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.
"My thinking now is that the election is likely to be a blowout landslide, somewhere between the elections of 1980 and 2008 in scope. I just don’t know which way."
The seal population around the Cape and the Islands has rebounded remarkably since the Sea Mammal Protection Act. Seals attract Great Whites, and when they are around the seals get out of the pool.
The aerial video is stunning witness. Watch it. In summer, we often swim amongst these big guys, up to 600 lbs. Not cuz we want to, but because they seem to like to swim over to say hi.
Michael worries about dying old mill towns in upstate New York and similar places and wonders why the party of free enterprise doesn’t have more to offer people dwelling in them. He imagines a disability fraudster dwelling in Garbutt, N.Y., and asks what we (we conservatives) are going to do for him and his sad little town. (Among the many dishonest responses to my piece were those treating the addled fraud artist in Garbutt as my hostile literary invention rather than Michael’s sympathetic one; no doubt Michael will have a lot to answer for the next time he visits the Greater Garbutt Chamber of Commerce.) My answer is that if there’s nothing for you in Garbutt but penury, dysfunction, and addiction, then get the hell out.
Singer, actress. "The American Beauty." She was a 200-pounder in this photo.
One of her husbands was Diamond Jim Brady. Diamond Jim liked jewels and food. Probably had Binge Eating Disorder, but all prosperous guys over-ate in those days.
It's all the rage these days, and rightly so. "Over the hill" is just a state of mind. There is a 92 year-old dude who does weights at my gym. Use it or lose it.
That good old guy must love life to pursue it so vigorously.
The reason for strength conditioning is to build or maintain functionality. That means preventing the muscle and bone loss of inertia and age, strengthening joints, improving posture, improving balance, enhancing nerve-to-muscle reactivity, and building or maintaining power and energy for daily life and for sports and recreation.
Strength training is not the same as "body-building." Normal strength-training by ordinary people like us is not meant to build bulging muscles. However, with each increment of improvement and with proper diet your naked self will look and feel a bit less like a weak slob with flab and sagging things, and that is a nice side benefit.
Should a healthy adult male be able to do a minimum of ten push ups and ten pull-ups? Of course. Sturdy males can do far more.
A comment about time efficiency in strength conditioning - and fitness in general - below the fold -
UN Human Rights Commissioner Louise Arbour, who insisted that there’s no difference between the once supposedly unassimilable Irish Catholics and East European Jews and the new Pushtun goatherds and Mogadishu hoodlums. It’s one of the curious aspects of self-proclaimed “multiculturalists” that they are, essentially, uniculturalists: they think everybody’s the same. But sometimes history doesn’t repeat itself — and Emma Lazarus’ lousy poem is an even lousier guide to social policy.
...the long-belated saga of the Minnesota Coronary Experiment may also make a broader point about how science gets done: it suggests just how difficult it can be for new evidence to see the light of day when it contradicts widely held theories.
What strikes me about it is the utter pointlessness of it. The endless posing and posturing has no end because it has no end point. A faithful Christian at least has the serenity of his communion with God. The Muslim, at the click of the detonator, knows he will be with Allah. Climate change fanatics have nothing but a hopeless misery. Even if all of their policies are enacted, nothing comes of it.
Problem is that the climate moonbats discredit worthy efforts at habitat conservation and the like. Serious air pollution, for example, almost eliminated in the US. That's good.
A bunch of government lawyers can mess up your life for a long time, even if they are wrong. Makes more sense for a business to not be a hero - just shut up and pay the extortion.
9:1 Meanwhile Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest
9:2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
9:3 Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.
9:4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"
9:5 He asked, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.
9:6 But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do."
9:7 The men who were traveling with him stood speechless because they heard the voice but saw no one.
9:8 Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus.
9:9 For three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank.
9:10 Now there was a disciple in Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, "Ananias." He answered, "Here I am, Lord."
9:11 The Lord said to him, "Get up and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas look for a man of Tarsus named Saul. At this moment he is praying,
9:12 and he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight."
9:13 But Ananias answered, "Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem;
9:14 and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who invoke your name."
9:15 But the Lord said to him, "Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel;
9:16 I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name."
9:17 So Ananias went and entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul and said, "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit."
9:18 And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and his sight was restored. Then he got up and was baptized,
9:19 and after taking some food, he regained his strength. For several days he was with the disciples in Damascus,
9:20 and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, "He is the Son of God."
Stumbled into this map of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. A major east coast estuary. Man, it covers a lot of real estate and even crosses a mountain range. Major rivers: The Susquehanna, Potomac, Rappahannock, York and James rivers are the five major rivers that flow to the Chesapeake Bay.
These rivers make large parts of the Chesapeake brackish, which is fine with the turtles, waterfowl, Stripers, oysters, and crabs.
Tax Day: 
The 
Singer, actress.
It's all the rage these days, and rightly so. "Over the hill" is just a state of mind. There is a 92 year-old dude who does weights at my gym. Use it or lose it.
Image: That 
Image stolen from 
The real pain 
(It's a lengthy piece about the death of his best friend, 