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after false gods.
40:5 You have multiplied, O LORD my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you. Were I to proclaim and tell of them, they would be more than can be counted.
40:6 Sacrifice and offering you do not desire, but you have given me an open ear. Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required.
40:7 Then I said, "Here I am; in the scroll of the book it is written of me.
40:8 I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart."
40:9 I have told the glad news of deliverance in the great congregation; see, I have not restrained my lips, as you know, O LORD.
40:10 I have not hidden your saving help within my heart, I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation; I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness from the great congregation.
40:11 Do not, O LORD, withhold your mercy from me; let your steadfast love and your faithfulness keep me safe forever.
A reader advised us that the Macaroni Pie in The Leopard was one local version of Timballo (or "Timpano"). There appear to be numerous local versions. I've never heard of it, but I want to try a good one.
Sometimes it's made with eggplant (aubergines), sometimes not. The version I had read about had hard-boiled eggs and chicken liver in it. Sounded delicious.
Here's a good post about Timballo. Lots of recipes pop up if you google "Timballo recipe."
Many of the recipes are made with Tagliarini, and almost sound like a molded Mac and Cheese with goodies inside, while some seem more like a molded lasagna.
Off topic, but during my research I stumbled on more tagliarini - the well-molded Bianca Tagliarini.
As is well-known, at least in New England, the Austrian von Trapp family (they dropped the von in the US) settled in Stowe, VT, where they opened the Trapp Family Lodge in 1950. The family, whose story is that of The Sound of Music, still owns and operates the Lodge.
White Food: “Anytime somebody orders a corned beef sandwich on white bread with mayonnaise, somewhere in the world, a Jew dies.”
To American women looking for relief from their endless homemaking duties, the invention of sliced bread in 1928 was the greatest thing since, well…since the invention of wrapped bread in 1915, which allowed consumers to buy bread never touched by (no doubt diseased) human hands.
My photo of one of the busy shoe stations came out too blurry to post, but here's a tip: The next time you're in Grand Central Station (Terminal, to be accurate) in NY, and have a spare 15 minutes, indulge yourself in a shoe-shine. It's a strangely-luxurious thing to sit up in the incredibly-comfy leather high chairs - they hand you the day's NY Post to read - to let those guys do a real professional spit shine on your good shoes.
You can even bring them a bag of shoes, and pick them up later. It's not just for guys - the gals do it too.
$4.00 per pair. Given how carefully and how hard these guys work, I usually figure a $4 tip too. It's never wrong to tip them before you pay, not after. Being capitalists, they will do one heck of a job for you. I hate to shine my shoes.
The Station, late-morning after rush hour. How many towns would love to have a grand, busy and fun place like this? Fun food joints on the lower level. They don't make 'em like this anymore.
Obama
Administration Demands Racial Quotas in School Discipline - See more
at:
http://www.mindingthecampus.com/forum/2014/01/obama_administration_demands_r.html#sthash.v5gvo85V.dpuf
Galileo famously stated that our Universe is a “grand book” written in the language of mathematics. So why does our universe seem so mathematical, and what does it mean? In my new book “Our Mathematical Universe”, I argue that it means that our universe isn’t just described by math, but that it is math in the sense that we’re all parts of a giant mathematical object, which in turn is part of a multiverse so huge that it makes the other multiverses debated in recent years seem puny in comparison.
and
My starting assumption, the external reality hypothesis, states that there exists an external physical reality completely independent of us humans. When we derive the consequences of a theory, we introduce new concepts and words for them, such as “protons”, “atoms”, “molecules”, “cells” and “stars”, because they're convenient. It's important to remember, however, that it's we humans who create these concepts; in principle, everything could be calculated without this baggage.
But if we assume that reality exists independently of humans, then for a description to be complete, it must also be well-defined according to non-human entities – aliens or supercomputers, say – that lack any understanding of human concepts. That brings us to the Mathematical Universe Hypothesis, which states that our external physical reality is a mathematical structure.
If President Obama really wants to set us on a course to greater income mobility, he could confront head-on the problem of father absence, perhaps in his January 28 State of the Union address. But instead, after $20 trillion in real spending on the War on Poverty, I anticipate we’ll hear a public call for still more federal spending aimed at aiding “our neediest citizens,” or overcoming income inequality through new government-led reforms.
What were the programs proposed by Lyndon Johnson that envisioned an America without poor people? They included not one program that transferred wealth from one slice of society to another to reduce poverty. They were job programs, education and skill training and legal help to gain access to housing and jobs. These included Volunteers In Service To America (VISTA), Job Corps, Head Start, GED programs, and Community Action Agencies to bring the poor, with programs they helped design, into the mainstream. Whether these were the right strategies -- and I now have my doubts -- they did not include trillions for a bailout to help people stay self-sufficient. For us now to say the War on Poverty was a success because we handed out the financial resources to alleviate poverty is a gross misunderstanding of the war in order to support the conclusion the war was at least in part won.
Many people in America do not mind relative poverty. Money isn't everything; freedom and self-determination is a lot, and the most important thing in the US.
She points out the (rather obvious) practical and economic advantages of committed relationships. I can't imagine handling all of the complexities of life without a partner.
A colleague who teaches in the humanities at the state college where I work also teaches at a nearby private college. In the colleague’s description, the private college is perpetually in the grip of a panic over the prospect of a drop in enrollment. The college’s administration has therefore instituted an unwritten but implacable policy the upshot of which is that the student is always right, no matter how absurd his complaint, and the consequence of which is that instructors must never tax students beyond an infantile minimum of scholarly exertion. Among the consequences of the consequence are that students refuse to undertake out-of-class reading assignments, fail quizzes related to those assignments, and then lodge complaints with chairs and deans against the instructor.
JFK drove the nail in the coffin of mens' hats. Trouble is, hats are a good way to stay warm in winter. They say that, if your head and feet are warm, you're warm.
Unless you are bald or wear a crew-cut, hats give you hat hair and you look like a dork when you take it off.
It's a dilemma: comfort vs. vanity.
Do you guys wear hats when it's cold? If so, what hat?
I have a few interesting days in NYC this week. I am happy to report that, thus far, the new commie mayor has had no negative impact on this liveliest and most bustling of places. It's a jolt of vitality every time. I felt the same way as a kid.
A reader advised us that the Macaroni Pie in The Leopard was one local version of 
T&A, with guns: (video) 
JFK drove the nail in the coffin of mens' hats. Trouble is, hats are a good way to stay warm in winter. They say that, if your head and feet are warm, you're warm.