Courage is knowing it might hurt and doing it anyway.
Stupidity is the same.
And that’s why life is hard.
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Weekend Fun
Last weekend, The Wife, The Brother and I took my mom out for some fun for her birthday.
We started at Manatee Historical Village’s Old Florida Christmas. It’s an arts and crafts fair on their grounds. Generally, their heavily Christmas-themed crafts, but there’s often a variety. This year had a lot more vendors than last. We walked around and picked up some things. The Brother was interested in some hand-crafted pens – because he’s really into ink pens. Mom picked up a wreath and we got some ornaments. Not a bad day’s haul.
Then we went off to Hobby Lobby – because Mom and The Wife needed some things. And it’s Hobby Lobby. While The Brother entertained himself in the Ward Wagon, The Wife, Mom, and I meandered through the store. Some things were purchased, but not as much as was threatened. At least The Wife and I got our white elephant gifts for our Toastmaster’s Christmas party.
Dinner was at Rosemary and Thyme’s. Which if you are ever down in Sarasota, I would highly recommend. We all had a wonderful time, but I managed to tempt my mom to forego dinner there for another little gem of our area. For dessert, we went down to the American Honey Creamery ice cream shop. This is The Wife’s and my favorite little ice cream shop. The Brother and Mom were suitably impressed with their offerings.
It was good we had so much fun on Saturday, because Sunday was for labor. I had to pull some work hours while The Wife put together Christmas cards. As in assemble cards from parts she made using her Cricuts. The Wife is of the opinion – and I agree with her – that if she has the time, she will make people greeting cards rather than purchase them.
Then it was time to assemble her new standing desk. The side table she had been using for her Cricut station was nice, but not the most stable thing. We’d been talking about getting her something like my workbench – which is kind of a standing desk sold by Home Depot. We found an inexpensive standing desk on Amazon, which of course, requires assembly. This is the third standing desk I’ve assembled, and in many ways, it went together the easiest. Some of that was experience.
Of course, once the new desk was assembled and put into place, that required reshuffling furniture. Side desk to loft. Loft furniture to gathering room. Knight to king four.
Still, a semi-productive weekend.
After 34 Years…
One of the suspects in the Lockerbie bombing has been caught.
From CNN:
A Libyan man accused of being involved in making the bomb that destroyed Pan Am flight 103 over the town of Lockerbie in December 1988 is now in US custody, authorities in the United States and Scotland said Sunday.
The article didn’t specify how authorities caught him or where.
Monday Links
This is more clearing out some old tabs…
First, a Reason article on how the current labor market is broken. Which follows my earlier blog post on the Great Realignment of labor.
Next, an article from Tablet that was making the rounds on my feeds a couple weeks ago about the next civil war. I kinda disagree with the feds sending in troops to red states. I think it’ll be much more like the violent dissolution of Yugoslavia.
An article from The Firearms Blog on “Annoying Little Truths About Gun Ownership.” I would also add – expect to have a drawer and/or tub of discarded holsters.
From Paratus, a 2017 article on debunking the myth of ballistic fingerprinting. Another in a long series of showing that all those forensic techniques are not as scientific as they are purported.
Now, the light items…
“All of Tampa Visits Tampa!” More to the point, all 100 residents of Tampa, Kansas came to Tampa, Florida.
What happens when you drop a 500 meter asteroid on New York? Play this little game and find out. H/t The Brother
Friday Quote – Julie Borowski
A right is not something someone gives you – it’s something that no one can take away.
The US Military’s Shiny New Flying Things
This week, the USAF took the wraps off of the new Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider. It’s a spiffy update to the B-2 bomber and expected to be able to infiltrate the air defenses of the US’s strategic threats. Namely China.
What I find interesting is that this new plane is expected to supplant the B-1 and B-2, but not the B-52. Which the military has used more. And is constantly updating because no new B-52 airframes have been produced since before I was born.
Also this week, the Army announced it selected Bell’s V-280 to replace the venerable Blackhawk. I guess the Army felt a little left out of the tilt-rotor games? Let’s assume that Bell managed to incorporate lessons learned from the Osprey’s myriad of teething troubles, I can’t see the V-280 being able to squeeze into the same areas that the Blackhawk was able to put down into. Unlike Sikorsky’s Defiant offering. Which means either the troops are having to travel further on foot – or the Army will have an excuse to buy another new helicopter.
Don’t get me wrong. I like looking at shiny new toys as much as the next guy. I’m just not sure they’re the right toys for the right game.
Derek’s Mildly Useful Reviews – The Quintessential Quintuplets Movie
Last weekend, The Wife and I went to go see the dubbed version of The Quintessential Quintuplets Movie. I watched both seasons of the show, while The Wife had not been exposed in any way. Overall, we both liked the movie.
The movie is pretty much a finale for the main story that goes through the television series. This meant I understood all the callbacks and references, where The Wife was just trying to pick it up as it went along. It does answer the question of which of the quintuplets does Futaro marry.
The first half of the movie is set up with Futaro telling the sisters he would choose one of them by the end of the school festival. From there, it’s kind of a Rashamon going through Futaro’s encounters with each of the sisters over the festival. It lays the groundwork that he could choose any of them. The final choosing scene is very well done. I had the surprise spoiled for me by an article, and I’m not going to spoil it here. I will admit that the choice wasn’t the one I thought should have been chosen.
The second half of the movie is a lot of drama about the sisters and Futaro dealing with his choice. Personally, this felt a bit too drawn out. The movie goes deep into the sisters’ history with their mother, their stepfather, and their bio-father. Some of it was interesting, some felt overdone.
Overall, the movie was great for fans of the show, but probably could have been a half-hour shorter.
Monday Links
First some gun stuff…
First, from Fox News is an article about the doubling of people routinely carrying between 2015 and 2019. I can’t imagine that has slowed at all since 2019. Particularly with more states not requiring permits to carry.
Next, from the Volokh Conspiracy, comes the ruling that the SAF can challenge California on the state’s attempt to make people pay attorneys fees for challenging anti-gun laws. Not surprising it comes from Judge Benitez – who has been trying to tear down every crackpot gun law that comes across his transom.
From SAF’s own GunMag, a bunch of state AG’s want shipping companies to explain their new gun tracking policies.
Kind of gun stuff, but more civil liberty stuff…
Reason has an article that Mesa Arizona is paying the family of Daniel Shaver $8 million for shooting him. Unarmed. And crawling on his hands and knees while police were shouting contradictory orders. And the cop who shot Shaver was under qualified immunity.
I came across this article from The Civil Rights Lawyer blog. New source for me, but it says that the big hotels are getting into the tactical team game so it can do weapons searches on customer rooms. Oh that’s going to go so well. Better read the terms and conditions when checking in – particularly with large hotels in big cities.
Two more Reason articles for fun…
Elon’s rolling back Twitter’s rules on COVID misinformation. I’d be more sympathetic to the pearl clutchers if so many of the things they screeched were misinformation hadn’t turned out to be true.
Surprising no one who actually lives in Florida, the state is quietly making a deal with Disney to undo the legislation that revoked their special zone.
The light item…
Headstamp Publishing is funding a book called Clockwork Basilisk. About early revolvers. Early flintlock revolvers. Nifty stuff.