Let’s hope none of us ever have to find out. But it appears the keys to surviving solitary confinement with your sanity intact are “grit” and an ability to direct your imagination. Here’s the official grit self-assessment. So where do you rate? Me? Well, directed imagination, I’ve got. Comes with the writer territory. Grit … not so much. I think, though, that when people take the grit test they’re tending to do the “90 percent of everybody is above average” variety of evaluation. Sitting at our computers it’s easy to say, “Yeah, sure, I never let setbacks discourage me. And…
Category: Mind and Spirit
Spirituality, moods, feelings, and thinking free to live free.
Commentariat 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).
… I really do. Normally I don’t believe in burning bridges unnecessarily, but right now I don’t care. And I don’t care who thinks I’m an asshat. Life’s just too short to deal with some people. I sent this to a well-known survivalist author. Not naming any names, but I’ll say he’s not the biggest, but someone you’re familiar with. He just sent an email asking a number of individuals and websites to promote his latest book. __________________, Do you realize you just cc’d my private email address to a bunch of strangers like some Internet n00b who never heard…
BBQ/work party According to Mike, a work party/BBQ to help with long-neglected home projects is forming up for the first weekend in February. If you’re near Pinson, Alabama, or have construction skills, a strong back, and are able to travel, this might be a great event for you. And certainly for Mike and Rosey. David’s fundraising plea David Codrea also clarifies issues related to his fundraising pleas for Mike — and gives righteous hell to a few yammerheads. Seems there are some who, rather than helping Mike, prefer to sit at their keyboards and make unhelpful suggestions. I haven’t personally…
I was debating whether to write more about Obama’s recent (though ancient in Internet Time) fiats against gun “dealers” and gun owners. Can’t bring myself to. Our Glorious Leader is all about “gun control theater,” signifying very darned little. Bans and confiscations clearly dance through Obama’s dreams, but he hasn’t got the guts to face strong people. He strikes at the weak and vulnerable. Then this morning I was reminded of the bottom line truth: (Source) —– Well, I finished watching The Man in the High Castle. Yep, as you who got there before me said, that was certainly a…
Deadlining today. The article came together nicely over the last several days, so today I had only to polish it, choose photos, and write captions. But this was still urgent, intense work. All the while I felt terrible because I could not pause to write a worthy blog on Mike Vanderboegh’s terrible news. M. posted the link yesterday evening in comments, so thank you for that. But I needed to do more — and now that I have the time, I don’t have the words.
Mike announced his own impending death with resolution and grace. You should definitely read what he wrote. The news wasn’t surprising; Mike’s been battling cancer for years. He’s reported many, many recent bad days. And merely the thin, drawn look of him at the events he’s managed to attend in the last year said he was no longer winning the fight. He’s a believer, of course. So he has that to hold onto. I hope it sustains him.
Mike is an authentic hero not only to gun rights, but to freedom in general. Nobody will ever match or replace him.
So I know from past Januaries that most Living Freedom readers (at least the most vocal ones) don’t do New Years resolutions. Maybe it’s just one of those “there are two kinds of people in the world things.” But I do do them and find them useful. The gods of the media seem to be with you non-resolving folks. You shouldn’t make resolutions because: You’ll fail to keep them and feel worse about yourself, which will just make meeting your goals that much harder. (Often true for us procrastinating writers.) You need resolve, not resolutions (a good point, actually) January…
Heh. Carl-Bear Bussjaeger has an idea for those who are likely to be reclassified as “gun dealers” by Obama fiat: comply, comply, comply, comply … and comply some more. Very good one from Mas Ayoob: Five myths of gun fighting. Until recently, the common assumption was that carefree, laid-back people lived longer, healthier lives and that anxiety and worry were bad for you. Lots of research these days points away from that belief. Here’s one more datapoint. Anxious people process threats in a part of the brain devoted to action. The Bill Clinton effect or why liberals may be more…
The other day I heard somebody refer to the “golden age of television.”
I immediately leaped to the conclusion that he meant that fuzzy black and white age in which all of America watched Leave It to Beaver, Gunsmoke, and Ed Sullivan’s variety hour and gathered the next day to share their mutual cultural three-channel (if you didn’t count PBS, which was at that point some guy standing at a blackboard writing equations), pre-programmed experience.
Just as I was about to remind the speaker that his “golden age” was mere seconds in geological time from when Newton Minow created waves — and a meme — by damning all of television as “a vast wasteland,” I realized that’s not what he meant.
He meant now. This very minute.
Yes! We must ban guns. So that gangs of robbers will have to use alternatives. (H/T MJR) Obama cynically decries cynicism. ISIS judge says kill all the “defective” children. I guess Middle Eastern mommies and daddies should be glad it’s being done by “humane” methods rather than public beheadings or burning the infants alive in cages. Patrick Buchanan asks whether elites will blow up the GOP. He then proceeds to chronicle how the GOP has already been blown up. Interesting glimpse at history and (these days non) smoke-filled rooms, though. It’s always hard to tell a real crisis from one…