"The kids are gonna be just fine" - E

I concur.

High on Stress.......................................Bite Your Tongue




I pointed out Friend Scott's recommendation of High on Stress this morning.  This afternoon Nick Leet, of said band, sent along a "glad you like it" e-mail.  The Intertunnel is a fabulous place, full of very nice people and very good music.

It's no rock-and-roll show...................

The Rolling Stones...............................Midnight Rambler

 

#13 on this list

Prefer...............................................

Democracy is a thing which is always breaking down through the complexity of civilisation.  Anyone who likes may state it by saying that democracy is the foe of civilisation.   But he must remember that some of us really prefer democracy to civilisation, in the sense of preferring democracy to complexity.
-G. K. Chesterton, as excerpted from The Everlasting Man

First............................................

"Freedom comes first.  I also support traditional values but I don’t want the government to shove them down my throat."
-David P. Goldman, channeling his inner Spengler

As the world turns............................

The history books suggest that maybe this could have been true when I was a wee lad.  I know it wasn't  so when I was in college.  Seems like it could be true again.  From Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay, Compensation:

"The preacher, a man esteemed for his orthodoxy,..........."

Fifty years ago...............................

The Rolling Stones.............................................I'm All Right

 

Resourceful and...................................

"Deprived of the use of force (a crucial caveat), human beings acting in their private capacity tend to be resourceful and benign.  Human beings acting in the political realm tend to be resourceful and dangerous."
-Charles Murray, from American Exceptionalism:  An Experiment in History

High On Stress.....................................

..........Our friend Scott keeps opening musical doors - like here.

Treasures....................................

"The world honors daring, exalts ostentation, and emphasizes progress.  What the sage treasures is patience, frugality, and humility, all of which the world considers useless."
-Su Ch'e

Steady as she goes...........................

Send prayers and healing vibrations Jeff's way:

'The last week had events to be attended to but no further distractions. As if any more were needed. Presurgical complete and clear sailing into Monday when we extract The Alien. Then we wait."

Having fun while making music.....................

Chuck Berry and friends.....Roll Over Beethoven and more

Setting and dreaming..................................

thanks hugh

Opening paragraphs..........................

Every night in the year, four of us sat in the small parlour of the George at Debenham - the undertaker, and the landlord, and Fettes, and myself.   Sometimes there would be more;  but blow high, blow low, come rain or snow or frost, we four would be each planted in his own particular armchair.   Fettes was an old drunken Scotsman, a man of education obviously, and a man of some property, since he lived in idleness.  He had come to Debenham years ago, while still young, and by a mere continuance of living had grown to be an adopted townsman.  His blue camlet cloak was a local antiquity, like the church-spire.  His place in the parlour at the George, his absence from church, his old crapulous, disreputable vices, were all things of course in Debenham.  He had some vague Radical opinions and some fleeting infidelities, which he would now and again set forth and emphasise with tottering slaps upon the table.  He drank rum - five glasses regularly every evening;  and for the greater portion of his nightly visit to the George sat, with his glass in his right hand, in a state of melancholy alcoholic saturation.  We called him the Doctor, for he was supposed to have some special knowledge of medicine, and had been known, upon a pinch, to set a fracture or reduce a dislocation;  but, beyond these slight particulars, we had no knowledge of his character and antecedents.
-Robert Louis Stevenson, from his short story The Body Snatcher

Just....................................

Although, it might take some time..........

Whatever initial misconceptions spin doctors may promote, reality will out.
-John Kay

Fifty years ago...........................................

The Rolling Stones.........................................Route 66

It is so much easier that way.................

via

The need for smarter "Greens"......................or, We'll give up the cats, but never The Dog......

Via Meadia points to this op-ed piece suggesting that our poor planet simply cannot handle all these pesky humans AND their pets ... "Two German Shepherds use more resources just for their annual food needs than the average Bangladeshi uses each year in total."

Walter Russell Mead's crew is not impressed:
Telling people not to own pets is like telling people not to eat meat: it riles the layperson up, and triggers a knee-jerk reaction not just against the specific issue the environmentalist may be advocating for, but for the green movement in general. Sure, our collective impact on the environment would be a lot less if we all went herbivore, or gave up our pet dogs for pet rocks, but that’s never going to happen. And this is worse than a lost cause—it backfires on greens, undermining both their credibility as policy advocates and as rational observers of the human condition. It wastes political capital at a time when the movement’s reservoirs are running dangerously low. We need—and the world deserves—much smarter green thinking than what we’ve got.

The Dog:

"How to be Perfect"............................

Get some sleep.

Eat an orange every morning.

Be friendly. It will help make you happy.

Hope for everything. Expect nothing.

Take care of things close to home first. Straighten up your room before you save the world. Then save the world.

Be nice to people before they have a chance to behave badly.

Don’t stay angry about anything for more than a week, but don’t forget what made you angry. Hold your anger out at arm’s length and look at it, as if it were a glass ball. Then add it to your glass ball collection.

Wear comfortable shoes.

Do not spend too much time with large groups of people.

Plan your day so you never have to rush.

Show your appreciation to people who do things for you, even if you have paid them, even if they do favors you don’t want.

After dinner, wash the dishes.

Calm down.

Don’t expect your children to love you, so they can, if they want
to.

Don’t be too self-critical or too self-congratulatory.

Don’t think that progress exists. It doesn’t.

Imagine what you would like to see happen, and then don’t do anything to make it impossible.

Forgive your country every once in a while. If that is not possible, go to another one.

If you feel tired, rest.

Don’t be depressed about growing older. It will make you feel even older. Which is depressing.

Do one thing at a time.

If you burn your finger, put ice on it immediately. If you bang your finger with a hammer, hold your hand in the air for 20 minutes. you will be surprised by the curative powers of ice and gravity.

Do not inhale smoke.

Take a deep breath.

Do not smart off to a policeman.

Be good.

Be honest with yourself, diplomatic with others.

Do not go crazy a lot. It’s a waste of time.

Drink plenty of water. When asked what you would like to drink, say, “Water, please.”

Take out the trash.

Love life.

Use exact change.


When there’s shooting in the street, don’t go near the window.

via
source

It's no wonder we all get so confused.............

“Life is two things. Life is morality – life is adventure. Squire and master. Adventure rules, and morality looks up the trains in the Bradshaw. Morality tells you what is right, and adventure moves you. If morality means anything it means keeping bounds, respecting implications, respecting implicit bounds. If individuality means anything it means breaking bounds – adventure.” 
-H.G. Wells

Time to mute our hoopla................

Mott the Hoople......................................All The Young Dudes



cartoon via

Inspired............................

"Mankind was never so happily inspired as when it made a cathedral."
-Robert Louis Stevenson

image of Mont Saint-Michel via 
back story on Mont Saint-Michel here

On giving.................................

"The wealth from giving generously is inexhaustible.  The power from not accumulating is boundless."
-Sung Ch'ang-Hsing

And then I woke up............................

"The biggest mistake that you can make is to believe that you are working for somebody else…The driving force of a career must come from the individual. Remember:  Jobs are owned by the company, you own your career!"
-Earl Nightingale

cartoon via

Excuse....................................

"A bad hair day is not an excuse for calling in sick." 
-Tadahiko Nagao

photo via

Fifty years ago..................................

Skeeter Davis................Gonna Get Along Without You Now

Hmm, not in my experience..............

via

Count on Michael to.................................

...................remind us of some important questions.

Change.......................................

"It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change." 
-Charles Darwin

cartoon via

Culling......................................

The whys and hows................................... here

"I’ll create some new bad stuff now; bad stuff which will lead to good stuff."

We thank you!

Now people let me put you wise............

Dion and The Del Satins...............................Runaround Sue

 

You may call me Sir..................................

     The use of first names has undergone a cultural transformation in the last three or four decades, so that by now the use of honorifics and last names is nearly extinct.  It's not just the telemarketer on the other end of the phone who calls you by your first name.  I have had parents introduce me to their six-year-old child with the words, "This is Charles," requiring me to choke back an overwhelming urge to pat the little one on the head and say, "But you may call me Sir."
     I blame this misbegotten use of first names on the baby boomers.  Frightened of being grown-ups since they were in college, they have shied from anything that reminds them they're not kids anymore. 
-Charles Murray,  as excerpted from The Curmudgeon's Guide to Getting Ahead:  Dos and Don'ts of Right Behavior, Tough Thinking, Clear Writing, and Living A Good Life
     

Illusions..................................

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place."
 -attributed to George Bernard Shaw

Solace.....................................

"But no public man in these islands ever believes that the Bible means what it says: he is always convinced that it says what he means ..."
-George Bernard Shaw

Fifty years ago.......................................

Nat King Cole...............I Don't Want To Be Hurt Anymore

Normality: The psychosis of the majority.............

"Why can't you be more normal?"  my father once yelled at his neurotic teenage son.  "Well, what's normal?"  I hurled back.  It was a good question, however defensively yelled: and still is.  During the plague, it became perhaps more pressing than ever.  "The poor homosexuals," Patrick Buchanan memorably wrote.  "They declared war on nature and now nature has taken its revenge."  As the epidemic continued its onslaught, and as the human horror of its path through the lives of hundreds of thousands of gay men became clearer, the question receded.  It became offensive, even obscene, to raise the question of the "normality" of people in such distress, to disregard what they so obviously had in common with everyone else - fear, family, isolation, death - from what resiliently set them apart.  
-Andrew Sullivan, from his essay Virtually Abnormal from Love Undetectable:  Notes on Friendship, Sex, and Survival

Making lemonade..............................

"Life is not a matter of having good cards, but of playing a poor hand well." 
-attributed to Robert Louis Stevenson

Yes, yet another random photo dump......

Every so often, the need arises..........................

The basics...............................

"All God's children need an income stream."
-Marty Morrison

Talked of life...................................

Sammy Davis Jr................................................Mr. Bojangles

Opening paragraphs...................Part One

     "Reverend father, will you die steadfast in Christ and the doctrines you have preached?"  "Yes," replied the clear voice for the last time.  On February 18, 1546, even as he lay dying in Eisleben, far from home, Martin Luther was not to be spared a final public test, not to be granted privacy even in this last, most personal hour.  His longtime confidant Justus Jonas, now pastor in Halle, having hurriedly summoned witnesses to the beside, shook the dying man by the arm to rouse his spirit for the final exertion.  Luther had always prayed for a "peaceful hour":  resisting Satan - the ultimate, bitterest enemy - through that trust in the Lord over life and death which is God's gift of liberation from the tyranny of sin.  It transforms agony into no more that a brief blow.
-Heiko A. Oberman,  from the Prologue to Luther:  Man Between God and The Devil

Opening paragraphs..................Part Two

     The Venetian ambassador is exasperated by the halting progress of the Diet of Augsburg in the summer of 1518:  "Incredible, these Germans!"  Here, he reported to his superiors in Venice, are princes and diplomats with the public good at stake, struggling to achieve a settlement between emperor and sovereign princes, while in the corridors the rumormill confounds their best efforts, and the seeds of mistrust are sown.  And all because of trivialities - a theologians' dispute over indulgences.  The ambassador did not even have to rely on vague hearsay:  he could name the adversaries - a monk called Luther and a certain professor from Ingolstadt,  Johannes Eck.  Ridiculous, to let indulgences distract one from reality!  Quickly, he steered his account back to political matters.
-Heiko A. Oberman,  Luther:  Man Between God and The Devil

Reformation, anyone.................................?

On the last day of October 1517, Martin Luther famously nailed his 95 Theses to the doors of the Castle Church of Wittenberg.  Upset over the sale of "indulgences" and other priestly fundraising behaviors, Luther started: 

Out of love for the truth and the desire to bring it to light, the following propositions will be discussed at Wittenberg, under the presidency of the Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts and of Sacred Theology, and Lecturer in Ordinary on the same at that place. Wherefore he requests that those who are unable to be present and debate orally with us, may do so by letter.

The 95 Theses can be found here.   Cliff notes on the story are here.

Bring on the eggs and butter............................

My Mom, one of the healthiest people on the planet until she was 86 or so, loved her morning egg, evening bowl of ice cream, and cooking with butter.  She was not a big believer in the government's "food pyramid."  Here is a longish essay detailing reasons why the government has had it all wrong.  Excerpt here:

Seeing the U.S. population grow sicker and fatter while adhering to official dietary guidelines has put nutrition authorities in an awkward position. Recently, the response of many researchers has been to blame "Big Food" for bombarding Americans with sugar-laden products. No doubt these are bad for us, but it is also fair to say that the food industry has simply been responding to the dietary guidelines issued by the AHA and USDA, which have encouraged high-carbohydrate diets and until quite recently said next to nothing about the need to limit sugar.

thanks Stuart

Fifty years ago....................................

At the movies.......Sean Connery as James Bond.........Goldfinger

A slight moral tinge..................

     All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and wrong, with moral questions;  and betting naturally accompanies it.  The character of the voters is not staked.  I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right;  but I am not vitally concerned that right should prevail.  I am willing to leave that to the majority.  Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it.  It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail.  A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority.  There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men.  When the majority shall at length vote for the abolition of slavery, it will be because they are indifferent to slavery, or  because there is but little slavery left to be abolished by their vote.  They will then be the only slaves.  Only his vote can hasten the abolition of slaver who asserts his own freedom by his vote.
-Henry David Thoreau,  as excerpted from his essay, On the Duty of Civil Disobedience

Primary elections in Ohio today........

Do vote.

Go Forth and Be Great...................

via leadership schpleadership

Make it better........................................

Sir Paul and some friends.......................................Hey Jude

 

From the Archives............................

From the Archives