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In this issue:
Good News | Product Highlight | Brainpower | Finances | Security | Health/Fitness |
Factoid | Thought 4 the Day
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Happy New Year!
1. Good News: Where the Intel is Good
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Political News? I have long considered myself to be apolitical. Yet, when I talk about
subjects such as economics or crime, nearly everyone takes that as political commentary.
I am against communism, which is a mental illness. We just underwent 4
agonizing years of Communist Occupation. It was during the Occupation that I
began commenting in a way that many people consider political. I was surprised a
few weeks ago when a friend referred to my newsletter as "your political
newsletter" when stating it was one of only two subscriptions he actually
reads.
In my view, I am just reporting on the facts and naming both the villains and the
heroes. But because the villains are "Democrats" and the heroes are MAGA and
America Firsters, the impression I give off is that I am being political.
That's not the impression I want to give. And I say that because when it gets
political, facts fall by the wayside and propaganda gets spewed. If it turned
out that the "Democrats" were not devoted to destroying our country, society,
economy, military, etc., and making debt slaves of all of us while ignoring not
only our civil rights but our human rights, I would seldom mention their party.
Until such time as the "Democrats" free themselves from communist control, I
will see the "demo" part as short for "demonic" because
their behavior is, when objectively viewed, evil. They behave not rationally,
but as if demon-possessed. And I will correctly report on
their damaging communism.
I'm not a big fan of the Republicans either. I used to call
them Repugnocrats and Demopublicans. Most of them are RINOs who give not
one whit about this republic. Until Trump actually won his second term most of them were talking trash about
him. Now they wear MAGA hats and give lip service, but the leopard does not
change its spots. Most are still the same uni-party criminals getting filthy
rich through insider trading and accepting bribes.
One big difference between the left and right wings of this uni-party
is if you
look at each of the past 40 years of spending increases, they are something like
80% from the Democrats. All of the huge policy failures have come from the
Democrats. All of the wars in the past 120 years have come from the Democrats,
with the sole exception being President-de-facto Cheney's Iraq War. But the Cheneys are neocon America-lasters and
well-noted for their TDS. You can't
really put that war in the Republican pocket. What about the first Gulf War?
That was the only other war not actually started by a Democrat POTUS, but it was
the result of Deep State meddling and the Deep State is run by the Democrats.
So if I seem to be political, that's because all of the big failures are
coming from a single source and that source operates politically.
Full disclosure: Late last summer, I re-registered with the county
election office as a Republican. I had been a registered Libertarian for
decades. But the LP is irrelevant at the national level and I want to
participate in Primaries. There's also the not inconsequential fact that
only Republicans can defeat the communists. Neocons and ne'er do wells
like Mitch McConnell no longer wield power in the GOP, so it is far less
repugnant than before Trump 2.0. |
Family Cat to the Rescue:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xnI4M6W8bCc.
- It is going to be a Trumptastic year! So much has been done
since Liberation Day, including trillions of dollars invested by
other countries, to boost our economy instead of poison it.
- "The U.S. economy exploded at a 4.3% annualized growth rate
in the third quarter, smashing economists’ 3.2% forecasts, a delayed
Commerce Department report revealed Tuesday amid fallout from the
recent government shutdown." [The Capitalist, 23DEC2025]
- The USA did not have a single hurricane in 2025. So much for Al
Gore's dire warnings and the communists' effort during The
Occupation to eliminate fossil fuels to "save the planet".
- Here's a marketplace that connects buyers to USA businesses:
https://www.rivly.com/
- Hakeem "Lying Moron" Jeffries gets called on his BS by an
informed interviewer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixzmfP8utaU. On the left-wing
CNBC!
- The People's Republic of California continues to address the
perceived shortage of violent criminals by continually writing laws
that make it safer for such criminals to rape and murder the
innocent. One such law was recently struck down by the Ninth Circuit
Court; it was a law banning open carry.
- It is worth noting that for decades the 9th Circuit Court was
one of the worst around, if your case went there it would not be
heard on the merits, case law, or statutory law. This court
frequently sided with the Institute of Reprobates and Sociopaths
despite the fact IRS had an indefensible case in those instances.
President Trump fixed this in his first term by appointing to the
9th Circuit judges who do not deeply hate human beings and who
actually respect our laws. The 9th Circuit Court has, since then,
been a beacon of hope and justice.
- DHS released figures at the end of last year showing that the
U.S. Coast Guard has seized more than 469,000 pounds of cocaine
since Liberation Day.
- A recent Gallup Poll showed an astoundingly high 8% of
conservatives trust the media. My theory here is they were just
messing with Gallup. What a stupid question to ask a conservative.
"Do you trust the lying, "always gets it wrong", anti-America,
anti-thinking, anti-freedom, leftwing mouthpiece media?" The
question is disrespectful, as it is no different from asking, "Are
you profoundly stupid?"
- A recent Gallup Poll showed an astoundingly high 51% of
Democrats trust the media. My theory here is they are profoundly
stupid.
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Testing A Planet-Saver
If some libtard expresses "green" virtue-signaling or support
for stupid anti-fossil fuel policies, ask this simple question. "Do you drive a
stick or an automatic?"
Why do this? In Europe, where the price of gasoline has been
very high for decades, nearly everyone drives a car with a standard
transmission. Here in the USA, where gasoline is a lot cheaper, the "standard"
is an automatic. An automatic gives a smoother shift between gears and a
smoother start from a dead stop, because of the torque converter that sits between the engine and
the transmission. This torque converter slips a bit, while the manual gearbox
doesn't slip at all. The only slippage you get with a standard transmission is what the driver produces in
the way he releases the clutch. The torque converter slips all the time, not
just during shifting. The fuel savings of a standard transmission is
significant. But to get it, you sacrifice a little comfort (Europeans don't even
notice this) and you have to (or get to, depending on your perspective) manually shift gears.
Of course, you can ask dozens of questions along this line and
the typical "save the planet" libtard will have the wrong answer nearly every
time. Here are a few:
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Do you combine trips?
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Do you use chemical fragrances?
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Do you buy processed food or Big Agra food (very high use of
petroleum)?
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Do you use electric heat (very energy-wasting compared to
gas)?
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Gas stove or electric?
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Do you have a top loading washer (inefficient) or a front
loader?
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Do you hang your clothes up to dry, or do you dry them
completely in the dryer?
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Have you replaced your incandescent lamp fixtures with LED
fixtures or did you simply replace the lamp (bulb) with a retrofit?
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Where do you set your thermostat?
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Do you wear sweaters and such in the winter, or just crank
the heat up?
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Do you use fans in the summer or rely totally on air
conditioning?
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Do you take hot pans outside to cool off when your air
conditioning is on?
Minnesota Mess
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Tim "Incredibly stupid" Walz is Governor. Still.
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Misrepresentative Ilhan Omar, who frequently badmouths
America has somehow gone from a negative net worth to having a net worth of
over $30 million while in Congress.
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Welfare fraud in Minnesota is now estimated to exceed $9
billion. That's 9 followed by 12 zeroes.
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Just about all of that fraud has been committed by Somali
immigrants, the very people whom Omar claims are the victims of racism.
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Minnesota, also sometimes called Taxesota, is #11 in the
list of states with the highest tax burden. It's even greater than that of "Taxachussetts"
The Fake Election of 2020
"Did Biden win Georgia? 2020 election results now in doubt after
county admits counting perhaps 315,000 uncertified votes." [Electoral Defense
Digest, Dec 2025].
Given the gross "irregularities", not to mention common sense,
one must conclude that only the willfully stupid believe that Brainless Biden
with his zero-attendance rallies won the 2020 election without massive cheating.
Especially when there were verified reports of things like more Biden votes than
residents in some counties.
Those of us who saw that preposterous fiction for what it was
took a lot of abuse, some of it pretty vicious. And our nation was plunged into four dark
years of the Communist Occupation. It was a time of violence, censorship,
religious persecution, racism, and financial malfeasance at extremes not seen
before in our history.
That election fraud should have been stopped by VP Mike Pence,
who had the Constitutional authority to remand the election to the states. But
Mike was afraid, and rightfully so, of having his life destroyed by the
criminals who had already been doing terrible things to Justice Thomas,
President Trump, and many others they didn't agree with. Pence took the cowardly
way out, and the entire world paid a very steep price for that.
What is happening now that the communists don't have total
control is investigations are moving forward. Many years too late, but better
late than never. The practical effect is not readily apparent, because the
massive damage has already been done and cannot be undone, and the millions who
died as a result of this are simply gone.
But proving that election was false and doing that beyond a
shadow of a doubt will show very clearly that election reform is badly needed.
Part of election reform will be the ability to arrest fraudsters and put them
away for a very long time. Much of this needs to be done before the midterms,
this November. The commies are counting on stealing dozens of seats in Congress
via fraud, and we know that because they blatantly lie about everything and
heavily gas light those who are imprudent enough to expose their minds to mental
pollution such as CNN, MSNBC, the New York Times, and other fake news outlets.
What these fake news outlets do isn't protected by our First
Amendment. They are involved in active sedition, libel, and slander; all of
which are criminal acts. Part of election reform should, but probably will not,
involve severe penalties for disseminating fake news about a political office
seeker. What is happening instead is Citizen Trump is suing these a--holes for
very large sums of money and thus inflicting nearly mortal wounds on their
companies. As President Trump, he is gracious to the non-fake news even if he
doesn't like their questions. And he is brutally honest with the fake news
people that they are awful at their jobs. We all need to do the same. Let
friends know that the Communist News Network is a sewer and the New York Times
is a joke. It'll be like the "wearing white socks" thing, nobody will want to be
associated with the ridicule. This will go a long way to preventing another
Biden-geddon.
Obamarama
The criminal going by the name "Barrack Hussein Obama" (even
though he was adopted by Lolo Soetoro and did not legally change his name back
to Obama) has been strongly implicated in several felonies related to the Russia
Hoax of 2016. Tulsi Gabbard talks about it at a recent White House Briefing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nko8kyu_kPc.
How do we know she's telling the truth, aside from the fact
"Obama" was a racist scumbag and communist operative who did immense damage to
our country? Politifact, known for its leftwing bias, claims she's "misleading"
people and MSN, known for being absurdly leftist, belittles her and the evidence
she talks about. You cannot get a better endorsement if you are telling the
truth!
The Fake News Never Stops
Trump detractors have to make sh** up because they can't find anything actually
wrong. It is amazing how low they will stoop and how desperate they are.
Recently, a consumer of the fake news system told me, "They were really close to
finding a cure for Alzheimer's but Trump cut the research funding."
Notice the vagueness. "They" were really close. Notice the disrespect. Not
"President Trump" but "Trump"
- I cracked a smile and replied, "Did you read that in the New York Times?
Nobody is anywhere close to finding a cure for Alzheimer's. We know the
major risk factors for it, one of those being the consumption of seed oils."
- He said that several people had told him this.
- I said it's all fake news, and just because people repeat it doesn't
mean it is true. There's no cure on the horizon, these "researchers" were
simply scamming the government for research dollars that would produce
nothing.
- He then said he was sorry he brought it up.
- I told him it's good he brought it up.
- Then he said he has never heard anyone else express the view I expressed
on this subject.
- I replied, "Which means you need to talk to more people, and get out of
your echo chamber."
Thank You, Elon
"Once Twitter/X was freed in 2023, the other platforms
followed suit out of commercial necessity. Ironically, the only place where
censorship remains fully in control is in corporate media itself. They’re still
operating under the old rules." [Jeff Childers, Coffee & Covid, 29DEC2025].
2. Product Highlight
We are proud to offer the Rocket Pen Reading Tutor. Click the image for more
info, such as videos. Highlights:
- READING TUTOR: The only reading pen with learn-to-read functions, and we
have six: spelling, syllabication (how the word is "built"), lookup of
phrasal verbs, lookup of idiomatic expressions, colors for different
dictionary fields, and it highlights words as it reads from scanned text.
These combine to dramatically improve literacy and reading fluency.
- READER PEN: You scan, it reads aloud individual words and even multiple
lines of text in natural voice. Helps those with dyslexia or other
reading-challenges gain reading independence. Earbuds automatically mute the
built-in speaker to avoid classroom stigma. Select different voices for
playback, lefthand or righthand use, left or right scan direction.
- READS ANY SURFACE. Scans what you actually read from: phone, tablet, PC,
other screens - not just paper. We could not find a single other reading pen
that can do this. But the Rocket Pen can.
- MASSIVE ONBOARD DICTIONARIES: The Rocket Pen has the New Oxford American
Dictionary with Oxford Thesaurus of English (Americanized) with over twice
the entries of the best competing products. It also has the Oxford American
Children’s Dictionary with Oxford American Children’s Thesaurus (both
Americanized). The Rocket Pen scans English and French only, but also
contains an English to Spanish dictionary and a French definitions
dictionary (French to French).
- COMES COMPLETE. Self-contained, no computer or Wi-Fi required. Kit
includes Rocket Pen reading tutor, USB charging cable, Quick Start Guide,
and earphones. Meets FCC, ROHS, and CE standards, and conquers illiteracy.
- BACKED BY EXPERIENCE. The lead developers of the Rocket Pen Reading
Tutor each have over 25 years of experience in reading assistive devices,
and yet the Rocket Pen is the newest and most advanced reading pen on the
market. And the only one with reading tutor functions.
- MISSION-FOCUSED. The Rocket Pen isn't loaded with other features a
struggling reader doesn't need. Its focus is on helping the reading
challenged master not only the texts they encounter but reading itself. This
reading pen is the only one that is also a reading tutor. Unlike other
products in this space, the Rocket Pen is truly a learn to read pen not just
a text to speech scanning pen. It provides six different methods for users
to learn how to read rather than just being read to. It's a powerful
dyslexia reading tool for students and adults, and for anyone else with
reading challenges. It provides six different methods for users to learn how
to read rather than just being read to.
- READY TO USE, EASY TO USE. Comes ready to use, no setup needed, easily
customized. 1.9 inch color touch screen; Physical buttons for screenless
scan and read; Select English or Spanish user interface.
|
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In
our Amazon store you will see more offerings, including:
Disability Products:
(We are the sole Amazon seller for these)
Radios:
- Connex 10 meter radios
- Dosy meters
- Galaxy 10 meter and 11 meter (CB) radios
- President 10 and 11 meter radios
- Ranger 10 meter radios
- Texas Ranger radios (Chuck Norris not included, sorry)
- Uniden radios and scanners
Tools:
- AEM instruments
- Bahco tools
- Case tools
- CAT tools
- CPS tools
- Irwin saw blades
- Mayes tools
- Rigid Tools work lights and related
- Vessel tools
- Wera tools
- Wiha tools
- Williams tools
More:
- American Hard Bag aftermarket sound system parts for Harley Davidson
motorcycles
- Centerpoint Archery devices
- Cold Steel knives
- Dead Downwind hunting products
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- Flexilla hose connectors
- Funko collectibles
- Mike Holt Electrical Exam Preparation products
- Nagy's aftermarket sound system parts for Harley Davidson motorcycles
- Paraben Consumer data recovery sticks, porn detection sticks, and
similar diagnostic/ IT tools
- ROK straps
- Rostra universal cruise control kits
- Swhacker archery products
|
3. Brainpower tip
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Have you ever noticed that people who are especially stupid, such as that
coworker who consistently gets things wrong, seem to be on some sort of
autopilot? At the other end of the spectrum are those people who apparently
never have any major problems, who can figure out just about anything, and who
frequently come up with insights. Then there are the rest of us. What's going
on here?
That person who seems to be on autopilot actually is. And this is what you
must replace with deliberateness, which is also called mindfulness or intent.
People aren't inherently mindful or not mindful. Mindfulness is a choice, notice
again the words "deliberate" and "intent". Rather than passively letting things
flow past you, choose to control those things. The more you do this, the more it
will be your default mode. It's a habit that needs nurturing.
A caveat here is there's a toe-dipping aspect, we can think of it as
superficial mindfulness. Rather than give things no thought, you give them a
little thought and then move on. It may seem like this is fine for things that
are neither urgent nor important, but sometimes we overlook the contribution
that mindfulness can make to little things that are often repeated.
Consider, for example, how you organize a drawer in your kitchen. You access
that drawer regularly, and holds things that you frequently use. But it also
holds somewhat related things that you never use. The clutter inside the drawer
is inefficient. By putting the few things you frequently use into a drawer bin
(or putting all the other stuff into drawer bins), you end up with an efficient
way of storing and accessing the things you really need.
The benefits of mindfulness, of course, can be come from many other things
than drawer organization. If you were to deliberately think through each
of your systems for doing things, you would make life easier and have more free
time. But it's easier to just be on autopilot and live with the loss of time
that comes from inefficiency. All of those little inefficiencies add up. If all
of your life routines took 50% less time (this is more achievable than you might
think), the effect could be the same as living an entire extra decade (depending
on how old you are when you optimize and whether you continue to optimize).
Practice mindfulness on your job, and watch what happens. The vast majority
of people are on autopilot at work, which is a major reason something like 80%
of people say they are not happy in their job. Be mindful, and your job
happiness will increase exponentially. As will your prospects for promotion,
plum assignments, greater pay, and being recruited by a better employer.
Practice mindfulness in your marriage. Rather than reacting to what comes
along, deliberately make some happiness. Look for something you can do to make
your spouse happier, even if just a tiny bit happier. That will have a snowball
effect.
Practice mindfulness in adversity. This is where the benefits are often
outsized. Whether it's a single small problem such as a needed fix-it or a major
"life sucks" situation, deliberately putting your smarts to work on it can pay
enormous dividends on even small efforts. Going on autopilot and reacting
accordingly will often make matters worse.
The more you practice mindfulness, the better you will be at it. Partly
that's because when you are mindful you are exercising your mind and thus making
it stronger. People who are on autopilot often seem hopelessly stupid, and
that's because of the mental atrophy from not tapping their brainpower. They
will have to start with really small efforts, and build up their strength. If
such a person is important to you, provide encouragement by noticing they
actually put a little thought into something and complimenting them on "using
the ol' noggin". |
4. Finance tip
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In 1988, I bought an electric clothes dryer. I still have it. A few years ago,
the drum seal failed. I replaced it. A few weeks ago, the drum drive belt broke.
I bought another one at Lowe's (Home Depot does not have them in stock) and
replaced it. I have a 28 inch dryer. The belts for the 27 inch and the 29 inch
are 92 inches long and 1/4 inch wide. They cost $12.82 and $16.14, respectively.
The difference is the one for the 29 inch dryer is stronger, so I installed that
one. Out of curiosity, I looked online to see how much a replacement would
cost. It would be about $800. Copilot says a dryer should last between 12 and 18
years. Mine is now 36 years old. So I have saved about $1600 on dryer repairs by
properly maintaining my dryer, properly using my dryer, and fixing it as needed
(very cheap to fix).
Volume
And I do a lot of laundry for a single guy. I change bedding every week,
change my mattress pad every month, and use cloth rags instead of paper towels.
I wash bath towels, hand towels, and wash towels weekly. There are two and a
half baths with towels. Plus a towel on my weight bench. When guests eat here,
we use cloth napkins (which get washed). I have cloth dish towels, too. When it
rains, the cat likes to go outside and then come in to be toweled dry. As soon
as he's dry, he goes back outside. Then we repeat this a few times. Each time,
he gets a fresh hand towel (one use on him, and in the hamper it goes).
Sometimes, there is much more laundry than this. For example, when a guest
visits from out of town. The extra bedding and towels, sure. But also they will
typically wash everything they've packed. Plus I go through more cloth rags.
Every year, I wash two canvas tarps, eight bedsheets, and two large (fold
over three times when using them) garden covers. And I dry them in that dryer.
The use of these keeps some plants well past Christmas, those being cabbages
such as bok choy and kale.
Maintenance
- Cleaning the lint trap is your first line of defense. I clean mine
before and after each use. I also clean around the dyer. Sometimes I will
unplug it, then remove the top and front panel so I can clean all the lint
out of the inside (this is the main thing that will cause the motor to
fail).
- Sometimes, dryer vent piping has to go around a sharp bend or two and
then up. This means that lint will eventually build up in that pipe. Most
lint is due to using high heat settings and/or using clothes made of
polyester. How to fix this: Pull the dryer out and disconnect the dryer vent
hose. Use an electric leaf blower to blow into the hose, forcing any lint to
go out the vent. If you do not have such a blower, you could use the blow
feature of your vacuum if it has one. To avoid having lint blow back over
your face, stuff newspaper or similar into the first several inches of the
vent, jamming it in there around the vacuum cleaner hose. Then, with the
other end of the hose inserted into the blow port of your vacuum, turn the
machine on and let it run for a full minute.
- Do not use your dryer top as a storage area. If you need storage,
install a shelf or cabinet. Never stand or sit on your dryer (it is OK if
the cat does it, that's not enough weight to hurt anything). Never use
anything harsh to clean your dryer; an old sock that's been made damp should
be sufficient.
- Ensure the ventilation for your dryer is not blocked. You will notice
vents on the back, if you look at any new dryer on the showroom floor or
pull yours out and look at the back. Heat from the drum will escape into the
dryer body, which is where your motor is. Heat is the number one enemy of
motors, and it's not so great for the other parts of your dryer either. Air
must flow around your dryer. Ditto for your washing machine.
- Maybe once a month, wipe the drum down with a damp cloth or vacuum it.
- Ensure your dryer sits level. If you've bumped it and now it vibrates,
see if you can jiggle it back to where it was. If not, you'll need to adjust
one or more of the leveling feet. Use at least one bubble level when doing
this. I like to use several magnetic levels (be careful, and they will not
scratch the coating which may be paint, anodization, or enameling), each one
on a different plane. Unlike the washer, the dryer is light so you can
easily lift it. Leveling a washer is more challenging, I use small crowbars
to do the heavy lifting.
Usage Best Practices
- Use a front loading washing machine. This is the single best way to
preserve your dryer, because it wrings out the excess water.
- Don't overload the dryer. It is better to do multiple small loads than
one big load. If something is heavy with water, wring it out by hand. Try to
avoid putting more than 15 lbs into the dryer at a time.
- Do not start and stop it frequently, doing so will burn up your motor.
If you stop it, wait ten minutes before starting it again.
- Allow a good 30 minutes between dryer loads. This allows
- Don't use the high heat setting. It damages fabrics and also is hard on
your dryer.
- Don't completely dry anything. I use a combo strategy of a small clothes
drying rack, a large overhead rod, and one of those over the door hangers. I
also hang things from my chinning bar and drape them over my Olympic bar; in
those cases, I let the portable air cleaner blow dry them. I have another
portable air cleaner that I set in front of the clothes rack.
- I hang damp bedsheets over my bedposts, then run the ceiling fan to
finish drying them. Over time this will wear the varnish off those posts,
but that is easily and cheaply repaired--something you can do when repairing
the finish on moldings and on other bedroom furniture .
- If you have a portable air cleaner, use that for the final drying.
- Do not use fabric softener sheets. Those petrochemicals cannot be good
for your dryer's finish, the conductor insulation (wiring), or your drive
belt. If your clothes feel rough, reduce your detergent by half and if your
washer has a fabric softener bin then add plain white vinegar there. Also,
do not dry clothes fully or (as mentioned already) on high heat; these bad
practices damage fibers, making them feel rough.
- Turn jeans inside out so the zippers don't scratch your drum.
- Use a delicates bag if drying bras, the hooks can destroy the drum
finish.
- Don't put polyester in your dryer. It will "pill" and that's going to
fill your lint trap. And it's going to cause your dryer to spew
microplastics everywhere. In fact, don't put polyester it in your washer
either; once it's dirty, throw it away and replace the item with a fabric
that isn't so toxic and that won't melt into your skin due to a grease
splatter or similar occurrence. Now, there is an exception. Microfiber is so
tightly woven it doesn't behave like normal polyester. So go ahead and wash
your microfiber lens cloths and cleaning cloths, but hang them to dry rather
than put them in the dryer.
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5. Security tip
Animals in the wild will typically try to intimidate the animals they feel
threatened by rather than engage in a fight. Even housecats do this, they puff
up their fur and hiss at the other cat. When threatened, humans (especially men)
do this, also. Men will shout at each other, one will threaten to kill the other
or say something to show bravery such as "Bring it." Or maybe he will wave a
knife at the other person.
On the surface, this sounds reasonable; scare off the attacker and avoid
getting hurt. But it's legally
called assault and it is a crime. Battery, a separate crime, is when things go
beyond threatening and verbal attacks to a physical attack. If you do both, you
can be charged for both.
Better
A much better approach, for those of us capable of doing it (and anyone can
become capable), is to simply
attack your opponent without the warm-up drama and without warning. You will not get charged for assault, even if
you do get charged for battery. But your chances of getting caught are about
nil, because you didn't spend time creating an audience via a drama show. You
end what could have been a dangerous confrontation by surprising your opponent
with quick delivery of excess force when they had expected a few minutes of
idiotic battery first.
I started using this approach when I was a little kid being bullied by other
kids who were much larger than I was. They never saw it coming, and nobody else really heard or saw anything
until the bully was running away or lying on the ground moaning. I
used it in high school when a kid twice my size attacked me for
wearing my Naval Junior ROTC uniform. He knocked my books out of my hands, and
the next thing he knew he was flat on his back (I charged at him and lifted him
at the knees, a classic wrestling takedown move). When I traveled all over the
country on construction products, I would run into low-life deadbeat dads and
other people who needed one of my lessons in why bullying isn't a good idea.
They'd start blustering, and I'd hit them in something soft, such as the throat. Fight ended. In once
instance, I interrupted an enraged football player who was beating his estranged
girlfriend while her father lay on the ground with a broken arm. I
just rushed up and tiger-clawed into his rib cage, something that is excessively
painful to experience.
Anyone can practice and become adept with two or three "go to" movements for
disabling an attacker. If someone is a threat, let your actions speak for you.
Don't say a word. Not only will you be physically safer, you will avoid being
charged for assault and stand only the slimmest chance of being charged with
battery.
Best, if applicable
An even better defense tactic may present itself. If someone is bellicose or
threatening, simply stay calm. It is easy for me to do this, because I know what
will happen if the other person tries to attack me. It is not easy for most
people, but make the effort. Think of something nice and smile. Say something
like, "Yep, I think I get where you're coming from. Tell me more about it." Now
all of the sudden you have changed the dynamic. You're a friend. You want to
listen. This usually brings the anger down several notches.
I have used this tactic far more times than a quick and brutal assault. But
it is not appropriate in all situations. Use your common sense and you'll be
able to determine when to use this. It is always appropriate when dealing with
an upset or scared police officer (the physical attack never is). It is not
appropriate when (for example) the other person is closing in on your personal
space or your odds of prevailing are not so good unless you hit first and hit
really hard. If you feel scared and cannot get calm, your system is telling you
something. Launch the attack.
Return to the wild
Back to those wild animals. A bear or a mountain lion is likely to make short
work of you, even if you could whup just about any human. There simply is no
contest. But they don't know that, and so your best option (if there is room
enough between you and nobody is charging at you) is to puff up and
make yourself look bigger. You make noise, but slightly retreat (not yelling,
that escalates things). I did find this works with mountain lions, they just
back off. I have
never encountered a bear, but my cousin's boy did. A black bear
charged at him, and his response was to calmly take aim with the one arrow he had and shoot the bear
in the neck. The bear took a few more steps, then dropped dead.
Dogs
This blustering can also work with dogs; but keep in mind if a dog is
defending his turf and you are on it such antics will just make him even more
likely to come after you. There's a lot of conflicting advice on this, but my
advice is don't turn and run. Here is how I have handled the few dogs that have
come after me: Keep facing the dog, but back slowly away and speak calmly unless
the dog lunges.
Something else I have done with success, but that is risky, is to just squat
down and talk to the dog like he's a puppy. "Good boy. Are you a good boy?"
That's for a mildly aggressive dog, it won't work on a dog that is snarling or
rushing at you.
So only once have I had to hit a dog. He jumped at me and while he was in
mid-flight I punched him in the nose. The force knocked him back and knocked him
out. The soft tissue of his nose protected the bones of my hand, if I'd hit him
in the teeth I would have been injured. The face is generally not a good target,
but in this case it was all I had.
Note also that dogs are naturally people pleasers. If a dog attacks you, it's
either because you pose a threat due to raising your voice or doing something
else to cause the threat response, or his "owner" is an abusive a--hole who
should never have a dog (or a kid). The latter case is the most common. Either
way, reporting the incident to the proper authorities is in the best interests
of everyone. If you are uninjured because you acted per the above, your report
should not end in a euthanasia action by the government (especially if you say
the dog "threatened" you instead of "attacked" you). People have a right to walk
in neighborhoods without being attacked, but when they are attacked it is almost
certainly the "owner" who is at fault.
Footwear
Whether confronting aggressive humans or aggressive dogs, your odds of
success are greatly diminished if you are wearing flip-flops. My fighting style
relies heavily on footwork, and I always wear shoes that facilitate that. If you
go around in flip-flops, maybe you should just dial 911 and wait 6 minutes for
the cops to arrive. They can fill out a report and take you to the hospital.
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6. Health tip/Fitness tips
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Age 65 in these pics |
See
all of my climbing videos here:
https://tinyurl.com/ClimbingSigChannel. Some cool climbing videos:
My hardest climb ever, a 5.11d on lead:
https://youtu.be/UT5h0heUUBc . I
made a dumb mistake initially, letting the rope wrap over my shoulder. Watch
what happens.
The scale:
- Beginner: 5.6. 5.7. 5.8, 5.9 (roped) / VV, V0, V1, V2
(boulder)
- Intermediate: 5.10a, b, c, d ;5.11a, b, c, d / V3, V4, V5, V6
- Advanced: 5.12a, b, c, d; 5.13a, b, c, d. / V7, V8, V9, V10.
- Elite and Pro: Even harder. Almost nobody climbs at either
level at any of the 6 local climbing gyms.
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Over the past few years, I have informally interviewed dozens of athletes
about their training methods. Most of the interviewees are climbers, and
that is so because that's convenient for me. I have found a variety of
training methods used, but some common themes that simply do not vary.
First, I need to set the stage a bit. Climbing at the Intermediate or higher
level is physically demanding. The posterior muscles are worked especially
hard; this is in direct contrast to the typical gym routine which
practically ignores these muscles. So climbers have a different emphasis:
- They almost never work arms, chest, or abs.
- They do a lot of squats.
- Most do not do the bodybuilder split routine (involves 4, 5, or 6
training days/wk). A common approach is two days per week for weight
training--there's a leg-emphasized day and then a day primarily for the
shoulders and the large muscles of the back. Climbers tend not to do a
lot of sets, but do tend to go to failure.
Bodybuilders, climbers, and other athletes are trying to do something
unnatural with their training. If you look at old pictures, black and whites
from a century ago, you do not see the modern athletic physique. That
physique is the result of training in a specific way, one that is not
natural. Which also means if you don't train for it, you won't get it. In
other words, it is an enhanced physique and it does not happen by accident.
Bodybuilders aim for symmetry plus size. Other athletes aim for balance
plus strength. How is symmetry different from balance? In bodybuilding, each
muscle group must be proportionate to every other muscle group. In Pumping
Iron, Arnold said if he increased the size of one muscle, he would then have
to increase the size of every other muscle or he'd lose his symmetry.
Balance is typically a lateral thing. You want the left side of your back to
be as strong as your right side, but your back doesn't have to be
proportional to your legs.
Both get vascularity because of the time spent in high metabolic stress.
But bodybuilders will typically chase vascularity, while other athletes get
is as a secondary result. You don't need big veins to climb, so you don't
train for those. But the training that you do will enlarge your veins. Make
sense? When you see the typical squat-free, count reps and stop at eight,
"use poor form and excess weight" gym rat, the vascularity is missing. They
exercise in the comfort zone, they don't push into high metabolic stress. |
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Getting high metabolic stress is one requirement for hypertrophy (the other
two are muscular damage and time under tension). Most athletes get into the
high metabolic stress zone by engaging in big compound movements. These also
train the nervous system, as they require coordination. But the main feature
of these is the metabolic response. The massive calorie burn depletes the
muscles of glycogen while simultaneously pushing the heart and lungs into
the red zone. Doing supersets and/or taking hardly any rest between sets
keeps the metabolic stress high. When you see gym rats walking around with a
towel over their neck or texting between sets, you are seeing metabolic
stress going away. Which is counterproductive to having a good training
session. One of my gym climbing buddies is also a rock climber. I have
seen him do his Leg Day routine in the weight room of a local climbing gym.
- He does walking lunges using 40lb dumbbells. Once around the entire
weight room, then from one wall to the other and back.
- Then he does calf raises while standing on something that allows him
to dip his heels.
- Then he does another set of walking lunges using 25lb dumbbells.
- Calves again.
- Then he does a set of walking lunges with no weights at all.
This doesn't seem like much, only 5 sets total. But try it and you'll
understand just how well he jacks his metabolic stress through the roof. No
rest between the walking lunges and the calf work, though he does sometimes
pause for a few seconds during a walking lunge set. That is a huge amount of
alternate leg squatting, none of which is particularly easy, so he gets
intensity and volume in one go.
He also is very in tune with his energy store. I once briefly disagreed
with him about how long I was resting between multiple attempts on a V7. I
said it was enough to get your heart rate back down. He said to give it
another five minutes. I did that, and I proved myself wrong; I got my best
attempt ever on that try. This is how climbers "argue," generally. Each
states a position, then we test to see which position is correct. Nobody who
has advanced in the sport has ever been stubborn about an opinion. As Cicero
noted, "Anyone can make a mistake, but only an idiot persists in his error."
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Of course, I am talking about opinion. This is something often confused with
fact. If someone wants to argue with me about whether you should do squats,
I'm outa there. Not going to waste my time. On the proven fundamentals,
there is no room for argument. But, you need to be careful as to what is a
proven fundamental and what is not. For example, we can all agree that you
must train your core muscles--including your abs. But what does this mean? A
few years ago, I was talking with another climber about scaling back my ab
work. He said he stopped doing separate ab work a long time ago. I asked him
for his rationale. He said climbing is so core-intensive, your abs get
plenty of work. That's one reason we climbers are known for our abs. Then he
went on to say the only training he did outside of climbing was one day for
upper body and one day for lower body and the squats alone sometimes meant
he'd wake up the next day with sore abs. This is exactly in tune with what
Shawn Phillips wrote in his book Absolution decades ago. Shawn was asked
what exercises he does for his abs, and his reply was "All of them." That's
profound, think about the implications. I am sure many people just did not
get his point because they were fixated on their own opinion.
Now, when my climbing buddy said "squats" he was not talking about
dipping your butt down a few inches by barely bending your legs. He was
talking about the kinds of squats that all serious athletes do, the kind
that load your quads, glutes, and hamstrings until they practically scream.
In my own case, I have not adopted the typical climber approach. I know
many other climbers who have not, either. I started with the wheel, a gift
from my grandpa, when I was a pre-teen. Then I dabbled with the Universal
machine in the high school weight room until the spring of 1977 when I did
more than just dabble with it. I did the recommended circuit on it almost
every day after school. I have not missed a workout since. But I have
changed how I work out. I moved to Kansas in 1996 and met a stunning beauty
with very vascular arms. Of course, I started a conversation with her. She
was a trainer, in the bodybuilding style with the split routine. No more
circuit training for me. Over time I deviated from what she told me, doing
things like radically slowing my tempo.
A few years ago, I got back on the "regular plan" with a tune-up from a
gold medal winning body builder. And since then, I have gotten both bigger
and leaner. I don't intend to change my program to the climbing one, even if
that means not optimizing for climbing. One of my climbing buddies is almost
my age and very developed from years of body building training. When asked
about this by a young climber why he wanted to carry around so much weight
while on those walls, he replied, "There's more to life than climbing."
Which is how I see it. If another climber thinks differently, that's fine;
she or he is still going to be remarkably fit.
One thing I won't do is downgrade my training to make it in line with
what's recommended for seniors. Everything I do is deemed wrong by the
"experts" who don't have the first clue about training. And you know what?
I'm fine with that. They are parroting baseless opinion that they have been
told, I am living the science that I have learned. And that science is
confirmed by other athletes on a regular basis. It's also confirmed by
actual experts, such as Dr. Rick Cohen of Pure Clean Performance,
https://purecleanperformance.com/. That's a free plug, just because this
guy knows what he is talking about because it comes from a ton of research.
It also helps that he, his wife, and their adult son are extreme athletes
and they work with a lot of extreme athletes. Testing things at the extremes
tends to cull the BS artists from those who are telling the truth.
I hope this insight into how athletes train is helpful to you.
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At
www.supplecity.com, you'll find plenty of informative, authoritative
articles on maintaining a lean, strong physique. It has nothing to
do with long workouts or impossible to maintain diets. In fact:
- The best workouts are short and intense.
- A good diet contains far more flavors and satisfaction
than the typical American diet.
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7. Factoid
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Government "service" has long been a euphemism for "Where
they send the incompetent people who are especially stupid and especially
dishonest". It's very discouraging for the accomplished, honest people who take
a government job and then have to deal with the morons and crooks who surround
them. This has radically changed under the Trump administration. |
8. Thought for the Day
"I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report
the facts." - Will Rogers
Please forward this eNL to others.
Authorship
The purpose of this publication is to inform and empower its readers (and save you money!).
The views expressed in this e-newsletter are generally not shared by socialists or
other brainwashed individuals. That's because those fools live in an alternate reality
and have not bothered to learn the basics of how life works. They cannot do
basic math, cannot apply logic, and cannot be bothered to learn the basic facts
relevant to any topic that they are passionate about.
Except where noted, this e-newsletter is entirely the work of Mark Lamendola. Anything presented as fact can be independently verified.
Where sources are not given, they are readily available to anyone who makes the effort.
Mark provides information from either research or his own areas of established expertise. Sometimes, what appears to be a personal opinion is the only possibility when applying sound logic--reason it out before judging! (That said, some personal opinions do appear on occasion).
Personal note from Mark: I value each and every one of you, and I hope that shows in the diligent effort I put into writing this e-newsletter.
It is an act of service, almost no money is generated for me through this
effort. Thank you for being a faithful reader.
Please pass this newsletter along to others.
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