Doctor's orders.......................

 

            more fun here

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

 

   The Oak Ridge Boys...............the Sky High album

 

A night out on the town.............

 

After a very pleasant dining experience at 1922 On The Square, My Sweetie and I walked down the street to the wondrous Midland Theatre where we took in a great show from the ageless Oak Ridge Boys.  Much fun.

I'm conflicted...............................

 

...................is this cool - or is it scary?

A bold bet..............................

 

...................................................pays off.

Today........................

 

a geometry of sunbeams.............

 

I am present at the sowing of the seed of the world.  With a geometry of sunbeams, the soul lays the foundation of nature.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

great advice....................

 

via

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

      Olivia Newton-John.................Please Mr. Please

 

2028.................................

 

..........................this will be interesting.

There’s a long roster of governors, senators, members of Congress, and celebrities who can take the plunge. A short list includes Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker, Maryland governor Wes Moore, Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, Kentucky governor Andy Beshear, and California governor Gavin Newsom. Senator Christopher Murphy of Connecticut and Ro Khanna, a Silicon Valley congressman, seem likely to announce. For Democrats hungry for wealthy, famous outsiders, billionaire Mark Cuban and Stephen A. Smith, the ESPN commentator, could be viable. Pete Buttigieg will probably run again. Both Harris and her old running mate, Tim Walz, might be in the mix. For those nostalgic for bruising centrists, Rahm Emmanuel is floating a trial balloon.

What's the hurry.....................

 

Only rush in the most dire of emergencies.  Otherwise slow is fast: engage all senses. Think. Plan. Execute. 

Here's an interesting concept............

 

Citizenship without partisanship—it just might save the country from its worst instincts.

On Trump's management style.........

 It may be the equivalent of changing the tires while the car is still moving, but the ultimate result may be much clearer authority, responsibility, and accountability.

When subsidies stop........................

 

The tone is what an editor breaking the news about Santa Claus to forty-year-olds would shoot for. 

Wisdom.............................

 

When I think I am getting too caught up in daily events, I do two things: First, I wait 24 hours (or at least overnight) before starting to form an opinion. Second, I try to think like a historian and put myself 50 or 100 years in the future and frame the disagreement that way.

-Kurt Harden

Fingers crossed that ......................

 

.....................it will all be worth it.

To say that people, companies and the market are unsettled would be an understatement.  Everyone is whipsawed by tariff announcements, other foreign affairs issues, uncertainty about where federal spending and the deficit are headed.  So no surprise that indicators on economy-wide trends are also in flux.  Going to be an interesting next few months.

-Kevin Roche

Noah Smith decides.........................

 

.................it's time to start panicking about the national debt.

Welcome to the party, although I disagree with some of his analysis.  But still...........

In the background..........................

The Rippingtons........................Black Diamond

Splash down.........................

 

Crew-9 returns safely.  What a story............................

I like simple and boring..............

 

I watch financial markets every day because I think they’re a window into culture and behavior. They’re so fascinating, so beautiful, like art. But my personal finances are simple and boring. They will win no awards. But they’re practical for me and my family. They provide what I need them to do. Isn’t there beauty in that?

-Morgan Housel, concluding this post

habits...................

 

You need ritual, not inspiration.  Everyday, no matter what, you must practice.  Your practice ritual is your highest priority—an unbreakable commitment.  Stubbornly protect this time against the demands of the world.

-Derek Sivers, How To Live: 27 conflicting answers and one weird conclusion

the path................................

 

Don't hope that events will turn out the way you want, welcome events in whichever way they happen: this is the path to peace.

-attributed to Epictetus

balance......................

 

     Truth is our element of life, yet if a man fasten his attention on a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone for a long time, the truth becomes distorted and not itself, but falsehood; . . . How wearisome the grammarian, the phrenologist, the political or religious fanatic, or indeed any possessed mortal whose balance is lost by the exaggeration of a single  topic.  It is incipient insanity.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson, from this essay

responsibility....................

 

Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility. . . . In the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have is the ability to take on responsibility.

-Michael Korda       

the unending tug of war..............

 

From the outset, the convention reflected a pointed truce in the unending tug of war between those who believed in the necessity of a functioning union and those who feared the encroaching despotism of a national government and clung to states' rights; between fervent slaveholders and ardent abolitionists; between those who worried that small states would be smothered by the political juggernaut of the big states and those who worried about the tyranny of the minority; and between radicals who wanted a clear repudiation of the past and traditionalists who wanted only to tinker at the margins.  The reality was that after more than five generations of laying down roots in America, the exigencies of life had only sharpened the old insistence upon demands for personal liberty and equality.  Now the Americans found themselves arguing both for the historic and chartered rights they had once enjoyed as Englishmen, and for the timeless and universal rights of man.

      It was complicated, it was messy, and somehow everything came together.  Politicians all, the delegates compromised repeatedly.

-Jay Winik, The Great Upheaval: America and the Birth of the Modern World, 1788-1800

Checking in ..................

 

.................................with Mark Manson

People like to make happiness complicated, but it’s actually quite simple.

The art of stoicism.........................

 

But in Stoicism the art of journaling is more than that, more than some simple diary. This daily practice is the philosophy. Preparing for the day ahead. Reflecting on the day that has passed. Reminding oneself of the wisdom we have learned from our teachers, from our reading, from our own experiences. It’s not enough to simply hear these lessons once, instead, one practices them over and over again, turns them over in their mind, and most importantly, writes them down and feels them flowing through their fingers in doing so.

-The Daily Stoic

As questions go.............................

 

...........................this one is pretty legitimate.

 Either way, Trump’s salvo brings to the forefront a major unanswered question about the Biden presidency: who made executive decisions in the last four years?

Curiouser and curiouser..................

 

...............................the ultimate can of worms.

Checking in..........................

 

.............................with Farnum Street:

The most powerful productivity tool ever invented is simply the word "no."

The single most effective habit is the willingness to change your own mind.

If you want to understand someone, figure out the narrative they tell themselves about themself.

If you want to change your behavior, change your narrative. If you want to change someone else’s behavior, offer them a more compelling narrative they can tell themselves.

If you are not reading....................

 

...............David Kanigan's Thrive, well, please do.

When will we finally understand that we are all drops of the same ocean, hurting together, healing together, hoping together? Don’t just pray for hands to heal the hurting. Pray with hands that are healing the hurting. Don’t just pray for arms to help the helpless. Pray with arms that are helping the helpless. Don’t just pray for feet to respond to need. Pray on feet that are responding to need. Don’t just pray for someone to do something. Be someone who does something.

-David Kanigan, channeling L.R. Knost

Umm, okay.........................

 

      From Tim Ferriss of all people

Suspecting the fox family.................

...............................that summers with us, would love us to raise chickens. 

Saving baseball.....................

 

........................................from itself.

choices....................

 

conceptions..........................

 Let all your efforts be directed to something, let it keep that end in view. It’s not activity that disturbs people, but false conceptions of things that drive them mad.

 -Seneca, “On Tranquility of Mind,” 12.5

The challenge...............................

 

..........................of behaving ethically.

Some people dine out on a single good deed for years.