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.
College selectivity did not significantly affect the graduates’ chances of employment, the authors write, and neither did gender, race or parental education.
To administer medical care that makes people suffer is anguishing. Physicians are trained to gather information without revealing any of their own feelings, but in private, among fellow doctors, they’ll vent. “How can anyone do that to their family members?” they’ll ask. I suspect it’s one reason physicians have higher rates of alcohol abuse and depression than professionals in most other fields. I know it’s one reason I stopped participating in hospital care for the last 10 years of my practice.
How has it come to this–that doctors administer so much care that they wouldn’t want for themselves? The simple, or not-so-simple, answer is this: patients, doctors, and the system.
“Why are we here today?” she asked. “To make revolution,” they answered. “What kind of revolution?” she replied. “The Cultural Revolution,” they chanted. “And how do we make Cultural Revolution?” she demanded. “By destroying the American family!” they answered. “How do we destroy the family?” she came back. “By destroying the American Patriarch,” they cried exuberantly. “And how do we destroy the American Patriarch?” she replied. “By taking away his power!” “How do we do that?” “By destroying monogamy!” they shouted. “How can we destroy monogamy?” “By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution and homosexuality!” they resounded.
Nature's alterations to the landscape never end, and mankind gets in the way.
Billingsgate Island, once the site of a lighthouse, a school, and over 30 houses, is now Billingsgate Shoal. It used to be a popular picnic destination, big clambakes.
Some of it is above water now, during low tides. Best explanation I've heard is that destroying the salt marshes that protected it from Cape Cod Bay (for salt hay to feed the critters) is what destroyed it.
This photo shows what agriculture and deforestation (by the Indians and then by the Europeans with their farms and cattle) did to the soil of the outer Cape: it's down to sand and sweet-smelling scrub now:
Consider Vermont. Unlike my own state of New Hampshire, it has a bucolic image: Holsteins, dirt roads, the Vermont Teddy Bear Company, Ben & Jerry's, Howard Dean… And yet the Green Mountain State now has appalling levels of heroin and meth addiction, and the social chaos that follows. Geoffrey Norman began a recent essay in The Weekly Standard with a vignette from a town I know very well — St Johnsbury, population 7,600, motto "Very Vermont", the capital of the remote North-East Kingdom hard by the Quebec border and as far from urban pathologies as you can get. Or so you'd think. But on a recent Saturday morning, Norman reports, there were more cars parked at the needle-exchange clinic than at the farmers' market. In Vermont, there's no inner-city underclass, because there are no cities, inner or outer; there's no disadvantaged minorities, because there's only three blacks and seven Hispanics in the entire state; there's no nothing. Which is the real problem.
Israel’s
Decision to Declare 988 Acres of West Bank Territory as State Land -
See more at:
http://jcpa.org/israels-988-acres-of-west-bank-territory/#sthash.EceSqJjB.dpuf
Israel’s
Decision to Declare 988 Acres of West Bank Territory as State Land -
See more at:
http://jcpa.org/israels-988-acres-of-west-bank-territory/#sthash.EceSqJjB.dpuf
I had a great supper last night: Cornbread, superb macaroni and cheese, ribs, cheesecake. A shame that I wasn't hungry because I could not do it all justice. I am rarely hungry despite enjoying some tasty food. Food is overrated, too important than it deserves to be as long as there is a little something around.
One smallish meal daily works well for me. Unless coffee is a meal. I still fit in my college Brooks Bros. tux. Money saved.
... then there’s plain sonic impact: Even his earliest important songs have a cerebral and reverberating authority in the recording, his voice sometimes filling the speakers, his primitive but blistering guitar work adding confrontation, ease, humor, anger, and contrariness, presenting all but the most unwilling listeners with moment after moment of incandescence.
And, finally, a key component often overlooked: Dylan’s artistic process. On a fundamental level, he doesn’t trust mediation or planning. The story of his recording career is littered with tales of indecisive and failed sessions and haphazard successful ones, in both cases leaving frustrated producers and session people in their wake. You could say the approach served him well during his early years of inspiration and has hobbled him in his later decades of lesser work. Dylan doesn’t care. During the recording of Blood on the Tracks, which may be the best rock album ever made, one of the musicians present heard the singer being told how to do something correctly in the studio. Dylan’s reply: “Y’know, if I’d listened to everybody who told me how to do stuff, I might be somewhere by now.”
Scruton actually composed an opera, says it was the most difficult task he has ever undertaken. One quote:
A full-scale spectacle must run for an extended period if it is to cover its costs. Hence an opera can put the composer's name in lights for days on end, and the more costly the production the longer it must run. But it is not the promise of repeat performances that draws so many composers to this supremely demanding art form. Opera is a crown to be won, a sign that the composer has finally stuck his head above the clouds on Mount Olympus.
"...I advise the gun. While this gives a moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprize, and independance to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks."
Thomas Jefferson (h/t Ace). Right on, dude. Took the pup for a long walk this moring with a pal with his Molon Labe t-shirt. We ran into a dear 92 year-old neighbor friend on his morning walk, and I accused him of being a dirty old man for drooling over Mrs. BD and the other gals. He punched me in the stomach. He is a mountain-climber, world-wide.
16:21 From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.
16:22 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you."
16:23 But he turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."
16:24 Then Jesus told his disciples, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
16:25 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.
16:26 For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?
16:27 "For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done.
16:28 Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom."
We had a few leftover Cape Cod lobsters from our birthday party (because many of the gals could only handle half a lobster). With these critters over one and a half pounds, I like to split them with a cleaver and a mallet, and guests like it that way.
I hit the jackpot with these three - all gal lobsters with abundant delicious roe. I like to eat that green liver too. Tasty.
In Maine, they call lobsters "bugs."
Even if you do not love lobster, it's a festive food. Lobster-buying tip: the meat-weight ratio increases with increasing lobster weight. Bigger lobsters are thus always a better deal. Somebody could do the math. Big lobsters are no more chewy than smaller ones.
Our lobster place in Wellfleet had an 8-pounder and a ten-pounder. Seafood stores will always steam them for you without charge.
Another comment about lobster fishing: government regulations determine keepable sizes and, in government's wisdom, it's ass-backwards just as it is with Striped Bass. Best for the species for fishers to keep the smaller ones, few of whom will ever reach breeding age anyway, and not keep the big breeders. But that makes too much sense.
Il Gattopardo. A wonderful novel which will help you understand Sicily when you visit (which you should - it's not the same old Italy - it's not really Italy at all). Wonderful place, insanely governed (like most places) but the people seem to ignore the government. They have been ignoring governments for thousands of years, despite constant invasions by everybody - including the Vikings.
Obama: “The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all, and that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m President of the United States of America...”
School Bans “Unsupervised Cartwheels” On Playground…
Spicy
The Truth We Won’t Admit: 
Nature's alterations to the landscape never end, and mankind gets in the way.
Colorful socks for guys: 
"Working"
"...I advise the gun. While this gives a moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprize, and independance to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks." 
We had a few leftover Cape Cod lobsters from our birthday party (because many of the gals could only handle half a lobster). With these critters over one and a half pounds, I like to split them with a cleaver and a mallet, and guests like it that way. 
Il Gattopardo. A wonderful novel which will help you understand Sicily when you visit (which you should - it's not the same old Italy - it's not really Italy at all). Wonderful place, insanely governed (like most places) but the people seem to ignore the government. They have been ignoring governments for thousands of years, despite constant invasions by everybody - including the Vikings.
Government publishes detailed instructions