Well, whaddayou know? “The Happy Marriage is the ‘Me’ Marriage” — not the ego-me, but the growing-me. (NY Times free subscription link) You heard about the man facing five years in prison for reading his wife’s email. Did you know that his act was “outed” by a good deed he attempted to do? Yes, it may have been done partly from vindictiveness; still, he was trying to save a kid from abuse. You saw the cartoon. Now read why a couple of fluffy bears (or are they dogs?) are making more economic sense than your average Ph.D. economist. At least…
Category: Dogs and (grudgingly) cats
No description needed. Dogs are life. Cats are also necessary on the Internet.
Somehow the local animal group has mistaken me for a tech guru, so I’ve ended up being their email contact person and webmaster. Regarding the title of this post, we get letters. Like these. The latest arrived yesterday. I quote [almost] verbatim, changing names to protect the innocent and guilty alike: My name is [Unspeakable] and my wife and I are facing a big transition in our life. We are suppose to adopt a baby in the next few months so we will not be able to give our 3 cats the attention they need. You see 2 of these…
“The verdict that may shake Russia.” I damn well hope so. The only thing this guy’s guilty of is challenging authority. Hey, this might work — being “too systemically important” to fail. Worth a try, anyhow. A word that’s been crying out to be invented: screwflation. Juries. They’re starting to rebel. (The good news is from Ellendra in a recent comment section.) Hm. In this economy, people are still quitting their jobs with no new work lined up. The article tsk tsks. But it kinda makes sense — considering screwflation and all. What kind of “justice” system sends somebody to…
Just returned from the post office with the first-arriving Amazon wish list gifts. WhooHoo! But my woohoos were muted by the fact that I still don’t know whom to thank. Amazon hasn’t revealed the gift-givers, but I figured the packages would contain that info. Nope. 🙁 Today’s gifts were for the pups. I already know the giver of the bounteous bag of tennis balls, thank you MS Jordan. But who sent the wonderful Kong Wubba? All three dogs started jumping the moment I opened it, but this is going to be the special toy for Nadja. Poor Nadja is a…
I didn’t know airports could fire the TSA and hire their own screeners. Did you? Apparently one of the poly-tick-ans who helped create The Sexual Assaulters is now urging airports to do so. Gotta love this, though: “When the TSA was established, it was never envisioned that it would become a huge, unwieldy bureaucracy which was soon to grow to 67,000 employees.” Because, you know. Stuff like that never happens. A heartwarming story. But more than that; a tale of complexity. And quiet individual initiative. This one’s just plain heartwarming. Also an example of dubious math. But what the heck.…
I know. Bread isn’t exactly the No. 1 item on a primal diet. In fact, its not anywhere on a primal diet. But once in a while even a caveperson needs a ham & swiss on rye. That’s a simple fact of life. So there I was in this town’s mini-supermart — which is a neat little store, but definitely little — scanning the bread rack. The first (and for a while only) rye bread my eyes lighted on cost six bucks. Ack! It was an interesting, even funky, unknown brand. All organic and containing nothing but Actual Ingredients. Still…
Fueled by coffee (which I rarely drink, being a tea wuss), I just spent the evening not working on the Paladin book and am now about to get back to those almost-final polishings. Meantime I enjoyed an excellent noir thriller which is as much a meditation on love, loss, regret, memory, and obsession as it is a murder mystery. The Secret in Their Eyes. It won this year’s Best Foreign-Language Picture Oscar — one of the few times I think I might agree with the Academy voters on a foreign film (they usually vote too politically correct or two just-plain-sappy…
The Paladin book is going into final edit before going off to the publisher and a S.W.A.T. magazine deadline looms this week. So the brain is a bit crowded right now (and that’s without … well, other stuff going on that involves three driven-to-distraction dogs and an overwhelmed but surprisingly calm guest kitty; more on that later). But, with a little help from my friends, here’s a bit of blogitude: Via Sam (thank you): What happens when an American traveler calmly refuses to answer questions upon his reentry into the “homeland.” Bold blogger, that guy. Larken Rose, who last time…
The dogs and I are getting to know the logging roads near my new house. Logging roads are familiar territory, even though these specific roads aren’t, and we have an established routine with them. If a road is gated but open to walk-ins, we never enter if somebody else’s vehicle is parked near the gate. If a road is open to vehicles, I cruise it in the truck to see if anyone else is around before settling on a place to walk. Don’t want to disturb any hunters or other dog walkers — and don’t want to disturb my own…
You know you have waaaaay too much government at every level when you repeatedly read stories like this one. And remember those no-down, 1-percent interest mortgages I goggled about a couple of weeks ago? Well, the USDA isn’t the only government outfit that has a darned weird idea of how mortgages should be handled in the post-bubble world. Sheesh! Via LRC.com: Project Vigilant. Do you get the feeling that the patriotic rhetoric — and the allegedly private financing — are just a smoke-screen? Via Joel and a whole lot of other places as the news spreads: Such a surprise! The…