No, I’m not talking about the target of the neocons’ latest interventionist fantasy. I’m talking about the St. Paul Moment. The Great Aha! Turning points and watershed occurrences in our lives. For the last three days the Damascus phrase has been banging around inside my head, telling me there’s a blog entry or article to be written. But whatever’s doing the banging hasn’t been kind enough to tell me exactly what brilliant point I’m supposed to make. Sigh. So I find myself once again scribbling something that might turn out embarrassingly idiotic, but really having no choice in the matter.…
25 CommentsLiving Freedom Posts
When an American artist came under unjust scrutiny from the feds, he conceived a modern variation of the old “over-compliance” trick originated by 1960s draft protestors. (Video of him giving a talk about it.) (Tip o’ hat to MJR) This is such a cool, clever, innovative idea. Wonder how long before the feds hit it with a drone strike? (H/T C^2) Sharp-eyed Kent spotted this review of Safety Not Guaranteed, the movie inspired by the classified ad written by our own John Silveira. The film was a smash at Sundance, is just coming into theaters, and currently stands at an…
6 CommentsOn the anti-snitch book: Thanks to enthusiastic input, the anti-snitch book (booklet, really) is outlined, reality-checked, and ready for writing. Unforeseeable circumstances held the project up for three weeks, but we’re rolling again now. Thank you to all who’ve contributed so far and all who’ve offered future help. We’ve got some great material. On Sweetie the heeler Speaking of a little help from friends, Sweetie the heeler (now called Georgia) is doing well several weeks after her first immiticide treatment for heartworm. Her two foster “dads” dote on her and they and Sweetie are being very patient with the endless…
1 CommentIt’s been a long time since I’ve bothered to kick M*cr*$*ft. It’s become kind of a non-issue. In fact I was pretty impressed with the newest version of W******s that came with my laptop. (Never used it after the first few days, but it was jazzy, easy, and functional and it’s still on there as a dual-boot with Mandriva Linux.) But boy, have you read the scathing reviews the upcoming Windows 8 is getting from its beta users? If you want the gory details, here’s a 7,400-word analysis. And a shorter take. Basically everybody is saying that no business or…
12 CommentsA certain “victim of the American drug war” has wisely said goodbye in her own inimitable style to posting about her experiences as a snitch. Apparently, she’s been in this mood for a long, long time — though I suppose it’s “statist” of me to say so. Speaking of statist, a gifted Virginia schoolboy has been suspended for touching the American flag. We may live in a police state. But at least we can still drink our troubles away. Idaho is going to permit Five Wives vodka to be sold after all. But only after a famous lawyer threatened to…
6 CommentsDefinitely don’t agree with some of his politics. (That wall — OMG, think Berlin!) But gotta admit, this candidate’s got style:
7 CommentsI was eight or nine. I was bored. With nothing of my own to read, I tried a book from the grown-ups’ shelves for the first time. My parents weren’t readers. They had just two shelves of hardbound books, which, lacking pictures, had never interested me. That day I found a lone paperback. Although it, too, had no illustrations, its cover was bright and strange enough to attract me. I had never heard of Arthur C. Clarke. I had no concept of science fiction. I didn’t know there were such things as grownup stories about spaceships or time travel. How…
35 CommentsThe last of the Big Four* has departed, age 91. (Bradbury, Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke)
9 CommentsWell, sort of. It’s now called EcoQue, which may be a horrible name, but at least hits its prime audience right on target. Okay, okay, what’s a Pyromid? Or an EcoQue? (I hear some readers asking.) It’s this, among other things: … The cleverest, best-cooking portable grill ever. And for a decade or more it’s been half-impossible to get. —– Back in the 1990s at some otherwise-unremembered preparedness expo, my then-Significant Sweetie, Charles Curley, and I saw a Pyromid being demonstrated. It folded down flat and slipped into a tiny case. It unfolded in a flash. It cooked on an…
8 CommentsAs Joel blogs on his bad days, “I got nothin’” today. I’m tired, whacked, gloomy, and was awake half the night pondering The Meaning of Life and other imponderables. So here’s a cool jumping cat gif for ya, courtesy of A.G. I’m filing it under “dogs” because I don’t have a cat-agory. Consider me inclusive and non-discriminatory. If you’ve arrived with NoScript, you may need to allow Feedburner to see the gif at work. Or go here.
9 Comments