Sunday, January 2. 2011
One of Alvin Ailey's masterpieces, Revelations - Section 1: Pilgrim of Sorrow.
A redneck was stopped by a game warden in Central Mississippi recently with two ice chests full of fish. He was leaving a cove well-known for its bass.
The game warden asked the man, 'Do you have a license to catch those fish?'
'Naw, sir', replied the redneck. 'I ain't got none of them there licenses. You must understand, these here are my pet fish.'
'Pet fish?'
'Yeah. Every night, I take these here fish down to the lake and let 'em swim 'round for awhile. Then, when I whistle, they jump right back into these here ice chests and I take 'em home.'
'That's a bunch of hooey! Fish can't do that.'
The redneck looked at the warden for a moment and then said, 'It's the truth Mr. Government Man. I'll show ya. It really works.'
'O. K.', said the warden. 'I've got to see this!'
The redneck poured the fish into the lake and stood and waited. After several minutes, the warden says, 'Well?'
'Well, what?' says the redneck.
The warden says, 'When are you going to call them back?'
'Call who back?'
'The FISH,' replied the warden!
'What fish?' replied the redneck.
 iPhone pic of the light show at Saks Fifth Avenue in NYC yesterday, emailed by a friend.
To keep things fair and to level the playing field, there should be a law that all photos in the US must be taken with iPhones. Not fair for some to have better equipment.
The end of Kodachrome (with the song)
Coffee-spew warning - and strong language warning, but it's all in a good cause.
Sheesh. Sounds just like my 7th Grade English teacher.
The Englishman's 7 steps to health in 2011
The most important book of 2010?
Mead takes on the Trinity: Yule Blog 2010: Meaning in Three Dimensions
God is beyond our petty distinctions, boxes, and categories.
Black Bears: This guy is insane
Reckless denial of what "wild" means.
Q&O: The usual "self-absorbed baby-boomers" article
King Coal: The Future Looks A Lot Like The Past
At No Left Turns:
...the American people are in the midst of a serious struggle to figure out what it is that they stand for--what it means to be an American. Obama, Pelosi and Reed have performed the extremely useful service of clarification. We may not fully know what we are, but it is pretty safe to say that after 2010, we certainly know what we are not.
Two Americas: the Americans who want to be given free stuff, and the Americans who do things and make things. The latter just barely out-vote the former - which is to our credit.
How Libs Explain Bush Book Success: It’s Because “He Was So Hated”
Must be why Sarah's books sell so well too - and O'Reilly's.
Via Ross:
By examining ice core samples for the past 10,500 years we learn that approximately 9,100 of the past 10,500 years were warmer than 2010... Thus, regardless of which year ( 1934, 1998, or 2010) turns out to be the warmest of the past century, that year will rank number 9,099 in the long-term list.
Related at Powerline: Relatively Speaking, It's Still Cold
Ron Paul: 'Moral hazard' to keep the scope of big government programs
Via NYM:
Where do I apply? I want to return wampum for Manhattan.
Last Psychiatrist: Taboos Are The Ways Christians Try To Control Us
Timing matters. Burst bubble, and return to normal trendline. Via theo:
97% of climatologists think what?
Radosh: The Second Time is Farce: Frances Fox Piven Calls for a new Cloward-Piven Strategy for Today
From a comment at B&R on Sadie Hawkins online dating:
Here’s my profile: 30 years old; tall 6’3″ male with Doctorate in Finance; recently inherited a substantial sum from my uncle; I’m a loving and caring man who has three shelter dogs and spent his weekends caring for his sick uncle; picked in High School as most likely to succeed in a campaign run exclusively by female students; I’m extremely fit and have continued in sports after winning acclaim at college; I desire an intelligent, progressive minded female; who’s unconcerned with money and seeks to make this world a better place using my base of substantial assets.
Pajamas: The Environmental Protection Agency’s End-Run Around Democracy
Medical care by bureaucrat
For our own good
Insty: More on the higher education bubble
From the drippy Archbishop of Canterbury:
"Whether you're a Christian or belong to another religion or whether you have nothing you'd want to call religion at all, some kind of big picture matters."
Pic reminds me of how thrilled the lad and I were to stand in front of Breughel's large painting in Vienna in August. One of the high points of 2010.
I Like The Christian Life (from Sweetheart of the Rodeo - a wonderful record):
Saturday, January 1. 2011
I meant to re-post this in December. Is it too late?
 Red-neck Yankees wear lined overshirts (like the one in the photo, from Moose Creek) much of the year. Few things are more comfortable, and you don't care what happens to them. They keep you cozy at 50 degrees and at 20 degrees - and lower if you are working hard and moving around.
These things are made for outdoor work. You often need to buy them one size up for layering underneath, depending on your personal size range. They look better and feel softer with some dirt and grease on them, and a small tear or two.
If you want to go a bit upscale from that sort of thing, these are always acceptable (even though they are from LL Bean). They are also made with quilted linings like this for colder weather.
Variants on the theme of overshirts and "shirt-jacs" is this Woolrich wool classic:
Filson's Wool Cape Coat:
A zippered, Windstopper-lined LL Bean Maine Guide wool jacket:
Carhartt's basic canvas, flannel-lined work shirt:
Lined flannel from Woolrich:
Lastly, Caribou Creek quilt-lined, at Cabelas:
Disclosure: Four dump trucks of wool and cotton overshirts were dumped in our Maggie's Farm driveway, blocking all tractor traffic and causing all sorts of problems with the hogs, in exchange for the above post. Please, everybody - Stop giving us free stuff and money! We don't want it! We have enough money and stuff, and it costs money, time, and effort to get rid of excess stuff. Ever try to take a Filson wool cape shirt off a dirty ole 800 lb. hawg who wants to put on airs? Dang.
A re-post - not snowing here today.
 Cold, snowy day up here. It makes you want mashed potatoes and meat and stuff.
I have some nice big white onions left over from making my onion pies this weekend. Some onion fritters would be good with last night's left-over roast. It's really sort of like a spidery mess of onion rings.
I never bother with the deep oil frying, though, for fritters. I just fry them in some canola oil, and it works fine. Best if you sautee the onions lightly first (with some chopped garlic) before mixing the onions with the batter. That way, they are certain to be sweet.
It's nice to have a little dipping sauce for them. A chili-garlic-soy sort of thing with chopped chives is good. Lime, as pictured, is interesting too.
It's Life 101: "Just do the next right thing."
That AA aphorism is good advice for a new year. It helped this lady.
Lots of folks I know spend their spare time sitting in Deer stands, with bow or shotgun at hand. Here's the conversation from earlier this season:
How did it go this morning?
Nothing. No buck. A waste of time.
See anything at all?
Saw the sun come up.
Anything else?
A small doe, didn't want to take her.
See anything else?
A Sharp Shinned Hawk buzzed past my head.
Anything else?
Flock of Wild Turkeys walked by.
Anything else?
A Bobcat. No, two Bobcats.
Anything else?
A Box Turtle walking through the leaves.
What are we waiting for? I don't think I need to explain my parable...
From Texas, from BL:
Friday, December 31. 2010
These two NOLA piano-men did a few duets at the festive event I went to a couple of weeks ago. Yes, including Iko Iko and Let The Good Times Roll. Good to see Dr. John - hadn't seen him perform in many years, but I always enjoyed that cranky SOB. Found this duet on Youtube:
Last I heard, there is still a debate about whether Broccoli is good for you, or whether it is a cancer risk.
At Pajamas, Can Congress Make You Buy Broccoli?
I am not from the government, but I advise you to enjoy your champagne, and to have a happy and prosperous 2011 despite all the Lefty nonsense we all have to put up with.
A few lines from Eliot's magnificent No. 4 of The Four Quartets, "Little Gidding":
What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from...
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Our family likes de Kooning, so we'll probably go to the the current show at the MOMA. Here's a brief review of Abstract Expressionist New York. I am still annoyed that we missed the Kandinsky show at the Guggenheim - lines to get in were always too long for me.
Even if I don't really get Jackson Pollock, we'll get a very good lunch someplace.
There was an amusing short book a few years ago about how to write ambiguous lawsuit-proof recommendations for people in whom one had little confidence. One of my favorites lines this one:
"You will be very fortunate if you can get him to work for you."
This one, via Wizbang, might not be law-proof:
"Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap."
Off topic, but I heard an amusing ambiguity on the radio news this week: "This holiday season, people spent more money than they had since 2006."
 Dynastar Twisters, because I like to do the bumps. No bumps means boring. I can't wait to try these on the giant Superstar moguls.
Skiing and hunting - and drinks by the fire - are the blessings of winter. Too bad I don't play Paddle, because that's another one of those winter blessings.
Headed up north right now to Killington with a gang of pals with wives and/or girlfriends, for a merry weekend. We were going to do Sugarloaf, but decided against that drive. We have a Par-tay house, and one of our gang is happily in the program so we always have a fully-sober and emotionally-mature driver.
HNY to our readers.
Thursday, December 30. 2010
The promo:
The Foam Weapon League is an alternative sports league that combines the best of live action role playing and martial arts, featuring male and female Warriors drawn from all walks of life, battling one-on-one in a combat circle using foam rubber weapons.
Like the WWE, each FWL Warrior has their own sci fi- or fantasy-inspired combat character name, as well as a distinctive costume to go along with it. Like a video game brought to life, Warriors wear whatever kind of makeup or costume they desire, and fight with the foam rubber armor and weapon of their choice.
Like the UFC, all FWL fights are 100% real and are not staged or choreographed in any way. FWL Warriors are real athletes who use real martial arts skills, but instead of grappling with or striking opponents with hands and feet, they are only allowed to strike each other with approved foam rubber weapons.
In order to simulate a battle fought with real weapons, Warriors wear harnesses with bags of fake blood attached at strategic points on the body. The first Warrior to break two of his opponent's blood bags wins.
Do foam or silicone breasts count as unfair advantage?
Also performing at the cool event I attended: Davell Crawford, with the Davell Crawford Singers (a 25-person NOLA gospel group). I had a nice chat with Davell afterwards. His grandpa wrote Iko Iko.
This is the only bit I could find on YouTube.
Calculating the unsustainable:
By assuming these 19 million public sector retirees, on average, received a retirement pension equal to 66% of their average base pay of $68,000 per year, you may estimate the total public employee pension bill per year at $862 billion. Similarly, by assuming these 67 million private sector retirees, on average, received a retirement pension equal to 33% of their average base pay of $41,500 per year, you may estimate the total private employee social security bill per year at $920 billion.
The implications of these calculations are difficult to overstate. Using assumptions which are well documented and representative of the actual wage and benefit realities in California, extrapolated to the United States as a whole, it is clear that the California model would mean that public sector retirees would cost taxpayers $862 billion per year, which is only 6% less than the entire bill for social security for more than six times as many people.
All about monotheism, Abraham, and a mental experiment creating religion amnesia: How Did God Get Started?
One quote from the lengthy essay by Colin Wells:
...faith is the unassailable citadel to which religion withdrew after reason had overrun much of its original territory. And, let’s be honest, storming religion’s territory is what rational inquiry came into this world doing. In the face of such relentless, even terrifying, psychological pressure, it makes sense that our collective embrace of the supernatural, if it was to persist without dissolving completely, would have to tighten to the point of obsessiveness.
But faith is also a mobile citadel, a portable fortress. Having evolved precisely to occupy the territory inaccessible to reason, faith evolved mechanisms to move fluidly with the boundaries of that territory, or, as with apocalypticism, to blithely revise its truth claims about the imminent end of the world as fast as they’re discredited by the world’s contrarian perseverence. Faith’s quicksilver essence can never be rationally pinned down: the harder you press, the faster it squirts out from under your finger. Like the alien monster in countless movies, faith only gets stronger every time you shoot at it.
If this model is correct in its psychology, monotheistic faith will spread across the globe together with reason—as indeed it seems to be doing already, whether through outright conversion or the subtle moulding of older traditions such as Hinduism and Buddhism into more monotheistic forms. Faith and reason help define the package we call Western civilization. We might even say that they do define it, and that they also account for its stunning global success.
Transcranial magnetic stimulation.
I am only recently hearing about this new thing. I don't know whether it sounds more like voodoo or more like light shock treatment. It is said to work for some, but I wonder how much is placebo effect.
Psychiatrists are setting up centers to provide this. It is very expensive.
Via Bernard Goldberg's Trials and Errors:
Radio talk show host Dennis Prager posed the following question: What’s the difference between the voters in California and the passengers on the Titanic? The obvious answer was that the poor souls on the doomed ship didn’t vote to hit the iceberg.
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