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Today marks the autumn equinox in the northern hemisphere, the day when I stop wearing shorts by default and when I get my SAD light out in order to save off the incoming winter blues. At the start of the month, I committed to camping for at least one night away from home. Having met that target last weekend in the Lake District, I managed to sneak in a Brucie …

I’m a traditionalist in some ways and a modernist in others, but I constantly strive never to compromise my own integrity nor the integrity of my work. What do I mean by that? Well, integrity affects many things. Going for cheap-quality and low-grade plywood would compromise the longevity of the pieces I make. Using solid... Source

Trip:47 Nights: 156-166 Part 1 On Thursday, we went back to Audubon and spent 2.5 hours walking the trails to ID 21 bird species. It was a good day of birding. Then we went back, packed up the camper, and moved about 40 miles east to a new campground, Shady Knoll Campground in Brewster. It was wonderful and definitely a solid choice for your Cape Cod campground. Between the battery …

Three weeks ago, I was following my afternoon routine of enjoying my afternoon coffee while scrolling through some of my old fishing folders. Surprisingly, I discovered the Bluegill website page I created in 2010 on the BLUEGILL-BIG BLUEGILL WEBSITE. In fact, that was the year I created my fishing blog, Fishing Through Life. I was using the Bluegill site to connect with bluegill fishermen nationwide. I decided to create a …

They were walking down yet another long dim narrow corridor. Mr. Whitman walked to Milford's left, his brawny arm in Milford's thin arm, pulling him along. Ahead of them walked Miss Blackbourne and the Negro man called Jelly Roll, and they also walked arm in arm.Mr. Whitman was singing, and his song was thus:Four friends, all stout and truestriding along through the hallways of life,they know not wherefore, nor where …

I met Mike Freedman last week at CMSA and I learned a great metaphor about an old favorite subject of mine, random walks on groups. The Heisenberg group is the group of upper triangular matrices with 1’s on the diagonal: You can take a walk on the integral or Z/pZ points of the Heisenberg group using the standard generators and their inverses. How do you get a central element with …

The activity in Kilauea in the last year has been, A LOT. Not much may have happened on the surface, but underground the developments have been many, including dike intrusions, changing focuses of inflation, and seismic crises. One year has seen a shift from a rapidly inflating Mauna Loa to an overactive Kilauea. It has…

Hello. Yesterday was probably the last day of the warm and sunny weather, and today it’s turned cooler and rainy for the coming week. Right now I love it. Ask me again in a month. Thank you to the several readers who sent advice on which washer dryer to buy. Unfortunately most of the specific suggestions were ruled out by my need for an integrated machine, which apparently means everything’s …

Randall Thompson at the piano at the University of Virginia with Glee Club members (including Paul Webb Bourjaily) and Glee Club director Stephen Tuttle I enjoyed reading this essay on Randall Thompson and The Testament of Freedom by Honey Meconi, who is both the inaugural Arthur Satz Professor at the University of Rochester and Professor of Musicology at the Eastman School of Music (as well as a former member of …

I’ve been in Essex all week where the late summer sunny weather lasted all the way through to yesterday. Even today, after rain this morning it’s been pleasant enough this afternoon. § I’m not sure what I heard or read that made me add Dreaming by Michael Rother (ex-Kraftwerk and Neu!), released in 2020, to my “To listen” playlist but it’s been lovely to listen to this week, despite lack …

Here's a couple or three photographs of the West Norfolk skies taken early in the morning during the morning Terrier walk in the last week. It constantly amazes me that the sky varies so much. No wonder the subject has inspired so many artist and photographers. The promise for the next week, if you care to believe it is grey and wet but I prefer to believe that we'll get …

Parker Palmer writes, “The function of contemplation in all its forms is to penetrate illusion and help us to touch reality.” [1] I think he’s right and I would add that great love and great suffering are the normal paths of transformation. There’s an important place for practices of contemplation. I’m not throwing them out, but any practice of contemplation is for the sake of helping us sustain what we …

1967 was a busy year for Christopher Lee, but not exactly a halcyon one, that sent him to Hong Kong twice for 'The Vengeance of Fu Manchu' and for 'Five Golden Dragons', to Germany for 'The Blood Demon', to the island of Fara with Peter Cushing for 'The Night of the Big Heat' and to a very English sounding Paris in 'Theatre of Death'. Here he plays an egomaniacal theatre …

Time for the sixth edition of the World Championships of Shoemaking, where the final takes place during the London Super Trunk Show on May 10 2025. In the prize pool we have £6,000 (€7,000 / $7,400), handmade shoemaking awls, and a chance to be showcased in shoe stores around the world. This year a double monk strap is to be made for the competition. Here’s all the info about the …