Maggie's Farm

Let's get two things straight first: 

- An hour of physical activity daily, just walking, jogging, or swimming laps, is better than nothing. It's minimal to maintain functionality.

-  You can't lose fat through exercise. That's about food. 

I've been chatting with doctors lately - my cardiologist for my annual stress test (no symptoms, no problems) and the internist who works out in my gym at 5 am. Oh, and my pure weights friend who is my internist (he is buff at 60). They joke about people who do long/slow exercise instead of weights and HIIT, but they are wrong to disparage people who make the effort to do anything more than sit on their asses. 

Of course, though, I know what the docs are talking about. 

Let's just talk about cardiac fitness rather than just the ability to hike for 5 or 6 hours.  The reasons to do "cardio" exercises are only secondarily for general endurance - they mean to address the heart muscle. That means Cardiac Output when needed, and improving heart vasculature (so you can maybe survive your first heart attack). People who just do "cardio" things do not build or maintain much strength.

That gets us to HIIT. HIIT is a serious cardiac stressor. It's sort-of fun too if you like to sweat. Yes, heavy weights are heart stressors too, but only for seconds. Our Maggie's calisthenics routines are too, to a degree, although they are more oriented to athleticism.

For people who like fitness, one way to do cardio days (assuming you do 2 weights days and 2 calisthenic/sports days) is to use the hour or so to mix in the HIIT with just trucking along. That's how the idea is designed to work anyway. 

 Low-Intensity Cardio Training: What Is It & How Does It Work? (Note that they assume that low intensity is just one part of a fitness program) 

 Is High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) the Most Efficient Way to Work Out? A simple guide to high-intensity interval training, or HIIT, the fitness trend du jour.

Eventually, we will all break down, get frail, and die (or die before we get frail), but why not make the most of today? Fitness is not about life span.

Meet the Australian lady behind your GPS 

WSJ: The Primary Breadwinner Is Disappearing From More Homes

 Protesters demand trans inmates be removed from all-female New Jersey prison, where 1 in 15 people were born male

 Thirty Years of Global Warming Prophecies

Meritocracy is racist 

 The Government’s Own Numbers Show Biden’s EV Mandate Is Crazy

Not serious 

Another menu I just found from our October hiking trip in Provence. No choices - it was what the Chef wanted to do that night. Olive Oil Ice? Yeah. Quite amazing. But for me, it's all about the cheeses.

 Primitive Asgard Cells Show Life on the Brink of Complexity. As researchers race to cultivate more of the intriguing cells from the deep seafloor, the few cells now growing in labs are giving us our best glimpses of the forerunners of all complex life.

Who was David Reimer?

 Too much AI has big drawbacks for doctors — and their patients

 Progressives’ years-long campaign to get NYers to flee state is working

 Natural Gas Derangement Syndrome

Nellie always is amusing: TGIF: They Can’t Handle The Truth. A professor lies about race. A newspaper condemns a leak. A state cooks data to hide its missing students. Plus: the Dalai Lama. And much more.

 The College Kids Who Unionized Amazon

 Diversity or Merit

 Political scientist: DEI policies linked to decrease in free speech support on campus, surveys show

 Hamas Official: May Allah Bring Annihilation Upon The Jews….

 The Chicago Teachers Union Now Runs the Mayor’s Office

"You will probably not recognize the name of Audrey Hale. For reasons that are not perhaps as opaque as they seem, her name and her cause have been conveniently erased from public consciousness.  After all, she shot up a Christian school, murdering three children and three adults last week." 

Some guys want to be eunuchs 

 Image via Doug Ross

 Global Warming Blamed for Home Runs

 "Bali is part of a growing number of popular travel destinations that are fed up with overtourism

This guy is no ballerina 

How large is Mexico? 

 College students with intellectual disabilities deserve better standards, agency says

"You Just Lied!": Elon Crushes BBC Reporter's Claims About 'Hate Speech' On Twitter

 Pouty NPR Claims That Twitter's 'State-Affiliated Media' Designation Undermines NPR's Credibility

 The Media and Politicians Keep Trying To Censor Things That Turn Out To Be True. The COVID-19 lab leak theory was labeled "misinformation." Now it's the most plausible explanation.

" Over the past three years, we reporters learned there were certain things that we weren’t allowed to say."

Why The People Who Cry "Hate Speech!" Are The Biggest Haters

As we have posted almost annually, lawns are not natural. They are more like turf farms. In the US, lawns and golf courses are imitations of UK sheep meadows and cattle pastures. 

 When to fertilize your lawn in spring? Lawn experts share their advice. Get the timing right for when you fertilize your lawn for lush and healthy results

The Pentagon Leak Is Really Bad, So Is Government’s Response

I believe nothing 

 Global Warming Blamed for Home Runs

 Stop freaking out over teenagers with fast-food jobs

 NYT gets what they wanted...good and hard

 Merit Over Identity - Dismantling DEI bureaucracies is the key to reviving American universities.

 The UK is among a number of countries with military special forces operating inside Ukraine, according to one of dozens of documents leaked online.

I'm not much of a stretcher except before heavy lifts. What good does it do?

 It's 50 years since Picasso died, and a lot of people are using the occasion to womansplain what a bad boyfriend/husband he was.

 The Case Against ‘Medical Assistance in Dying’. Canada’s assisted-death law seems connected to the atomization of our society—as much a symptom of inhumanity as a cause.

Artificial Therapy

 Now, This Makes Sense – Marketing VP Alissa Heinerscheid Explains Why She MadeBud Light the Brand for Woke Transvestites

 How to Understand the Well-Being Gap between Liberals and Conservatives

 CAN THE DEMOCRATS’ STRUCTURAL ADVANTAGES BE OVERCOME?

 Victor Davis Hanson: Fiddling America Away

 The Left has killed our great cities

 New York Times goes full Trump Derangement Syndrome

Likeable guy

 Then and Now - This is Easter, a holiday commemorating a miracle. That is good, because we are going to need one. 

 Mom Who Was Arrested for Letting 14-Year-Old Babysit Has Finally Been Cleared

 AI Therapy Is Here

 Get Serious: About Purpose. We have become a treatment-resistant Prozac Nation. But the practice of believing in something—anything—can pull us out.

 Is Therapy-Speak Making Us Selfish? Boundaries are important. But our relationships require a touch more compassion than some online blueprints offer.

Swiss government withdraws all recommendations for Covid vaccines

 The School That Couldn’t Quit Covid

 GERMANS HAVE GIVEN UP ON “GREEN” ENERGY

 The increasingly dangerous transgender movement sweeping America

 A Lot of the Trans Folks Are Self-Identifying as Violent Now

 BUD LIGHTHEADED

 American Politics Has Become Amplified Rage

  Scientific American Compares DeSantis to Mussolini. Florida’s governor is a “fascist” for listening to voter concerns about leftist indoctrination in schools.

 George Floyd riots rewritten as "2020 fires"

 Dems play same old hand: The Trump Card

 Victor Davis Hanson expounds on the grave unfairness of President Trump’s indictment

 How Did George Soros’ Son Score So Many WH Meetings?

 Chinese Aircraft Carrier 'Seals Off' Taiwan, Sends 58 Planes To Buzz Island

Putin saved NATO 

Believer or not, it's a joyful hymn that brings tears. God knows how Jesus or Paul would have reacted.

With a black Christian conservative

 A good, long read about forgiveness. Perfect for Holy Saturday: The Limits of Forgiveness.

Is forgiveness a choice, a blessing, or weakness? Is it for them or for yourself?

This year, we're doing a light brunch after church (quiche, salad, crudite, cheese, etc) and then pizza and Easter Cake with the family littles later in the day.

Which reminds me of my favorite pizza joint in NYC: Artichoke, right off the High Line and next to Chelsea Market. Not thin crust, but thin enough. A good New Yorky joint. Forget the artichoke thing - their basic ones are delicious. Good beers too.

Mrs. BD and her dad ventured out today to the real Italian market a few towns away. Everybody there speaks Italian or Sicilian, including most of the customers. Place smells amazing from all of the cheese and salumi and pickled vegetables. And, next door, is an Italian pastry shop. All of it, the best food on this planet. 

We tend towards the Italian on religious holidays. Mrs. BD is 50%; her dad is as Irish as can be. However, trust me, Italian blood beats celtic or anglo-saxon every time. 

She needed candied citron for Easter Pie (Wheat Pie). Naturally, they brought home a bunch of arancini for lunch. They were the size of baseballs. I've never seen them that big in Sicily. Also, baccala for tonight. Hard as wood at first.

For today, baccala to keep with her family tradition. For Easter dinner, a Nice Legga Lamb. That's the Irish part. Just 4 of us, sad to say this year. Distancing, for what it's worth. I miss the whole BD family but I miss church a lot too. It doesn't feel right. I love our congregation.

 Law Prof Calls Out Stanford Students for ‘Infantile Protests’

 The Work Ethic in Today's America

A  Censored Generation

 The more you trust the media, the less accurate you are

 At MIT debate, DEI defenders concede diversity policies can make ‘things worse’

 Kudos to Cornell and Stanford for finally standing up for free speech

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: WE’RE IN A REVOLUTION

 You’re Being Played, Republicans!

 Chicago Crosses the Rubicon

 Politico: “That’s not how our system is supposed to work.”

 "Trump Can't Get A Fair Trial In NYC" - Dershowitz Warns "He'll Probably Be Convicted"

 For the left, putting Trump through a painful prosecution is the point

"The Last War We Can Afford To Fight": Tucker Carlson Sounds Alarm Over De-Dollarization, Slams Biden Admin For Pissing Off World