Friday, April 11. 2008
Obama on Sunday: You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them...And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
Query for Barry: Are you, perhaps, referring the the Great Unwashed? Like me? To what should I cling, if not to guns and God? To you?
And a comment: Unskilled, semi-skilled and skilled manufacturing jobs have been disappearing for far longer than 25 years. In our parts, they disappeared 50-80 years ago. Barry has a short time-frame. New England is filled with old mill towns and old empty factories with broken windows. Things change, and I thought you were in favor of change. Anyway, I know the economic facts don't matter: it's just routine pandering, because those old jobs are never coming back and people have to learn how to do things for which there is a labor market.
Thursday, April 10. 2008
Barry Obama has a race problem: he is pissed off at whites despite his charmed life in America. The guy misses the point that almost everybody in America is post-racial these days (not in Euroland, however). White folks do not spend one second of their lives thinking about oppressing black, brown, yellow or red people, and to imply that they do is hateful, malicious, manipulative, - and wrong. Character and behavior, not skin, is what folks are interested in. I do not give a damn about skin, and I believe that very few people are hung up on skin these days, and we would be even less so except for the Left constantly pushing skin and genitalia and transgender-mixed-frozen-vegetables in our faces. Honestly, would Obama be a presidential candidate today if he were a white guy? Of course not. Hillary would have eaten him as an hors d'oevre by now. It's plain as day, but people don't say it. Heck, Congress is full of glib Leftists: consider the always-charming and articulate Barney Frank. Obama is a phee-nom because he is half-black (and he is a likeable fellow, as pols go). The Obama effect is pure reverse-racism - mixed with ageism (he's a kid) and a touch of jaunty metrosexual bias (the American MSM press is not known for its comfort with manliness). I find this video disturbing, insulting, dumb, and offensive (from piece at Gateway):
Wednesday, April 9. 2008
 I am meeting John McCain at a fund-raiser this week, to which our Editor Dog-in-Chief, Bird Dog, has invited me and the Mrs.
In fact, several of the Maggie's Farm crew will drive there, with money in hand, regardless of our beefs with McCain. I have my sentence ready for the guy: "I am happy to meet you, and thank you for your service." I want to say "Global warming is BS," but the Mrs. will not let me say that to him or there will be hell to pay. I disagree with him on about 30% of the issues of the day (eg immigration, McCain-Feingold, global cooling). But what the heck, I disagree with everybody about something or other, being a difficult, cantankerous, opinionated Yankee. We have warnings that the AFL-CIO might be protesting something or other, along with other lefty loonies. Good on 'em. A free country. But are they aware that the employment rate right now is higher than it was during Clinton? No, and they don't care. They have their agenda. Update: Got a photo with him. Thanked him for his service to the country. He is solid, somewhat of a tough guy, enormously likeable, and uninspiring. Those are all probably good qualities for a president.
 From a CNN piece on the Pulitzer announcements, which includes this about Bob:
Long after most of his contemporaries either died, left the business or held on by the ties of nostalgia, Dylan continues to tour almost continuously and release highly regarded CDs, most recently "Modern Times." Fans, critics and academics have obsessed over his lyrics -- even digging through his garbage for clues -- since the mid-1960s, when such protest anthems as "Blowin' in the Wind" made Dylan a poet and prophet for a rebellious generation. His songs include countless biblical references and he has claimed Chekhov, Walt Whitman and Jack Kerouac as influences. His memoir, "Chronicles, Volume One," received a National Book Critics Circle nomination in 2005 and is widely acknowledged as the rare celebrity book that can be treated as literature. According to publisher Simon & Schuster, Dylan is working on a second volume of memoirs. No release date has been set.
Why reporters persist with that "prophet for a rebellious generation" nonsense I don't know. Maybe it's to put the guy in a box with a label. Of course, he is not the corporate guy in the grey flannel suit, but if that's rebellious, then bring it on. I'd call him a prodigious and ambitiously truth-telling singer-songwriter whose work, over 45 years, covers everything from love to God to war, from joy to despair, and which borrows - or steals - heavily from the Great American Songbook using folk, blues, country blues, country, ditties, jazz, nursery rhymes, rock, and love ballads...not to mention the Great Irish and Great Scottish Songbooks - and from movies, books, and especially from the Bible. Many folks don't seem to realize that most of Dylan's best stuff is post-60s. We do get a kick out of olde Maggie's Farm though, because all of us have learned to dislike working for other people (what's with the headdresses? Pure loony frivolity, methinks):
Tuesday, April 8. 2008
If there is no self, whose flu is this? Be here now. Be someplace else later. Is that so complicated? Drink tea and nourish life; with the first sip, joy; with the second sip, satisfaction; with the third sip, peace; with the fourth, a muffin. Wherever you go, there you are. Your luggage is another story. Accept misfortune as a blessing. Do not wish for perfect health, or a life without problems. What would you talk about? The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single Oy. There is no escaping karma. In a previous life, you never called, you never wrote, you never visited. And whose fault was that? Zen is not easy. It takes effort to attain nothingness. And then what do you have? Bupkis. The Tao does not speak. The Tao does not blame. The Tao does not take sides. The Tao has no expectations. The Tao demands nothing of others. The Tao is not Jewish. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Forget this and attaining Enlightenment will be the least of your problems. Let your mind be as a floating cloud. Let your stillness be as a wooded glen. And sit up straight. You'll never meet the Buddha with such rounded shoulders. Deep inside you are ten thousand flowers. Each flower blossoms ten thousand times. Each blossom has ten thousand petals. You might want to see a specialist. Be aware of your body. Be aware of your perceptions; Keep in mind that not every physical sensation is a symptom of a terminal illness. The Torah says, Love your neighbor as yourself. The Buddha says “There is no self.” So, maybe we're off the hook.
That reminds me of this old, old one:
Shirley returns home to Miami from her big Africa trip. Her friends ask her about it, as she sits crying at the Mah Jong table.
"Oy," she says. "In the jungle, I was carried off by a huge gorilla, who took me up into a tree and had his rough, animal way with me for hours."
"You poor thing. It must have been terrible." "No, it was more wonderful than you could ever imagine. Nothing like Marvin." "Then why are you crying?" "It's been two weeks, and he doesn't write, he doesn't call."
and there's a good Passover joke at Theo
Documentary filmmaker Errol Morris discusses the making of The Thin Blue Line in the NYT (h/t Neuroanthropology via Dr. X). My bolds: Personally I have never been averse to the use of reconstruction, generic archive footage, still photographs, or whatever techniques exist or we can create for ourselves as film makers so that we can become better story tellers, but the unbreakable rule must surely be that the audience MUST always know what it is they are seeing, at least when it comes to documentary. I know that there is no such thing as objective truth, particularly when it comes to film-making, but if audiences are being tricked without their knowledge, and worse still, when the film makers themselves are unable to distinguish between fact, fiction and distortion, what chance will they or future generations have of being able to disinter even a semblance of truth about what happened?
Huh? If the guy is hopeless about facts and truth, why does he bother worrying, and why doesn't he simply call his own stuff "fiction"? This guy is an exemplar of the pomo notion of "narrative." I guess nobody killed the police officer, or maybe the chocolate shake did it - probably the same chocolate shake that shot JFK. Al Gore, Michael Moore, Oliver Stone: all fully-conscious propagandists seeking to mess up the minds of the ignorant for their own purposes. Malignant people, clever but not wise.
Sunday, April 6. 2008
 We reach down to the Gold Coast of suburban Fairfield County, CT for today's New England house for sale.
This 1920 4-bedroom house, with 4800 sq. feet, sits in the Tokeneke area of Darien's Long Island Sound waterfront in what realtors still call "Aryan Darien." Darien: Cheaper and more homey than Greenwich, more pleasant than Stamford, and less than an hour from NYC by train. Average house price in town: over one million, and every kid in town is above average and plays hockey and lacrosse. House looks modest and civilized enough to me. Asking $3,995,000, which seems quite reasonable for the area. More photos of the charming place here. But can I farm it, and shoot on it?
Bob Brinker noted on the radio today that many Americans would find themselves in the 64% tax rate in some states, such as NY, MA, and California, with Obama's Social Security and tax plan. Brinker said, correctly, that few Americans are willing to work for 36 cents on the dollar unless they are desperate. The entrepreneurs and job-creators would go fishin' or golfin', and cut back hard on their expenses. Thus, on the tax income, job-creation, charitable donation, and consumer sides, the economy would go into an ugly spasm and a downward spiral. "It's nuts," says Bob (who is a political "moderate"). I, for one, would retire immediately and remove my income from the tax rolls: I enjoy my work very much, but I won't be a chump, or a serf or slave to the Federal government. I thought we left feudalism behind us...I think we already had a war about that. Russia now has a 13% flat tax on everybody, on all income. I would be OK with that. How can they be ahead of us? Off topic, Charlton Heston said, before his decline, "I'd like to be remembered as: American, husband, father, actor."
 I take a good hammer and pound a 1" dowel into the ground about 12-18" deep, 2-3 holes per shrub (including roses), and fill the dowel hole with a cheap all-purpose fertilizer. I make the holes within the drip-line of the plant. It seems to work well. Fertilizer thrown on the surface just washes away and never gets to the roots.
I do it now, before the leaves emerge in Yankeeland. Roots wake up and start getting active and growing at least 4 weeks before you see any greening - and the roots are the root of the matter. I repeat in June, if I remember and if I feel like it. Definitely twice for the roses, though. They are hogs. If I don't want a plant to grow more vigorously, I don't fertilize it. Incentives, you know. Speaking of outdoor chores, I am working on an update of my Maggie's Farm Exclusive Lawn Care post. I did lime my lawns today, too, despite the icebox weather. The "poor man's fertilizer" adjusts the soil pH around here. It's good that it comes in pelletized form now.
Saturday, April 5. 2008
 Texas Throw 'Em. Video at Reason TV
The Politics of Poker and online gambling, also at Reason TV. I do not know how the gummint can try to control online gambling, but leave the casinos alone. Besides, isn't the gummint in the sinful gambling business itself? Lotteries, etc? Excellent basic info for the new cigar-smoker (yes, we are always ten years behind the fad curve, here at Maggie's. Next post: Fun With Hula Hoops.) Good advice on cigar storage. (Including Don't use analog hygromofisticators - they are inaccurate. In the old days, they used apple cores as humidifiers, and no hygrometers. I like that idea - a nice apple smell.) Like an earthworm, a decent cigar out in the air will begin to lose its vitality in two hours unless it's a muggy day. All this post needs is a bit on Port and Cognac, but I won't do that. They are delicious, but give me a headache if I consume them in a masculine volume. Re photo: Not to worry. I unwrapped those Montes before I put them away.
 It's a good time of year to re-link our past piece on Removing Pachysandra, that durable shade ground cover which is ubiquitous in these parts and which can be pleasant in the right place, but vulgar, I think, in others.
Getting it established takes some doing, but once it's happy it sure is tough to get rid of. I have a patch to remove, maybe this weekend but my wheelbarrow has a flat so I need to fix that first.
Thursday, April 3. 2008
Our morning links today reported the growing ogling crisis in the UK. Men are pigs: the government must do something. We hope this sign will contribute something useful to the discussion of the crisis, if not offer a simple solution. Why ogle, after all, if you can just stare? 
We like the healthy, wholesome NSFW barmaid on the continuation page.
Continue reading "Re the pub ogling crisis in the UK"
Wednesday, April 2. 2008
 Sheffield, MA, in the southern Berkshires, is one of the loveliest villages in New England. It has well-kept horse farms, a few dairy farms, a bunch of quaint bed-and-breakfasts, wooded hills, a 250 year-old Congregational Church, and a population of around 3000.
It isn't too far from Maggie's Farm, and it isn't too far from where Alice's Restaurant used to be (in Stockbridge). The only problem with this fine 1880 carriage barn-home is that it comes with only 6 acres. I would need ten or twenty times that to do what I want to do. The only other downside is all of the Subarus with Obama stickers in the area. (Asking price $740,000). The workshop and office space on the ground level are an appealing feature. (No, we are not in the real estate business: we just like a break from politics.)
Tuesday, April 1. 2008
I'm being silly, of course. The feckless Stilton scarfers are actually looking down their aquiline bluenoses at us. The Independent, which is a sort of digital newspaper for wrapping your crappy online fish and chips, says in the Headline: USA 2008 The Great Depression. They've even got the requisite breadline picture: 
Woe is us, huh? Here's the accompanying text. Warning! Englishmen don't know how to pluralize things properly. You know, not like Americans, who are important people, and not doily-fetished tea-slurpers. Dismal projections by the Congressional Budget Office in Washington suggest that in the fiscal year starting in October, 28 million people in the US will be using government food stamps to buy essential groceries, the highest level since the food assistance programme was introduced in the 1960s.
The increase – from 26.5 million in 2007 – is due partly to recent efforts to increase public awareness of the programme and also a switch from paper coupons to electronic debit cards. But above all it is the pressures being exerted on ordinary Americans by an economy that is suddenly beset by troubles. Housing foreclosures, accelerating jobs losses and fast-rising prices all add to the squeeze.
Emblematic of the downturn until now has been the parades of houses seized in foreclosure all across the country, and myriad families separated from their homes. But now the crisis is starting to hit the country in its gut. Getting food on the table is a challenge many Americans are finding harder to meet. As a barometer of the country's economic health, food stamp usage may not be perfect, but can certainly tell a story. Yes, and after all, "telling a story" is exactly what you're attempting to do. You're just not very good at it. But I want to be kind to our friends on that miserable pile of rocks and coal across the pond. I think it's swell that they've taken time from their busy schedule of crushing each other to death against fences at soccer games, throwing up on themselves in the gutter outside pubs, and surrendering to imams to pay any attention to our festering hive of poverty and depravity here in the States. I especially like the fellow that's the centerpiece of their pieta of poverty there in the picture. Let's zoom in on him, shall we? 
You see, in the thumbnail view of the picture, the noble Bob Cratchit figure is holding his poverty-numbed fingers in the universal sign for "Please sir, can I have some more porridge?" It's a shame to ruin it by showing him in closeup, fiddling with his MP3 player to get just the right mix, and shod in elaborate, new, expensive footwear and clothes. Because what we're looking at here, is indeed a line of people who are willing to stand in a line to get free stuff. You're right there, Percival. Unfortunately for you Someone at the National Review Online read the caption on the image you used, and it reads: NEW YORK - NOVEMBER 30: People wait on line to receive donated coats at the kickoff of the 17th annual New York Cares Coat Drive a the Bowery Mission November 30, 2005 in New York City. Bloomberg helped give out coats to residents of the Mission and the coat drive hopes to collect and distribute 80,000 coats to needy New Yorkers by New Years. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)
But your point is made, even if fraudulently. Very truthy, Cedric. People are lining up virtually, if not physically, for free food coupons, which you inartfully mention later in your article can be illegally sold to unscrupulous people for seventy cents on the dollar to buy drugs and booze and... well... I don't know, maybe MP3 players. I might mention that this isn't much of a line in a big, strapping adult country like the United States. It might impress you over there in that little dollop of dirt you live on, the remaining wreckage of your "Empire." Do you guys even get to lord it over Scotland anymore? You guys shed power and influence like dandruff, I can't keep up. But let me assure you that if that was a line to get free Hannah Montana tickets, that line would reach to New Jersey. You remember New Jersey, don't you? We beat your inbred monarch-ass-kissing fruity wig-wearing generals like a drum there in the 1700s. With guns we used to shoot squirrels with. But I digress. After all, it's not fair to compare Hannah Montana tickets to Food Stamps, as Hannah Montana is more important than food to a teenage girl. And Hannah Montana is bigger than the Gross Domestic Product of Great Britain. But then again, what isn't around here? In the article, those Malvinas-pestering cold-water-flat-loving hollow-chested Britishers refer to everybody in the picture as "disadvantaged Americans." Fair enough. I'll use their criteria: that queuing citizens trying to get free stuff from the government is a sign of an apocalyptic breakdown of a whole society. Hey, Alfies: 100% of the population of Great Britain gets in line to get their chit to see a doctor. So by your reckoning, your entire country has collapsed. And it's been collapsed since 1948, if you go by the National Health Service. You know, right after we saved you the trouble and expense of German lessons. I was always enchanted when I was a lad to read compelling news stories of daring Britishers swimming the English Channel. Shame you just end up in France, though. Nothing to do there but warm your hands over the burning cars. So I have some advice, you crumpet nibblers. Swim west from now on. You might like it here. I bet the NHS doesn't hand out MP3 players with the calendar you get to plot your wait times for your medical care.
JUDEO-CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLES | NEW AGE GUIDELINES | The Ten Commandments | Ten Suggestions for a More Guilt-Free Life | 1. You shall have no other gods before me. | 1. You should feel comfortable in believing in whatever feels good to you. | 2. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them. | 2. You really should not be bothered with Things. | 3. You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God. | 3. You should not swear unless you really have a bad feeling about something and swearing helps you get in touch with it. | 4. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. | 4. Sunday is a good day to sort out how you really think about stuff. | 5. Honor your father and your mother | 5. Never forget to send HallmarkÔ Mother's Day or Father's Day cards. | 6. You shall not murder. | 6. You should not kill anybody, but if they really oppress you or have possessions that you need and you feel they really deserve it and you do not know what you are doing (and can swear to it) then, maybe OK. | 7. You shall not commit adultery. | 7. What's "adultery"? If you have a good feeling about someone and they have a good feeling about you and it is really beautiful, that must be OK. | 8. You shall not steal. | 8. It is illegal to steal but if you or your cultural affinity group were oppressed or put down by somebody else or by another member of their cultural affinity group, taking what might rightfully have been yours is not really stealing anyway. | 9. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. | 9. It is against the law to lie in court but you can tell the media anything (if they pay). | 10. You shall not covet your neighbor's house, or his wife, or his possessions. | 10. If you want your neighbor’s house or his possessions, marry his wife after she gets them in the divorce. |
In no way do I believe that Dems have a monopoly on lying and other sins, but I just want to focus on one thing: What do Dems tend to lie about most? I would suggest that they lie most often to conceal their Leftist agendas from the mass of voters. It's a gramscian tactic, and well-understood and accepted by the Left. (By any means necessary..") Hillary's latest whopper was an effort to claim, essentially, that she is tough and comfortable with war. Obama's lie du jour is about his responses to the political questionnaire he completed. I wish they would decontaminate and simplify our lives by running on what they really want to do. Ah, but they're too "smart" to do that.
Monday, March 31. 2008
 Tis Issat is the Smoke of the Nile - the falls of the Blue Nile in Ethiopia (map). The Blue Nile, arising in Lake Tana, provides most of the water to the Nile proper.
Here's a better photo of the falls. You can learn a lot about 19th C. Ethiopia (Abyssinia) in Flashman on the March (he survives a tumble down the falls - and then a tumble with an obese Queen). The subject comes up today because, after church yesterday, friends were discussing their upcoming mission trip to Ethiopia and I regret that I cannot join their group. On the other hand, maybe Ethiopia ought to be sending some missions to the USA and Europe. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church (previously the Coptic Orthodox Church) has been around since about 300, and has taken its own path. Note the outfits of the Deacons. I would love to see that country.
 You bought a house two years ago, no money down, with a one-year teaser interest-only rate. You knew what you were doing: you gambled that in a year you might be able to make the second year's payments and, if not, the house would have more equity in it. That equity would belong to you.
Can you really blame the mortgage broker? Or, maybe, you bought a second house or two to rent out, as an investment a speculation, with that same deal, planning to flip it when the time seemed right. You had no skin in the game, except for your hope for wild profit - it was all the bank's money. You had nothing to lose. Now the house is worth less than your buying price, and you can't keep up with this year's payment because you didn't get the promotion you hoped for. Logical (if dishonorable) person that you are, you consider dumping your committment and going back to renting again - or hoping that the taxpayer will somehow rescue your reckless real estate investment gamble. Well, not to worry. The Dems want to bail you out. McCain thinks it's nuts, and so do I. Am I a heartless Scrooge? In truth, buying a home mortgage is no different from an LBO, or buying options on margin. Didn't these people ever play Monopoly? Newspapers and pandering politicians call these unlucky gamblers "homeowners," but they aren't. They own nothing but debt and a contract. As prices drop, houses are becoming more affordable to credible buyers instead of crazy gamblers. And, in ten years, there will be another housing bubble. You can bank on it. If your house is an investment, and not a home, sell it then. Editor's note: There are comparable moral hazards with rescuing the banks. See Fed eyes Nordic-style bank nationalization. I am not convinced that we are at that point. Power-people see every problem as an opportunity for a power and/or money grab. Just label it a "crisis."
Sunday, March 30. 2008
 The NYT did a piece on So You Want to be a Blogging Star?
I guess we would welcome fame and fortune, as long as we could maintain our anonymity. What we would prefer would be to deserve it. But, as Bird Dog often says, we are an "elite boutique blog for the cognoscenti - not mass market." I know he puts it in those transparently flattering terms to feed our vanity and to keep us working without pay, but I know we have some modest impact and some utility for those who have found us. Anyway, Glenn Reynolds is quoted in the piece: Fit blogging into the holes in your schedule. “Deal with the rest of your life first,” advises Glenn Reynolds, a law professor at the University of Tennessee who posts constantly throughout the day on his site, Instapundit.com. The volume and regularity has helped make his political opinion site one of the most popular on the Internet. “The blog is best handled by inserting it into the small bits of free time that rest among the bigger chunks of your work.” Mr. Reynolds slips in posts between classes, as a break from writing law review articles and during slow time at home.
We do that too, Glenn. But what is "slow time at home"? Oh, I get it: the wife has a blog too (our blog-friend Dr. Helen). Photo is the Farmington River, in CT, in autumn.
This medical post came in over the transom - a cautionary tale about certain handguns: A St. Louis Missouri guy had a bad accident with his S&W 460XVR Magnum. He was shooting with a two handed hold and got his left thumb up near the lower front of the cylinder. The normal (powerful) gasses blowing out at the barrel/cylinder gap ripped the top of his left thumb off. I've added some of his posts & some pics.460XVR blew my thumb off today! No joke, about 1/2 of my left thumb is gone what's left is a friggin mess. It's pretty hard to type, and I'm only posting because you never know, it might save somebody else a thumb. I was using a 2-handed grip, fired off a Cor-Bon DPX .460 and the blast came violently out the side of the gun. This is an example of how he was holding his revolver. Wrong, wrong, wrong! 
At first my thumb was so covered in blood that I couldn't see how bad it was ... and I was full of adrenaline and felt no pain. And honestly it looked really bad, my whole hand was covered in blood and it was kinda gushing. The blown-off thumb was on my support hand. I'll re-create the grip tomorrow to see where my thumb was, but it's not like I didn't already know not to get any body part near the cylinder gap. And even if I totally screwed up and did, taking my thumb clean off seems a bit excessive? Just be careful with those 460's. That case operates at such high pressure, it's just asking for trouble. BTW, I bought my 460 new and had exactly 12 rounds through it. Info about the gun, it's a full-size 460 with the 8 3/4' barrel and factory installed compensator.. It's one of the Whitetails Unlimited models. Ammo was 200gr Cor-Bon DPX.
The gun only had 12 or 13 rounds of the Cor-Bon through it, and 10 45 Long Colt rounds through it. So it was essentially still brand new. Saw a hand specialist while there today. Lots of ways to try and save what's left, but first I just have to hope it doesn't get infected in the next few days then surgery early next week. The hand specialist I spent a few hours with last night said that in gunshot wounds there is always a lot more damage than is first visible ... same with things like fireworks going off in your hand. A lot more flesh around the wound is dead, and will rot and fall off over the next couple days. That's why it's so important to keep clean, and that's also why they can't do surgery now. If they wrapped new skin over dead skin it would just flake out, possibly turn gangrenous, and they'd have to start all over again. If you aren't squeamish, what's left of the guy's thumb is on continuation page:
Continue reading "How NOT to hold an X-treme revolver"
I guess I am a bit of a Gilbert Munger (1830-1904) fan, although I cannot say that he had an entirely coherent body of work - but who does? Others of the Hudson River School achieved much more prominence, and one of Munger's claims to fame was spending a day sketching with Bierstadt, the master of the School. But Connecticut-born Munger did get around a bit, from Yosemite to Venice, his work evolved, and did not have the over-dramatic Victorian quality that Bierstat is sometimes accused of. But man, would I like to have a Munger over my office fireplace. The image is is Cazenovia Cornfield, but look at his pictures on the link - good stuff. This is his Lake Marian, Humboldt Range, Nevada, 1871: 
 Like all thistles, Sea Holly likes sun and poor or sandy soil.
Like campanula, it's a blue late-summer bloomer for a perennial border. I found this one here. I like it.
Saturday, March 29. 2008
 It says 1997, not 1998, on these fine cigars our friend Nathan sent me. Many interesting tart, sweet, funky, sexual, and multi-layered aged flavors in them. I like the 43 ring size, but my humidor is a bit too high on the humidity right now - I think. Stepped on the meter like a complete klutz and broke it a while ago, and I think it is like the Everglades in there right now, judging from the draw.
I did spill some water in there, too - don't ask. I think I will leave the thing open for a few hours to dry out a bit, and order another crappy $5 hygromificateristicalmeter. Got some fine tobaccy in there: I want it in perfect condition when Nathan visits from Jerusalem next month.
Friday, March 28. 2008
 We linked to Geert Wilder's short movie on the Koran last night. That movie is becoming a cause celebre.
Here's Diana West on "Pre-emptive Rage" at the Wash. Times. My only reaction to the fuss and the predictable Moslem "rage" and the rush of the Left to disparage and attack the film is this: What if Geert Wilders had made a short movie critiquing the Holy Bible? Would anybody say anything? The Left likes the Islamists (only in the abstract, mind you - not for their dinner parties) because they imagine themselves to be rebelliously anti-Western civilization as they sip their Pinot Noir. The rest of 'em are just scared pantywaists, as Teddy Roosevelt would say, and don't want to poke a rattlesnake. Photo: Time to bring out Rage Boy again
Thursday, March 27. 2008
The essay, Are We Really That Ill? (in which the author notes that, according to that Psychiatric diagnostic manual "DSM", half of us are mentally ill) in the NY Sun has been referenced frequently this week. And regrettably so, because the author is a Professor of English and knows little of the practice of Psychiatry. I only have the time to address one of his statements: With over a million copies in print, the manual is known as the bible of American psychiatry; certainly it is an invoked chapter and verse in schools, prisons, courts, and by mental-health professionals around the world.
Yes, it is invoked often - but it is no bible. No well-trained Psychiatrist uses it as a tool for understanding or treatment. It was designed as a research tool, so that researchers would share definitions. It rapidly became a tool for filling out the "diagnosis code" space on insurance forms so that patients might be eligible for some medical reimbursement. Many of the "diagnoses" listed are not illnesses in any usual sense: nictotine addiction, insomnia, alcohol abuse, post-traumatic stress, personality disorders, ADD, and "adjustment disorder" are just a few examples of the listed items which are common parts of the human condition, but which are subjects of medical research and which are things for which people often ask for help. But they aren't illnesses - they are insurance codes.
|
