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.
Mrs. BD spent a couple of days in Dublin. Quaint tiny picturesque village in southern NH within view of Mt. Monadnock. As her pic shows, it's the home of Yankee Magazine (and of The Olde Farmer's Almanac).
Some people term them "real jobs." This is kinda brilliant even if you think Mike is a twit. Peripitaeia is a good word. So is anagnorisis, but the most painful and tragic version of it is the reality of oneself.
Story is that the tuxedo was indeed invented (and named after) the exclusive and still exclusive private neighborhood of Tuxedo Park, NY.
It was especially taken up by the youth at the turn of the century, who hated the fuddy-duddy formal wear, and dinner wear, of the time copied from aristocratic Brits. In 1889, the tux was accepted as appropriate wear in the Dress Circle at the Met Opera. Officially, a tux is considered "semi-formal;" but the meanings of formal, semi-formal, etc have devolved rapidly in the informal direction for two generations.
Nowadays, "black tie" evening weddings, for example, means tux, not tails. Nobody owns tails outside the royals and, for the past two generations in the US, events with tails are considered pretentious and in poor taste. Rented costumes. No royals in the USA.
Most women will say that all men look best in a tux, and absurd in tails. As time goes on, my need for my nice Brooks tux (had it for at least 30 years and wore some holes in the pockets) decreases each year. Last year, I only needed it twice. Suits seem fine for weddings and fancy holiday parties these days.
A cup of seawater contains 100 million cells, which are preyed upon by billions of viruses. Fifty million tons of fungal spores are released into the atmosphere every year. And the human gut is home to somewhere between 500 and 1,000 species of bacteria. The more we learn about microbial biodiversity, the clearer it becomes that the vast majority of life has long gone unseen, and unobserved. The flowering of microbial science is revolutionizing biology and medicine in ways unimagined only a few years ago, and is inspiring a new view of what it means to be alive...
When you take a walk on the High Line, at the northern end you can watch the construction of what is, in effect, a new city in itself. It's a sight to behold, a boom town. It will even have its own schools, parks, everything.
Will the 60,000 new apartments lower Manhattan rents? I'd guess no. And Brooklyn is a boom town too. However you may feel about NYC, a lot of people want to live there and I don't blame them because it's a high-energy place.
Laws against homosexual practice or marriage are clearly a freedom issue. Abortion, of course, is an impossible issue. I would prefer that people talk about freedom rather than rights. Laws are mostly made to restrict freedom but a rare few are made to assert freedom. For me, when in doubt, freedom is the default position. Courts do not "invent" rights but, when necessary, they should reveal freedoms when laws attempt to obscure them. Our Bill of Rights was forced to make this explicit:
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
What are (or have been) your favorite places to get frisky au pleine air? It's the best fun, is it not?
- on a boat - in a wildflower meadow - in a sleeping bag by a campfire - in a pool or other body of water - on a beach - in the woods standing against a tree - Urban rooftop or balcony - Other
This is a Scientific Survey for purely research purposes so your responses matter. Please no facetiousness - this is Serious Science.
World Cup balls are designed anew for each World Cup. Adidas makes them. They vary especially in pattern, and number and size of the seams.
Pro balls are inflated to rock-hard levels, unlike recreational balls. That's one reason people are concerned about brain injury from heading in pro soccer despite the fact that more concussions in soccer are from collisions on the field.
What sorts of speeds are attained by balls in the highest levels of soccer? Obviously it depends on the purpose of the pass or kick, but most are in the 20-80 mph range. Free kicks and penalty kicks can reach 90-100 mph. The fastest recorded penalty kick was 131 mph. Those balls can bang up a goalie pretty bad.
Murray might be the most important social scientist of our time, but he became toxic to the Left for speaking truth about subcultural issues. Most of his recent work has been concerned with the white underclass, which is far larger than other ethnic or racial underclasses in the US.
The word "myth" seems to have two meanings in English: first, ancient and enduring tales containing deep meanings about human nature and existence itself, and, second, common but mistaken out-dated beliefs. For examples, "myths about nutrition" vs "so-and-so is mythic in depth, scale and scope." Moby Dick is mythic.
Freud's one-time colleague in depth psychology had many interests but among them was a study of myths and the representations of archetypes embedded in them. In a way, Jung viewed myths as related to humanity as dreams are related to an individual. I suppose that seems obvious now.
From what I have heard, the "secrets" from his kids were no secrets in the world. The man had vast talents and either vast appetites or few inhibitions. Probably the latter.
Mrs. BD's Father's Day "present" to me was a trip to her fancy hair salon to get me an updated hair style to fit my Charlie Brown face and my buff body this past Friday. She said her gal there loves to do men's hair.
Can I say that I was not comfortable going to that place? I've been going to Tony, my same old Sicilian barber for 25 years and only when it's past the point of necessity. My wife's cute and athletic hair gal (who I know from the gym) and Mrs. BD agreed that my haircuts were primitive and made me look old and stodgy, like a dorky Senator from Arkansas or a dork from 1980. "Short or long?" was Tony's only question.
My heart beamed Friday night as my sons welcomed the Sabbath with perfectly sung prayers.My heart broke Saturday night as my sons fought while I grilled a perfect wild-caught salmon, and I got indigestion instead of the meal I thought I deserved.
I'm reminded of the saying, "A Man's children and his garden both reflect the amount of weeding done during the growing season." And, the growing goes both ways as we fathers grow, have to grow -- into the men we want to be under our children's careful observation, into the men that they need.
We yearn to please but, most important, to pass on life's lessons.
Father's Day is full of platitudes and real feelings, of missed and appreciated opportunities. And, of how much we care by just being there. I'm reminded of GeorgeStrait's "A Father's Love", of Conway Twitty's "That's My Job", of Rascal Flatt's "My Wish."True, heartfelt, and missing the tougher choices we have to make and impose to make as sure as we can that our children grow into responsible, resilient and caring adults.
There's a wisecrack, "If God is so perfect, how do you explain us."As fathers, we're not perfect, but we try to find and know the ways to be better, and most of us find it. We continue to strive, and so may our children, with a higher hand to reach for and give us the strength to be better and have hope.
I think one major impetus for my change was the fact that, despite being in default liberal environments all of my life, I nevertheless always adored the works of the Western literary tradition. And when I saw the 1980s’ multiculturalism taking over university campuses, and ignorant students who had never read the works of the Western canon feeling empowered to reject those works on the basis of the gonads and melanin of their authors, that to me was appalling.
Ironically, people I don’t think understand this distinction, in the 1970s, which was the height of this very abstruse literary theory known as deconstruction, that you mentioned, and that I was an uncritical acolyte of. However odd the theories of language were, holding that meaning is impossible, that the human self is just a fiction, a trope of language, we read the canon without ever once thinking to say, if I’m a female, “Oh, gee, I can’t read Milton because he’s a dead white male.” It never came up. So, I fortunately had a strong grounding in greatness, in beauty, in eloquence, in sublimity. And when that came under attack, that started to turn me away from the broader trends that were going on in academia.
Story is that the tuxedo was indeed invented (and named after) the exclusive and still exclusive private neighborhood of 
What are (or have been) your favorite places to get frisky au pleine air? It's the best fun, is it not?
World Cup balls are 
Cooking With Glass: How Pyrex Transformed Every Kitchen Into a Home-Ec Lab
