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.
Bands with handles, and those without, are excellent general fitness tools. For people who just want to keep moving and to stay functional without powerlifting or high- intensity cardio, you can do almost anything with them: legs, arms, back, and abs.
I tend to think of bands as ways to intensify the calisthenics part of the fitness triad. Many people are not very disciplined with home exercise (including me), but anything stressful is good.
64:1 O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence--
64:2 as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil-- to make your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence!
64:3 When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.
64:4 From ages past no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who works for those who wait for him.
64:5 You meet those who gladly do right, those who remember you in your ways. But you were angry, and we sinned; because you hid yourself we transgressed.
64:6 We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.
64:7 There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity.
64:8 Yet, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.
64:9 Do not be exceedingly angry, O LORD, and do not remember iniquity forever. Now consider, we are all your people.
2 days of cooking, 25-30 friends and family, all fireplaces blazing, pre-dinner silly games and a long after-dinner walk in the dark and, often, chilly drizzle. Mrs. BD did the flowers for each table. Usually 4 tables set up in the living room, dining room for buffet and kitchen table for desserts.
Maybe next year. Last night we took our team of 12 out for a pre-TG dinner. Good times, and Mrs. BD brought her own squash pies for dessert.
Didn't get any port this year. Happy Thanksgiving to all. There is so much to be thankful for and I do not mean material comforts although those do matter too. We're doing diner take-out for the three of us (us two, and F-in-law) to celebrate in front of the fireplace. Bought a bottle of Highland Park just for him. Maybe me too.
Multiple Editors At Random House Broke Down In Tears After Hearing The Company Will Publish Jordan Petersen’s Next Book…These people are not well in the head.
On January 20, 2021, the media will cease reporting on the coronavirus. The stories will then all be about the great recovery engineered by Joe Biden in the first hours of his presidency.
... after 37 weeks of pandemic, too many American parents are too tapped out. Decades of research has definitively shown that the presence of a responsive caregiver, especially during early childhood, when the brain is extremely plastic, is the crucial ingredient in healthy development. This stable adult attention is exponentially more meaningful when children are growing up in persistent adversity: environments of neglect, abuse, deprivation, or poverty that medical and psychological professionals call “toxic stress.”
At the turn of the century, the Eastern Wild Turkey was nearly eradicated by hunting and habitat loss, and was entirely absent in the Northeast.
By the mid 1800s, the woodlands of New England had disappeared for farming, charcoal production, and lumbering.
But the woodlands have returned as farming moved west, and the wierd gobble now can be heard even in residential areas.
Thanks to dramatically successful conservation and transplantation efforts, there are now estimated to be 7 million of these huge iridescent birds, which Ben Franklin felt to be so quintessentially American that he wanted one on the US Seal. (Video of the turkey's comeback here.)
There are six species of wild turkey in the New World, and none elsewhere. (The domestic turkey is likely a descendent of the large Mexican species.) It is the Eastern which we feature here which has, in recent years, been transplanted successfully west of the Mississippi, and elsewhere.
As a sought-after game bird, the turkey's habits have been much studied. They are wary and cautious. In most areas, there is a spring and a fall hunting season for turkey, and they are pursued with bow or shotgun. It is the one game bird which it is sporting to shoot on the ground.
I have hunted them on a couple of occasions. Never managed to shoot one, though. Had a good time however, sitting at the base of a tree in camo, watching the other wild critters pass by.
Does the wild turkey taste different from a supermarket bird? Yes - the wild turkey tastes like turkey and the supermarket bird tastes like a supermarket.
The tail-fanning? That's part of the male's mating strut. The CLO page here, and the website of the worthy National Wild Turkey Federation here.
For the few of our readers who are even bothering with cooking for 3 or four people (I know it's a beloved tradition but sheesh - at least just get take-out or go to the diner if you don't have a jolly crowd), Grandma's Corn Pudding is delicious and easy as pie.
Thanksgiving supper is not about gourmet. Grandma made pudding out of cans.