Top.Mail.Ru
.... Qui sera sera
? ?
[public] after 20 years...   
02:56pm 01/05/2022
  since LiveJournal still will not cooperate with Dreamwidth to re-enable crossposting after a few months of it being broken, I expect this is the last post I will ever make here.

my Dreamwidth is over here -- go there for future updates. comment here if you can't see my locked posts and, if I know you, I will grant access. (thanks to OpenID, I can grant access to your LJ account even if you're not on DW yourself.)
 
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07:17pm 15/08/2030
  I realized I should probably put one of these up, like some of my friends have, because people who come here and see almost nothing recent might be a little confused.

This LJ is, for the most part, friends-only. If you want to be able to read the bulk of it, IM or e-mail me asking me to friend you. Just keep in mind that if I have no idea who you are, I probably won't grant your request.
 
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[public] really, LJ?   
09:29am 24/01/2022
  it wasn't until I actually went to my LiveJournal portal and saw the new message that was indeed waiting for me from the LiveJournal staff that I realized that their most recent email, despite such obvious errors and awkwardness as "You have received new message" and "We are in social networks", was actually legitimate and not phishing.

is this really what we've come to, LJ? you care so little about your non-Russian userbase that you don't even have native English speakers writing this stuff for you anymore?

well, there's a reason that every one of these posts has been originally posted to Dreamwidth for years now...

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/765050.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] too hot (hot damn), like a Dragon Ball in __________   
10:30am 07/01/2022
  I generally find that a lot of what Ramit Sethi says makes sense and/or is just good advice, but this one line from his recent emails is something I can't let pass without comment:
Too many of my readers end up in a situation where they saved and saved and saved . . . but never learned the skill of spending. Do you want to end up 70 years old with millions in the bank, having agonized over your spending all along the way? Would you even know what to do with that kind of money at 70?

to which I can only respond: if the alternative is running out of money in retirement, then YES!

between the continued low interest rate environment (and my expectation that my generation, being the "boomerang" generation and therefore substantially bigger than the Xers and Zers, will have a further depressing effect on rates when we hit retirement age), the widespread lack of trust in our politicians to fix Social Security before the trust fund is depleted in the 2030s, increasing longevity, and health care costs rising faster than general inflation, I don't see how else I can expect to be self-sufficient at that age.

(I'm also bombarded at work with news briefs analyzing the current US retirement crisis, so I'm probably more sensitive to these things than most people are.)

and this is even though I've been saving for retirement since age 21 and I've actually been hitting those milestone targets that it's trendy to attack on social media as hopelessly unrealistic and out of touch for the average Millennial. (twice one's annual salary saved by age 35? I had that even at the bottom of the March 2020 crash!) even with that, I still don't feel secure about my future retirement. that is how little faith I have right now in the future state of inflation, interest rates, equity returns, and my own earning power.

so I don't trust the government to keep me out of poverty in retirement, I can't in good conscience allow myself to become a drain on the system anyway when there are so many people out there who need the help way more than I do, I don't have any hypothetical future children to count on, and even if I did I would never ask them to prop me up like that, just as I would certainly hope my mother never asks me to.
I can't count on anyone else to keep me afloat, so I need to ensure that I save sufficiently now to do so. this has been my way of thinking for as long as I can remember.

(and that's why I identify as libertarian.)


now it would be all very easy to say that I got this mindset wholesale from my father, who from an early age impressed upon me the importance of saving for retirement and not trusting Social Security to be there when the time comes. he might have gone a little overboard sometimes, like how in the 1990s he had a spreadsheet tracking his retirement accounts every business day (I've only ever updated mine quarterly). but he did end up getting to do a lot of worthwhile and spendy things in his later years, like building a basement room for watching movies, adding a heated in-ground pool, taking lots of photographs, and going on substantial vacations with the family (often not including me because I judged/assumed I couldn't afford it), sometimes road-tripping all the way from coast to coast and once even going to China. so I'd say it paid off for him.

besides, I haven't seen anything yet to indicate that his paranoia was wrong.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/764505.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] and for your information, you Lorax, I'm figgering on _________ and _________...   
11:29am 16/12/2021
  at 155 pounds (+/- 2) consistently for about the past week, I am now easily the biggest I've ever been in my life.

if I wasn't so paranoid about putting up undisguised photos of myself on the Internet, I'd post some progress shots, and compare to summer 2020 when I was around 140# due to the pandemic lockdown.

well, perhaps I still will, but with my face irreversibly obscured.

the odd thing, though, is that I don't feel like I'm eating significantly more than I was earlier this year (when I wasn't consistently gaining weight). the new exercise regimen by itself should not theoretically make me gain weight unless I'm also increasing my caloric intake. could my recent wine kick have something to do with it?

but in any case, when you consider that four years ago I considered 141# a big breakthrough, and then a year and a half ago it was a sign of serious backsliding due to the lockdown torpedoing my routines, I think I can be pretty happy about how far I've come.

I may not quite be there yet, but every month, given proper posing, I'm looking a little more like Renaissance art.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/763979.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] at least _ _______ ___ _____ or more to see (wait, isn't that awfully redundant?)   
11:39am 08/12/2021
  I have come to the conclusion that I should aim to stay at or above 150 lbs. going forward.

I didn't realize it before, but looking at photos of myself from (say) 2017 or summer of 2020, when I was consistently around 140# and my collarbones were clearly visible, I seem a bit gaunt compared to now (when I'm consistently over 150# and my collarbones are not clear).
(why summer of 2020, you ask? because I lost about 10 pounds within a month of the lockdown starting, due to the disruption of my weekday eating routine; it took me a while to gain it back.)

... I also need to remember better to maintain proper posing discipline when I'm taking these comparison shots. shoulders back, stomach slightly in and up, free arm either doing the giant-sub-sandwich pose or aside hip, etc. (come to think of it, I suspect that the shots in which I didn't do so are those I took to capture unusually good hair days, rather than improving physique.)

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/763465.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public]   
02:46pm 03/12/2021
  75½ days straight without wasting any time on video games.

so why do I not feel better?

I've been keeping up with my exercise goals (and buying myself the resulting bottles of reward wine) for at least two months now, and practicing horn with similar regularity; but I've still felt severely lacking in personal energy lately, and I don't have any ideas for what to do to stimulate it.

... except perhaps caffeine -- which I've avoided most of my life (having witnessed my father's caffeine addiction) and don't have any sources of at home.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/763359.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] yes, really. I have no idea what they talked about when alone.   
10:37am 21/11/2021
  in the spirit of gratitude (because gratitude promotes emotional health), I must acknowledge how nice it is that [personal profile] cyanna and I can have conversations and jokes at home or in the car about common interests and shared experiences, including music, video games, the shows we've watched together, Disney parks, etc. ...

because it occurred to me that I can't remember ever witnessing my parents do the same.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/763076.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] communi-CA-tion breakdown! it's always the SAME!   
04:46pm 15/11/2021
  one of the books I'm being assigned readings from for my DMAC module (the last substantial requirement before I earn my FSA) is Messages: The Communication Skills Book (3rd ed.), by McKay, Davis, and Fanning, from New Harbinger Publications.

I'm finding myself asking "where was this book in my life 20 years ago?!"

... and the answer, of course, is that (this edition of) it wasn't published yet.

but even if I'd had access to the 2nd edition (1995), this is not the kind of book I would have read at that age unless forced to. I never had a proper appreciation for the importance of social skills.

and as useful as the techniques and advice in Chapter 14, "Making Contact", are, I still found myself raising an eyebrow at things like the following:

[R]eframe the meeting experience so that the stakes aren't so high. Meeting with interesting strangers shouldn't be a test to see if they want to sleep with you, want to be your friend or mate, or even particularly like you. It's merely an opportunity to begin getting to know someone who interests you.
The most basic rule of conversation is to pry. [...] Be outrageous, because each question continues the excitement and pleasure of a growing intimacy.
Prying is fun. It helps you satisfy your curiosity and also get more information so you can keep the conversation going. When you are no longer curious enough to pry, it's probably a good sign that the conversation has run its course and you should look for a graceful close.


the problem is that I can probably count on one hand the number of people in my adult life who've interested me enough, gotten me curious enough, to pry. people in general, and what might be happening in their lives, have never piqued my curiosity.

now, it's a fair question whether that is due to my almost never taking the first step of breaking the ice that might allow me to get to the "prying" stage in the first place. on the other hand, in the past few years I've had no shortage of such opportunities with the NJGSO -- I typically join those who go out for dinner and drinks after rehearsals -- yet I still haven't felt the urge to progress past the "acquaintance" stage with any of them, if that. and you could say the same about the AMV crowds at the conventions I've attended.

even at CTYer reunions (are those still happening? I haven't been invited to one in years now) which reminded me of some of the happiest times of my life, I generally avoided talking to people much, greatly preferring games of the card and board and party varieties. I just didn't see a reason to... unless of course people were asking me about my life or a topic relevant to my interests, in which case I'd gladly go on as long as they'd let me.

in the same vein, [personal profile] cyanna may not have liked it very much when I told her 19 years ago, but so far it looks like I was right: I haven't missed any of our high school classmates.

... I wonder if this kind of pattern fits any diagnosable psychological disorder?

anyway. thoughts? does anyone else out there have the same tendency? is this the kind of thing that changes with enough deliberate social exposure and conversation?

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/762728.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] a political preference quiz because it's been a while.   
10:34pm 10/11/2021
  Pew Research Center says I fit in best with the Outsider Left!
... and also don't see fit to include an HTML sharing option without Iframes and ECMAScript so that Dreamwidth will actually allow it!

the quiz is only 20 questions long (as opposed to 27 for the original study, at least in its 2021 incarnation (they've clearly done this same exercise in past years), which they used to come up with the nine groups in the first place), and I must complain that not one question was about balancing the budget or reducing the national debt. does NO ONE care about this mammoth looming issue anymore?

here's how the nine groups compared on the issues and on demographics.

and here's the details of the Outsider Left. personally, I don't feel like this group as described is actually a great fit for me, especially the bit about "holding liberal views on most issues and voting overwhelmingly Democratic". I've always considered myself more of a libertarian than anything... though it looks like, according to the current iteration of the World's Smallest Political Quiz™, I'm actually now a moderate? and wasn't this the quiz that was supposed to be biased towards libertarian results?

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/762562.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] yeah, random progress update.   
07:22pm 08/11/2021
  51 days straight without any time wasted on video games.

also I'm still consistently weighing in at 150# or just above it, and I think my musculature is looking better in the mirror. I met my goal of working out X number of days in October and rewarded myself with a bottle of a wine I've never tried, and I'm on track to do the same in November (6 down, 12 to go -- I try to keep to two days on and one day off, allowing a day or two slack each month in case of injury or other extenuating circumstance).

my DMAC module is coming along, though slowly, and I continue to pick up all sorts of psychology I never appreciated before from the books I'm borrowing from the library. you know, all that stuff that younger me didn't think I'd need, like entraining good habits, persuasion, actually thinking about how to get what I want out of life...

lastly, househunting would be considerably more fun if there was any sort of inventory of houses in my target area actually IN my price range instead of over or (deservedly) under it. and I'm talking a range about $100k wide; I don't think I'm being unreasonably picky here.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/762082.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] how come you're always such a fuzzy young man?   
07:19pm 22/10/2021
  (I actually thought that was the first line of "Eat It" when I was a kid.)

in the course of reading Scott Adams's (remember, the only names you should be omitting the S after the apostrophe in the possessive of are Jesus and Moses) book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life (Portfolio/Penguin, 2013), I eventually got the chapter that Adams devotes to the topic of one's diet.

the following bit jumped out at me:

If you know anyone who maintains an ideal adult weight without the services of a personal chef or a personal trainer, wouldn't you like to know how? Ask anyone who has a healthy weight what he or she eats, then be on the lookout for the pattern.

well, one of the few things that has unequivocally gone right about my adult life, and I feel confident that any objective observer would agree, is in fact my weight. I stand 5'10", and for many years my weight was in the 130-140# range. I took some photos in the summer of 2017 and labeled them with my weight at the time, which was 141#, as a "before" point of comparison so I could see how much improved my body would look if I put on a few (okay, a lot of) pounds of muscle. now, in 2021, I've been right around 150# consistently for the past month or two, safely out of the "underweight" BMI range (we all know BMI is a poor metric in isolation, but apparently insurance companies and so forth still care about it).

and -- though I don't like to admit it -- the majority of that time was without any sort of regular exercise. and my weight remained in a healthy range all the same.

so in the interests of starting a healthy dialogue and maybe uncovering some patterns that could be of use to people, here's what I generally eat.

  • cereals, usually without much added sugar (because sugar is bad for teeth, with which I tend to have issues, and for skin, which I actually care about); I usually end up with Cheerios, Honey Bunches of Oats, Life, or Peanut Butter Crunch. sometimes Rice Krispies, but not as often as the others. also, I adore Quaker's Honey Oh's -- a throwback to my childhood -- but I've never seen it available anywhere outside Morris County.
  • oatmeal, which (combined with the Cheerios) seems to be keeping my cholesterol at really good levels
  • 1% milk
  • orange juice
  • Greek yogurt (usually Chobani's "less sugar" vanilla, which is no sacrifice because it still tastes good)
  • cheese
  • eggs (when I remember to buy them)
  • carrots
  • Craisins (original only these days; I've tried the "less sugar" variety, and while the taste is still acceptable, the texture is sufficiently harder to chew that I get sick of them halfway through the bag)
  • Wheat Thins (unlike the previous, I heartily suggest the "less sodium" variety, because I cannot taste a difference and I have high blood pressure in my family history; too bad BJ's doesn't carry it)
  • strawberries, blueberries, cherries
  • apples, pears, nectarines (plums and peaches are good too, but nectarines are my favorite of the three)
  • broccoli, zucchini
  • frozen vegetables, usually mixes including broccoli, zucchini, cauliflower, carrots, corn, peas...
  • peanut butter and honey roasted peanuts
  • bread, never plain white but not exclusively whole grain either (often in combination with the peanut butter; before the pandemic struck, I basically included a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in my lunch every single weekday for 14 years)
  • Lärabars (usually chocolate chip cookie dough and peanut butter chocolate chip, because that's the only combination that BJ's carries anymore, dammit)
  • protein bars, often two a day recently (Clif Builder's Bars are cheap and tasty; Premier Protein was better on paper due to less sugar, but always too chalky and hard to eat; I remember liking certain PowerBars but I can't remember which kind it was, the kind that ate more like a 3 Musketeers bar; ZonePerfect is quite good and cheap, if not as full of protein as the others; same goes for Clif non-Builder's, of which I'm partial to the white chocolate macadamia flavor)
  • stuffed chicken breasts (broccoli & cheddar flavor)
  • TV dinners (most often lasagna because it's always the cheapest per pound and I like it, but I also like things like chicken & broccoli Alfredo, and I'll always take Hungry-Man dinners when they go on sale for $2 each)
  • skillet-fried frozen dishes (such as Bertolli chicken florentine, Tastee Choice shrimp alfredo, Birds Eye chicken dishes...)
  • canned tuna
  • breaded chicken cutlets (sometimes nuggets)
  • frozen fish fillets: sometimes breaded (like Gorton's), sometimes not (like Sea Cuisine)
  • tapioca pudding


I almost never eat out (I couldn't name three non-chain restaurants in the town I lived in 2010-2021), and I never get fast food unless I'm on a road trip or desperate. both of those are really more for reasons of money than for my health; but, when I was on a long road trip in 2018, having to eat fast food so often (for lack of alternatives) introduced me to what heartburn feels like... and the usefulness of the acid reducer famotidine.

and I think that about covers it. comments?

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/761475.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] ...and force-fed me nothing but sauerkraut until I was __½ years old!   
11:59am 14/10/2021
  (yes, I know that's a recycled subject line from 11 years ago. deal with it.)

I'm now up to 26 days without any time wasted on pointless video games.

and yet I'm still not making progress on my last FSA module (DMAC) or my next arrangement for the gamer orchestra!

why? largely because much of the time I previously would have spent on games is now being spent on reading books from the library instead, many of which are about plants and/or landscaping and therefore are not exactly immediately useful to me while I'm living in a townhouse. (but I do enjoy reading them, particularly the ones that tell me something I didn't already know.)

however, I have been going on a workout habit that seems to be working. there is now a prominent sign on my wall telling me how many days I need to work out this month before I'll let myself buy another bottle of wine, and sticky notes underneath marking the days I did so. I'm also giving myself candy melts (white chocolate, which I love but never get to have) after each session.
I've calculated that I need to do two days on and one day off (my current program is split into a push day and a pull day) from here to the end of the month, with only one day's margin for error, to meet the goal -- so any day on which the target muscle groups aren't shot, I must do the workout.

(and yes, I am seeing slow improvements in the reps achieved.)

and I've also been getting in horn practice 4-5 days a week pretty consistently as well, so I probably don't need any further motivation on that front.

now I just have to get something together to realize similar progress on said long-term projects. I should probably start by limiting myself to one day a week of checking real estate listings (like I used to years ago), or whenever I get an update from my agent's screener... the mini-binge I went on yesterday did not give me any new insights or promising prospects.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/760471.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] "I'll have ______, please!" "_____? _____ what?" "... I forget..."   
07:45pm 07/10/2021
  I'm now up to 20 days without a second spent on time-wasting games. no Tetris, no backgammon, nothing of that sort.

I have had two or three nights of TF2 in that time. this doesn't make me feel nearly as guilty as the others, especially if Cy is playing along. but it's still another time expenditure that doesn't make me feel better and that I could cut out.



I continue to do far more reading of actual books than before. I have two days left before I must return Change Anything, so I'm hurrying to make sure I finish my notetaking on it. in my most recent library run I checked out How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life, by Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert), listed in the Biography section even though I got it for the life lessons.

so far, it's proven to be another book that is full enough of insights and lessons I never got anywhere else that I know I'll be taking notes to save forever.

in particular, the paramount importance of systems and habits -- and NOT (outcome-based) goals -- is something that all these successful writers agree on but that nobody ever taught me anywhere.
(Adams writes bluntly that "goals are for losers." the Change Anything folks don't go that far, but they do agree that you should "reward what you do, not what you achieve.")

based on how they raised me, I infer that my parents thought that if I kept my grades up and graduated from a good college with a lucrative major, and also knew a thing or two about personal finance and investing, I would be set for success. I say this because they never mentioned anything about the importance of habits, systems, hard work, mental fortitude, or social skills (another huge gap in my personal skill set) to achieving success, which I'm beginning to believe exceed that of actual knowledge and talent.

I suppose they may have had the excuse of coming of age in a different time, being able to ride the wave that was the rise of computing in the 80s and 90s to what should have been a fairly comfortable lifestyle (absent my mother's still-troubling spending habits), which might have brought one to the conclusion that a good degree in science/tech was all one needed. to his credit, my father realized in the 90s that he needed to update his skills, and went to the community college and got certifications in C/UNIX (apparently they were considered inseparable at the time) and web design/HTML (back when you pretty much had to code everything by hand).
that wasn't enough to stop him from getting downsized in 2008, when he was 53 and out recovering from an aortic aneurysm, but by then I was two years out of college and my future looked so promising that I didn't really learn anything from the event.

and I suppose further that I actually am in a pretty successful spot by the metrics others use. an in-law of mine pointed out that I have such things as a house, two cars (cheap and used but reliable), a fairly high-paying job with career upside in a job category that has perennially low unemployment rates, and a wife.

and yet I still don't feel like a success. I feel like I still haven't found the things I want from life.


... as for just what those things would be, I still haven't quite figured that out yet (if you're a long-time reader, then you know this is not a new problem), but let's start with freedom from needing to work for a living. that would be huge.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/759900.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] come aloooong WIIIITH me... and the butterflies, FULL STOP.   
07:33pm 05/10/2021
  from the Pollinator Partnership's publication Selecting Plants for Pollinators: Eastern Broadleaf Forest (Oceanic) Province (said physiographic province being the one containing all of New Jersey), the following is a list of native pollinator-friendly plants that are NOT claimed to attract bees, for my own reference:

  • Aesculus pavia (red buckeye) -- red trumpet-shaped flowers are a hummingbird magnet, whereas bees can't see the color red according to this publication
  • Asclepias incarnata (swamp milkweed) -- also an excellent larval host plant like all Asclepias species are, but apparently A. syriaca and A. tuberosa do attract bees *shrug*
  • Lilium spp. (native lilies)
  • Phlox spp. (phlox) -- and as a bonus, some species, such as P. divaricata and especially P. paniculata, are fragrant
  • Spigelia marilandica (woodland pinkroot) -- I haven't actually heard of this one before
  • Bignonia capreolata (crossvine) -- as with Aesculus pavia above, but I would never actually plant a plant as aggressive as Bignonia
  • Lonicera sempervirens (trumpet honeysuckle, coral honeysuckle) -- as with Aesculus pavia above

it's... rather short.

'tis a real shame that so many of the flowers whose fragrances are so attractive to humans are also attractive to bees, since fragrance is something I'm always looking to get if possible. examples include Cephalanthus (buttonbush), Rosa (native roses), Monarda (bee-balm/bergamot), Oxydendrum (sourwood -- notorious), and Tilia (basswood -- no-no-... no-TOOOOORIOUS).

also where the hell is Clethra alnifolia (summerwseet)?!



Edit: from the Eastern Broadleaf Forest (Continental) Province, we can add to this list Lindera benzoin (spicebush), praise the sun! also Sassafras albidum (sassafras) and Viburnum prunifolium, but those are said to attract only flies and beetles. still great trees worth growing for other reasons though.

the Laurentian Mixed Forest Province adds Hamamelis virginiana (common witch-hazel), hooray!

the Outer Coastal Plain Mixed Province contradicts Aesculus pavia from our original list. however, it adds Rhododendron spp. (native azaleas) and Wisteria frutescens (American wisteria) -- sweet! and on top of that, they're both also larval hosts! also Yucca filamentosa (Adam's needle yucca), but I have far less interest in growing that one.

from the Central Appalachian Broadleaf Forest, we get Kalmia latifolia (mountain laurel -- how I wish I could, but deer ruined it for me), Calycanthus floridus (sweetshrub; beetles only), more azaleas, Viburnum cassinoides (withe-rod; also a larval host), Heuchera villosa (rock alumroot), and Aristolochia macrophylla (Dutchman's pipe; flies only).

I hope this is not too much of a stretch, but the Southeastern Mixed Forest contributes Crataegus viridis (green hawthorn, also a larval host, and usually represented in commerce by cultivar 'Winter King') and a number of vines: Decumaria barbara (climbing hydrangea or wood-vamp), Passiflora incarnata (passionflower, also a larval host), and Gelsemium sempervirens (Carolina jessamine, also a host). and I already know from personal experience that I love the last of those.

finally, the Adirondack-New England Mixed Forest adds... nothing. thanks a lot.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/759468.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] close your eyes and watch me... I'm ____ing again   
09:39am 01/10/2021
  last week's weather was pretty much perfect -- not too hot and not chilly either. great for opening the windows and/or getting outside... as well as for not spending money on air conditioning or heating.

but a few autumnally cool days in a row have now left us at a point where I can no longer go without a shirt in the house.

oh well.

the good news is that the warm times look set to return even as soon as tomorrow. I'll need to get out to a nearby arboretum and take advantage.

I still would like to be able to live somewhere with less snow than New Jersey (preferably none) at some point in my life. the Pacific Northwest (either Oregon's Willamette Valley or the Puget Sound area) seemed ideal, with practically no snow AND more tolerable summers (because Mediterranean climate, and therefore cooler summer nights and more arid summer days), until I saw what was happening climatically over there this year (continuing megadrought, wildfires, and even triple-digit daytime temperatures breaking records).

Melbourne looks like it has an utterly amazing climate: cooler summers than here with lots of sunlight and average dew points in the low 50s(!!), and never any snow. it's apparently quite cloudy in the cooler months, but the Pacific Northwest gets that too. alas, it's in Australia.

so far I haven't been able to find a better compromise east of the Rockies (and therefore avoiding the wildfires, droughts, and water-rights issues of the West) than Asheville, NC, which is pretty much the southernmost city of decent size in the Appalachian Mountains, at an elevation of 2,130' and with a metro-area population of over 400,000 (bigger than Roanoke's). it has summers essentially the same as here but winters 7-10°F warmer, with a commensurate reduction in snowfall. I can certainly see why my father was always talking about relocating there after he retired (though it never actually happened, probably due mostly to my mother).
Lynchburg, VA, and Bristol, VA/TN, are similar but marginally less nice on both extremes.

but due to life circumstances, I don't think it's going to be possible to move out of New Jersey until I retire.

This entry was originally posted at: https://scintilla72.dreamwidth.org/759135.html. Please comment wherever you prefer.
 
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[public] progress.   
01:31pm 19/09/2021
  total amount of time wasted playing video games over the past two days: zero.



having access once again to the excellent county library with which I grew up has really been a revelation. looking through the 15x section this past weekend, I came across Change Anything (155.25 CHA) by Patterson, Grenny, Maxfield, McMillan, and Switzler, 2011 (authors of, inter alia, the seminal Crucial Conversations). it's been quite the enlightening read so far, and I'm making an outline of notes as I go to make sure I retain the material (and can apply it practically!) after I have to return the book. I don't think I've ever done that before for any book that wasn't a textbook.

how much more could I have learned, and how much less time could I regret having wasted, if I'd actually had a library card the past 11 years for what was then my town?

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[public] gratitude.   
08:21pm 04/09/2021
  it is September once again, and that means that Ginger Gold apples are finally back in stock.

and I can also still get fresh cherries for non-exorbitant prices.

life is good.

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[public] why have I never heard of this concept of "thumos" before?   
02:48pm 29/08/2021
  from an article in a series on Plato's allegory of the chariot:

A man lacking in thumos is the “nice guy” who can’t stand up for himself when others push him around. He is placid. Nothing arouses him. He has no ideals for which he fights and no real drive or ambition in life. He is content with mediocrity, or at least doesn’t have the will to figure out how to make things better.

BIN-go! that has pretty much been me for years now, and that's not exactly a revelation. I've been painfully aware of it.

but now would you mind suggesting what I can actually do to correct this condition?

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[public] science!   
03:01pm 13/08/2021
  New York Times: "What We Think We Know About Metabolism May Be Wrong"

assuming this new research holds up, it turns out we don't actually suffer from slowing metabolism for most of our adult lives -- it's pretty much flat between ages 20 and 60. so we can't use that as a weight gain excuse anymore.

in other words, my father always warned me that my well-nigh avian metabolism would slow down in middle age, but it turns out he might have been wrong. whoohoo!

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