Tuesday, October 6. 2015
It takes a lot of time and trouble unless you use a slow cooker.
Peeling is the biggest problem.
It's a shame we never found a date for a Maggie's urban hike this Sept. Bulldog mapped one out, but I never had a free weekend day.
Maybe we'll do it in May instead.
The guy at Forgotten New York is an experienced urban hiker. Fun website: Forgotten New York
Sunday, October 4. 2015
Mark 10:2-16
10:2 Some Pharisees came, and to test him they asked, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?"
10:3 He answered them, "What did Moses command you?"
10:4 They said, "Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her."
10:5 But Jesus said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you.
10:6 But from the beginning of creation, 'God made them male and female.'
10:7 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife,
10:8 and the two shall become one flesh.' So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
10:9 Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate."
10:10 Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter.
10:11 He said to them, "Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her;
10:12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery."
10:13 People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them.
10:14 But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, "Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.
10:15 Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it."
10:16 And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.
Saturday, October 3. 2015
 Cool site: Scouting New York
The archives will stay, but now he's scouting LA (h/t, Coyote)
Celebrating Post-Modernism in Journalism and the Media
Hurricane Joaquin Forecast: Why U.S. Weather Model Has Fallen Behind
Hackers steal T-Mobile data on 15 million US customers
Farming in fear
A simple history lesson
The Nazis Wanted to Beat the British With Exploding Chocolate Bars
Psychologist Pours Drain Cleaner in Woman’s Eyes Because She Thinks She Was Meant to Be Blind
More physical mutilation as "therapy"
Is It Sexual Assault to Force a Woman to Shower Alongside the Transgendered?
Whom among us does not enjoy pretty girls in the showers?
Media Narrative: Half-Black Oregon Killer is a "White Supremacist" Was he a Half-White Supremacist?
Mental illness. The press also mentally-disturbed.
Psychologist
Pours Drain Cleaner in Woman’s Eyes Because She Thinks She Was Meant to
Be Blind - See more at:
http://moonbattery.com/?p=63680#sthash.13Z9hwbd.dpuf
The Global Search for Full Pay Students
Guns and alcohol
Michelle Obama Denounces Museums and Concert Halls as Racist
Feds: PPACA risk program may pay just 13% of 2014 claims
They want to bankrupt private insurers
Michelle Obama Denounces Museums and Concert Halls as Racist - See more at: http://moonbattery.com/?p=63656#sthash.WJbYGmAz.dpuf
The War of Amazon, Apple and Other Near-Monopolies
Jobs up only for immigrants, +14,000, down 262,000 for 'native-borns'
How Europe’s Capital Became a Jihadi Recruiting Center
Where is the case for co-ed ground combat?
Putin:
“An aggressive foreign interference has resulted in a brazen destruction of national institutions. ... Instead of the triumph of democracy and progress, we got violence, poverty and social disaster. Nobody cares a bit about human rights, including the right to life.”
Egypt is un-Canadian
Meanwhile, An Islamic Fifth Column Builds Inside America
Plan B for Libya
From a reader on the Connecticut coast. Actually, Seaside Goldenrod. A succulent version of the ordinary, the way Seaside Daisy is.
Friday, October 2. 2015
Two or three of our readers are interested in my "boot camp" activities and progress because it is informative about how trainers approach middle-age fitness these days. It's not much different from how they deal with young athletes.
Fridays are my day for general fitness and muscle endurance. Here's what he had me do this morning:
- 3 minutes of elliptical warm-up (and wake-up), then
- 1 minute elbow plank
- high-rep chest press machine
- high steps
- heavy ball smashes
- rope slams
- low-rep heavy bench press
- pull-ups to failure
- basic burpees
- heavy-hand (kettlebell) farmer's walks to grip failure
- dips to muscle failure
(Repeat the circuit of italicized sets 5 times with only 15-25 seconds between)
- cool down (?) with a couple of minutes on stair machine
That's a tough hour or so for me even without the usual squats with light military presses. I keep trying to remind myself that my breaking point is not what I think it is. I think I'll be able to do my end-of-week general fitness hour without his babysitting soon - but without the heavy bench work.
Tomorrow, he encourages me to begin to add stair machine (I call it stairway to heaven because you can die on that thing) to my cardio day routine to intensify it. It's intense already, but I do what I'm told.
 U.S. Passes 4,000 Breweries
Laid-Off Man Finally Achieves Perfect Work-Life Balance
Correcting the New York Times’s Absurd Vision of the Modern Man
Don't Follow Your Passion
The Latest DIY Trend? Sex Tapes
Twitter Characterizes Disagreeing With Someone’s Opinion as “Abusive Behavior”
Mad scientists beat back the politically correct ‘police’
Race-Track Owners Consider Moving One of the Triple Crown Tracks out of Baltimore, and the City’s Clueless Leaders Cry Foul
Oregon bakery owners refuse to pay damages in gay wedding cake case
WaPo: Problem with capitalism is that you have to work
Al Gore: ‘Democracy Has Been Hacked; Capitalism Is in Need of Serious Reform’
Guy made 250 million on "green" scams. That ain't workin, that's the way to do it...
Backfire on the #RICO20 and Jagadish Shukla is imminent; wagon circling, climbdown, dissolution begins
Guy made millions on "green" scams, without working
Did Hillary Clinton Spike CBS' Coverage Of Benghazi?
What if the Refugees Were Blonde and Blue-Eyed Swedes?
Germany's Sharia Refugee Shelters - "Bulk of Migrants Cannot Be Integrated"
PM slams Abbas’s ‘deafening silence’ after terror attack
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blasted the United Nations and its members
OBAMA LOSES ANOTHER WAR THAT HE 'ENDED' - Afghanistan is turning into a disaster, just like Iraq.
Top EU official warns of rising anti-Semitism in Europe
Coming from the Left and the Muslims, no doubt
The Russian Navy Is Back
China dispatched nuclear-powered submarine on first combat patrol, report says
Iran troops to join Syria war, Russia bombs group trained by CIA
Russia and China want to be players in the world. I don't blame them.
Obama’s Talk and Putin’s Blitz: A Russian Middle East Coup in Three Acts Posted By Claudia Rosett
Thursday, October 1. 2015
Wednesday, September 30. 2015
 Got some advice from my chef friend about Goulash. I have a lot of venison in the freezer, some tender cuts and some tough cuts. Tough cuts are for the goulash.
It's all about paprika. Very simple. Chef tells me real goulash has no tomato in it, and the meat should be falling apart. Like real chili, should be made with meat chunks, not ground meat. No noodles in the stew, but can serve on egg noodles or rice with some sour cream to top it off. This stew at the end should be thick, not soupy.
Recipe:
Brown a few onions in butter and veg oil - not chopped, just quartered, with some garlic
Then brown chunks of tough meat in butter, after seasoning heavily with salt, pepper, and paprika
Cover with chicken or beef broth and bake covered in oven for 2 hours or more.
Then check it for moisture, add some broth or water if needed, check for salt, add more paprika. Can add some potato chunks if you want.
Then back in the oven for another hour or 2. If too soupy, uncover and let it thicken in oven longer or cheat and stir in some thickener.
I guess crock pot would work, but it would need to cook a while at the end to thicken.
Here's an example: Real Hungarian Goulash
 Is empathy overrated?
I never trust expressions of empathy
Almost All US Temperature Data Used In Global Warming Models Is Estimated or Altered
The Stunning "Explanation" An Insurance Company Just Used To Boost Health Premiums By 60%
"It's Not Right To Make A Profit on Public Land"
How to fix our educational system
‘Affordable’ Housing: Karma’s a You-Know-What
Pope’s World and the Real World
The New Rich -- Living the High Life Through Your Non-Profit
Elizabeth Warren Goes Crazy for Black Lives Matter
President Donald Trump Holds First News Conference
Z-man:
These Muslims are not looking to become German, even if that were a possibility. They are not seeking temporary shelter from a storm back home. The majority are men of military age, who should be back home fighting to make their country safe again. No, this is just a bunch of people looking for a better deal.
Tuesday, September 29. 2015
A debate about altruism, do-gooders, and people who are sure they are right: Beware systemic change. (Thank you, AVI)
I also look back at history and am deeply troubled by what I see. In the 1920s, nearly all the educated, intelligent, evidence-based, pro-science, future-oriented people agreed: the USSR was amazing. Shaw, Wells, Webb. They all thought Stalin was great and we needed a global communist revolution so we could be more like him. If you and I had been alive back then, we’d be having this same conversation, but it would end with both of us agreeing to donate everything we had to the Bolsheviks.
Problem is that people who think they are really smart enough to run things for others are often or usually wrong. Only humility grows wisdom, and vice versa. "Rational," "scientific" social planners have created far more misery, and far less freedom, than anybody else on earth.
 A like totally cool site, BirdCast, from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
We take the fall and spring migrations for granted, but they are in fact miraculous feats and remarkable adaptations to the climate changes of the ice age era (which we are still in today - and have been for 2.6 million years with lulls and expansions of northern hemisphere ice. If you can apply "normal," this planet normally has no ice).
 Toon via Theo
The Cocked Fist Culture - Crossing the microaggressions minefield
Lawmakers: U.S. plan for Internet may be unconstitutional
Notre Dame to invest $100M in renewable energy projects
Maybe Mother Nature’s Tougher Than She Looks - Wonderful folks who brought you "climate change" wrong again!
Buddhist Inspired University in Colorado Contemplates Killing Prairie Dogs
Best estimates are that American debt cannot be fixed with taxes on capital
An experiment in universal childcare in Quebec has been mostly a disaster. Here’s what could work for U.S. kids instead.
Birth tourism booms in California despite federal crackdown
"So-called progressives love to talk about how their policies will create a workers' paradise. Why is it, then, day after day, month after month, year after year, people are fleeing liberal blue states for conservative red states?"
The reality is the Team GOP types will ALWAYS be outbid by the left. There's no margin for small government conservatives in playing this game.
Sultan: The left has defined the terms of battle. And its terms are total control over everything
Ivy Leaguers pour money into Hillary campaign
Obama's UN speech:
It is excruciating. The tone is professorial, patronizing, obnoxious, and unmanly. Obama challenged, and was followed by, Vladimir Putin. Putting the merits to one side, the contrast was not to Obama’s advantage.
Catalonia votes for independence
Officials in Giessen have taken to warning their own citizens not to go out alone at night.
Swedes' Homes May Be Confiscated to Accommodate Asylum Seekers
Best
estimates are that American debt cannot be fixed with taxes on capital -
See more at:
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/09/best-estimates-are-that-american-debt-is-not-sustainable.html#sthash.mPDXxVzD.dpuf
Monday, September 28. 2015
How Keith Richards became everyone’s favourite Rolling Stone
Eyes down, minds elsewhere, ‘deadwalkers’ are among us
1902: “I am loving New York and having a great time.”
A Trucker Explains What You're Doing Wrong on the Highway
Urban forms: Fall and Rise of the "Euro Block"
Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) Guide for the Perplexed, 2015
Do children still need to read the classics of English literature?
Confirmed: Pope’s Encounter With Illegal Alien Girl Was Staged
A Dozen Things 'The New Yorker' Gets Wrong about Free Speech (And Why It Matters):
In the article, Sanneh likens free speech advocates (like me, I assume) to "gun nuts," claims that campus speech codes have mostly been repealed (which is completely false), then bizarrely questions if people can believe in a diversity of belief. Those of us who are big fans of the concept of pluralism found the latter particularly mystifying.
The Clock Faker Goes International
Low Interest Rates Mask the Effects of Job-Killing Policies
How Uncle Sam Uses Behavioral Science
The GOP should "de-traffick" Planned Parenthood
5 Judges: Forcing Contraception Reg on Nuns Like Providing 'Only Non-Kosher Food' to Jewish Prisoner
Maine Mayor Wants Website to Post Name and Address of Welfare Recipients
Liberals Are Done Debating
“They can’t get to yes” = “They won’t give the Democrats everything they want”
Yesterday we popped into NYC, the greatest and most entertaining city in the world, to see a series of street theater events that were staged up on the High Line.
One part of what was cool about that was that, in NY, so many things are happening all the time that it's hard to tell the staged from the real. Not to mention that the city is an excellent stage set in itself and everybody on the thronging streets is interesting to look at. Bit part players on a giant stage.
Glad we parked in the burbs and took a train in. Took an Uber to Gansevoort. This week, we had the Pope, Obama, Putin, the tyrant of China and the whole UN General Assembly yesterday and again today. Thus, blocked streets, barricades, and cops making huge overtime everywhere. Not to mention the tourists. September is a big tourism month in NY, and rightly so.
I notice that nobody uses cameras anymore. Even the Japanese tourists, remarkably, just use their iPhones these days instead of their fancy Nikons. Fine cameras seem to be obsolete and nobody buys them anymore. Even the little Lumix I like to use seems kinda dorky, but I don't care.
The terminus of the High Line in the old meat-packing district, Gansevoort Street. I remember when this was a grim industrial neighborhood. Now the crowds and the new construction are astonishing:
More pics below the fold -
Continue reading "All the world's a stage"
Sunday, September 27. 2015
 Ralph Waldo Emerson, an important American figure who I find almost impossible to read, took a train out west partly to visit John Muir.
Emerson was Muir's hero. However, the elderly Emerson, the author of Nature, had no interest in going into the woods with Muir. I think nature was an idea for Emerson, not experienced outside of a park or a farm. For Muir, of course, wilderness was religion.
Life – and Emerson – tried to lure the naturalist John Muir back to the world. But his home was always the American wild.
Pic: Muir with Teddy Roosevelt in Yosemite, 1906.
These TEDs are interesting even if, like me, you liked math once you got the hang of it: Talks for people who hated math in high school
The US Army introduced fitness tests in 1943. They have relaxed their standards since.
When I began high school, every entering boy had to take the test while the coaches recorded. They were looking for athletic potential. If you didn't pass, you had to do a semester of remedial fitness before you could even do a (required) intramural sport - or even a JV sport. The remedial fitness was a bitch. 2 1/2 hours each afternoon. Ex-USMC math teacher was the coach. He made overweight kids go on diets and run extra unless they needed a JV fullback. Good stuff if you could handle a little humiliation. Runs, sprints, lifting, squats, football sleds, sit-up marathons, pushup marathons, etc. I flunked on the pull-ups. They also had a swim speed test which I handled easily but I didn't want the swim team. I still stink at pull-ups.
Are You As Fit As a World War II GI?
I doubt that a public school could make such demands on kids. Funny, as I reflect on it: We had riflery and shotgun teams too, but they were extracurriculars, did not count as sports. Still do, I am sure. Heck, even girls' summer camps have them today. A Bird Dog daughter was an NRA-certified riflery and archery coach/counselor at a girls' camp.
Mark 9:38-50
9:38 John said to him, "Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us."
9:39 But Jesus said, "Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me.
9:40 Whoever is not against us is for us.
9:41 For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.
9:42 "If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.
9:43 If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire.
9:45 And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell.
9:47 And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell,
9:48 where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.
9:49 "For everyone will be salted with fire.
9:50 Salt is good; but if salt has lost its saltiness, how can you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another."
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New clay tablet adds 20 lines to Epic of Gilgamesh