Reading the local newspapers is always interesting. In the last one, there was a story about a guy starting up a hot dog stand or some such thing in a neighboring suburban town.
Points of interest to me:
1. He asked permission from the City Council first (there being no existing ordinances governing hot dog [...]
Coffee Tea Books and Me has a good series up about taking steps off the financial grid, by learning how to do things yourself. Since they kind of relate to a series of predictions that I was planning to post, I thought I might as well get started.
First, a warning about predictions in general: [...]
We recently signed up for a farm share. We are trying a different farm this time. Last year we didn’t get a farm share, and often had a hard time getting over to the farmer’s market, every Saturday. Buying the farm share automates this; fewer choices involved, we just pick up the [...]
Last week we took a whirlwind tour around to see various friends and relatives. We stayed four different places in the course of a week. I am glad that I got the apartment relatively clean before we left, it was nice to come home to our own space. The roads were great [...]
Renters in Minnesota, give your Certificate of Rent Paid (CRP) a close reading this year. Your friendly state government has stolen some of the renters’ property tax refund money to balance the budget. Instead of estimating property tax as 19% of rent paid, they are using 15%, and the money to pay the [...]
I recently read The Alpha Strategy, by John A. Pugsley, which asserts that the best investment in an economy like ours is tangible goods, because of inflation and other eroders of value. A post at Coffee Tea Books and Me outlines basically the same strategy.
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I was reading in Nehemiah how debts with (if I [...]
There has been so much spiritual warfare stuff going on here this fall, impeding the completion of my book, and other projects that we are trying to get going. One thing after another; interruptions, illnesses, and we just now found out that some witless minion smashed out a window of our car TO STEAL [...]
…skimming through the HARRY_READ_ME.txt; highly entertaining reading. It’s not a regular here’s-what-you-need-to-know-before-you-use-this-program kind of readme, it is more like one guy’s research notes covering a period of months. Really, it is a long saga of a guy trying to make something besides “garbage out” come out of “garbage in”.
To me, it [...]
I was wondering why I didn’t like granite countertops. Well, polished granite reminds me of headstones, and headstones remind me of death. Now, multiply that by a few million granite countertops, plus the second-order effects of dreary paint and accessory colors, and the state of the economy starts to make sense. Death [...]
Believing something is true because scientists say it’s true is one thing; actually understanding the science yourself is another. I’ve been seeing a disturbing pattern lately, where belief in science is being encouraged at the expense of actual scientific literacy. In this pattern, blind faith in Theory X is good. Outright superstitious [...]