Today we were between rainstorms. In the same way the Inuit are said (even if inaccurately) to have 200 words for snow, the NorthWet ought to have a word for this. Something like “interrainum.” Be that as it may, by late morning I was also between interviews for this cannabis article I’m working on. I’d just wrapped up one at the coolest retail store and didn’t have another until tomorrow. The day was already pleasant and just about then turned bright blue. I took the dogs walking on a river trail. We moseyed along in comfort, no fleece-lined jacket for…
13 CommentsMonth: January 2016
Cool story from shooting-sports star Vera Koo. I had no idea she was so old or that she learned to shoot only in middle age because she was terrified of guns. Amazing and discouraging that cops continue to get away with being highwaymen despite these tactics being repeatedly exposed. Picked the wrong victim this time, though. (H/T MJR) Why is there no Uber for healthcare? You already know the answer, but this article finally asks some of the obvious questions. Much sweat has been sweated over China’s holdings of U.S. debt. This is the first time I’ve seen anybody get…
9 CommentsPart the first: Cannabiz
If I’ve been quiet the past few days (and continue to be quiet early next week) it’s because I’ve been lining up and conducting interviews for an article — something I rarely do nowadays.
When I was in corporate communications, I was forever interviewing somebody. Executives and project managers needed to talk about their latest work. Clients praised or critiqued products. I even had a gig for a long time where I (much more interestingly) interviewed employees of a big corporation about their hobbies, accomplishments, and good deeds. A millworker with a home blackmithing shop. A low-level manager who’d been the foster father to 37 children. A group of workers who saved people from a fire. Before that, I had a gig touring people’s fabulous homes and interviewing them about the designs and improvements.
Nowadays, my work requires few interviews and what little interviewing I do is by email. It’s far easier than traveling to in-person interviews or playing phone tag for weeks with busy execs, but it’s not adventurous and doesn’t usually lead to the entertaining or revealing digressions that in-person talks and tours can.
This month, though, I’m visiting growers, processors, and retailers in Washington state’s newly legal recreational cannabusinesses. And wow. Is that ever fun. Tiring because there’s a lot of work involved and all this chatting hurts my hermit heart. But fun.
31 CommentsIt’s looking as if this is one “snowpocalypse” that isn’t going to fizzle out and embarrass the media. So, just in time, or maybe only slightly late, a friend sends along these tips for what to pack if you have to travel in the mess and what to do if you get stuck. We here in the NorthWET just got another punch from an atmospheric river. Coincidentally the amount of liquid we received in 24 hours was roughly equivalent to the amount of liquid in the snow y’all back there are about to be clobbered with. Say, roughly the level…
20 CommentsBest to you all from Virginia to New England. Stay safe, warm, electrified, and avoid hysterical politicians. ADDED: And same to you all up and down the coast. Sounds like major nastiness is getting spread around.
17 CommentsAt The Zelman Partisans, Nicki lauds the young Pakistani professor who used his firearm to protect his students from a terrorist attack. Killing the golden goose of capitalism. And speaking (as we were earlier this week and above) about the way bad law and regulation ultimagely discourage everyone and everything, NHTSA regulators are trying to destroy the Elio before it even goes into production. (H/T jed) Okay. I’m sure this is humorous. Now, this, on the other hand I’m not so certain about. (Both links courtesy of Y.B.) No wonder college students are so eager to destroy free speech and…
16 CommentsYou remember I had to refresh Firefox last week, wiping away all my settings and add-ons. NoScript and a few key settings went back on right away and so far, so good. No crashing. In that quick re-set I made sure that “Do not track” was enabled. I didn’t, however, do anything with cookie management. Just now I was cruising through Firefox Preferences looking for additional settings to put back to normal and I had to laugh. My browser was infested by hundreds of tracking cookies — so many that I couldn’t wipe them out selectively and keep the “good”…
21 CommentsWow. But not surprising. The ATF and the Obama administration, via Fast & Furious, supplied drug lord El Chapo with .50 cal weaponry. Zombie ships ply the ocean in hopes of paying just the interest, not the principle, on shipowners’ debt. One more place all that central bank bubble capital has been going for the last eight years. Right analysis? But completely crazy proposed solution to global bubbles. With state legislatures in session, it’s become political silly season. Most of the goofy new bills will never pass, so you can stop sending me alarming emails about junk that might not…
11 CommentsCommentariat member Dana got me reading Thomas Cahill’s How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role From the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe. It’s short, lively, and even if it’s not totally satisfying in describing how the Irish did the saving, it’s full of smack-upside-the-head insights.
The best material is on Rome’s collapse. (The first chapter was so persuasive it darned near made me feel sorry for tax collectors.) Before I return the book to the library, I want to post a couple of paragraphs. In the first, Cahill is mostly quoting from Kenneth Clark’s Civilization (spelling Americanized).
22 CommentsBrad, over at WendyMcElroy.com, says, “Adios, Forbes.” I’ll follow that with my own “Sayonara.” I used to check Forbes often; now it won’t let me in even when I try to accommodate its demands. Seems that’s just as well, really. You might not favor this guy’s environmental stance, but the way he went about saving a patch of old-grown forest is an inspiration. Yikes! Village endures “biblical” rains. (Commentariat member Roger: I hope you don’t live anywhere near this place!) (H/T jed) David Codrea reminds us of a few more things Mike Vanderboegh has done for freedom. Google’s (unsurprisingly) creep…
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