Good news. There’s a typeface designed to be hard for NSA computers to read. Bad news. It’s pretty hard for humans to read, too. More of an art/protest project at this point (though created by a former NSA contractor). But just a taste of how smart people will ultimately defeat the Stasi. Kent McManigal on avoiding being sucked into people’s negative vortexes. You know those strange names parents are giving their kids, these days? Names like Naiphthan, Elyivya, and Nevaeh, and J’oshau? Well, we can all be glad nobody’s getting stuck with these names any more. And speaking of names…
Category: Mind and Spirit
Spirituality, moods, feelings, and thinking free to live free.
Swarms of tabs are buzzing ’round my head again. Some contain news that fills me with such loathing I can’t decide whether to blog about it or run for cover. I’ll avoid the most loathsome for now and merely blog the good, the bad, the indifferent, and the funny to clear my browser and my head. The NSA disguised itself as Google to enable even more spying. Part of me says this is bad in the same sense that the CIA’s longstanding practice of disguising its agents as journalists is bad (for the health of actual journalists). Part of me…
Loving a bad dog. (Oh yeah. Been there …) News of the weird. Shelley’s Ozymandias. Um … with socks. Wall Street deals in physical commodities. Commodities producers operate hedge funds and sell derivitives. And there, and there, and there go the trillions. I really like Ricky Gervais and I want to see this. For anybody who still doubts that Edward Snowden did the right thing. Won’t get anywhere. Not enough. But the Surveillance State Repeal Act is a start. Yes, we already know that the fedgov is run not merely by narcissists but by full-blown sociopaths. Still, this Salon piece…
… even when genetics and circumstances conspire against you. Iligitimi non carborundum. Oh yeah, the happy-science article forgot to mention cute dog videos. Even when they’re just commercials, they’re right up there with cute cat pix as mood lifters. —– BTW, you can get the cool led-light collars (and leashes) on Amazon. I didn’t intend this post to be a promotional, but what the heck. My Amazon sales are down a little and if you don’t want any buckets of wheat berries, Israeli bandages (a perennially popular Amazon item hereabouts), survival knives or gourmet coffee, maybe some dress-up for your…
Jackson county, Mississippi, sheriff Mike Byrd was apparently a typical corrupt cop. If the accusations are true, he used his power to get everything from free lawnmower repair to a murder indictment against an innocent man. Alas, there’s nothing unusual about that. What’s unusual is the way the Christian Science Monitor used Byrd as a tsk-tsking hook for an article about how terribly, terribly dangerous the patriot-supported power of the sheriff is. You know the belief: the sheriff, the highest elected law-enforcement officer, is therefore the highest law enforcer, period. And — in desperate times — that makes him the…
I confess that even though she and I are both considered Gunbloggers (she more than I, though she disputes her gunblogger status), Erin Palette really wasn’t on my radar. Not until yesterday when I noticed this graphic popping up across the gunblogosphere: Blogs like this one and this one and this one told part of the tale. But everybody stepped aside to let Erin Palette reveal what she has gathered the great courage to say about herself. I can’t add anything to what’s already been written. Erin Palette, you got guts. But Erin’s story is also a great testimony to…
This came from C^2 with the title “A Cartoonist’s Advice.” It’s that (words by Bill Watterson, creator of Calvin and Hobbes, art by cartoonist Gavin Aung Than). It’s one heck of a lot more. A deep-breath-taking reminder that no matter what anybody else wants, demands, or expects of us, our life is ours to make. —– Raining this morning. The first really good fall-like rain. Though temps are still summer-mild and there’s not even a breeze to rattle the wind chimes hanging outside the window, it’s another reminder. It reminds me of this. And to live while life lasts (a…
When I was 10 or 11, the 16-year-old boy next door would sit pressed up against the fence between our properties, listening to my friends and me talk. During backyard campouts our conversations often turned to sex, as we shared misinformation and bad jokes in hopes of understanding that mysterious adult something we were beginning to feel in our bodies. Though we whispered, evidently we didn’t whisper quietly enough because Roger would sit there on the other side of the fence for hours, doing we did not know what, though it involved occasional grunts and groans. Even when we were…
You know that constant busy-ness that’s afflicted (or blessed) me since late spring? It culminates this week. Specifically tomorrow. After that, though there’s another week or two of “heightened activity”* as the folks at the NSA-CIA-DHS like to say, it is done. I can go back to being my usual slug-lazy self** and poke around on the Tubz for good (and bad) stuff to blog. But look for the blog to have a couple of quiet days. Of which today was one. Tomorrow will probably be even quieter. So I count on the Commentariat to pick up the flag and…
Yes. That’s a soap dispenser. In the shape of a kitty. Who is tied to the top of a Christmas box by a big golden bow. And who has holly stuck in its fur. And who is (quite understandably under the circumstances) sad-eyed and apprehensive. In fact, I’m rather surprised the poor porcelain beastie didn’t come to life and furiously claw the nose off the Chinese worker responsible for its plight. I bought it at an estate sale this morning. I didn’t buy it because it’s a good thing (yeah, trust me on that). I bought it because it demonstrates…