I was just over at …

the Coltillion Interview and while the questions Basil asked and the answers the ladies gave were all almost equally interesting, this one tickled my fancy:

“How do you handle writer’s block?”

The ladies’ answers were cool, but I prefer my method of dealing with writer’s block over all others:

I simply emulate James Joyce and start spewing unconnected, random words that have apparent connection without having any cohesive meaning. When something starts to stick to the screen, I know I’ve found some good $*** and start blogging.

Often, I’m wrong of course, and it’s not good $*** at all, but really bad $*** and ought to be a candidate for a “worst of the blogosphere” award. So? It still keeps the voices in my head mollified…

😉

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi Dead?

Maybeso. Not confirmed. Keep an open mind on this, but cautious optimism seems warranted since even Reuters notes the possibility. heh

If true, it won’t end the terrorist attacks on civilians in Iraq, but it will put a dent in them-again, if this proves out.

UPDATE (Monday): Nope. New news says probably NOT. More as things unfold, but this was just a lil premature, looks like.

OTOH, maybe for Christmas Santa will put a Zarqawi in America’s stocking. heh. (I’d rather he deliver some spine and stones to Republican’t Congresscritters, but bagging Zarqawi looks to be more possible… )

If this doesn’t move you…

…then you need a heart and soul transplant.

Just CLICK HERE or on the pic below

Honor-Sacrifice-Duty

If you can watch the linked Flash presentation and not be moved deeply, just go away. I don’t want to know you.

Linked at The Uncooperative Blogger, Don Surber, Peakah’s Productions, Stop the ACLU, Soldier’s Angel, Common Sense Runs Wild, MVRWC, Outside the Beltway, MacStansbury, Right Wing Nation, Where are my socks?, TMH’s Bacon Bits, NIF (where TJ continues to “blog by trackback-proxy”), Basil’s Sunday Brunch, and Mensa Barbie.

[BTW, click here for an explanation of an obscure term used in the background music.]

Crossposted to Cathouse Chat

Just Regular Ole Black Beans and Rice

Regular Ole Black Beans and Rice

Ingredients

  • 2 cups dry black beans
  • olive oil
  • 1 medium onion, diced
  • 1/2 teaspoons garlic
  • 1 jalapeño pepper, diced
  • 1 cup tomatoes, diced
  • OR, instead of the jalapeño and tomatoes, a can of Rotel chiles and tomatoes
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (or Chinese Five Spice)
  • 2 cups beef stock
  • OR water only and one package of dry onion soup mix
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • Rice, any old way you wanna cook it.

Preparation

Start this one the night before. (You can move that to morning and do step 4 all day) Black beans just take more prep than pintos. Go ahead and don’t do it this way. You can always load your 00 shells with the resultant rocks.

  1. Wash and sort the beans. I usually do this with a large pot and a sieve. Beans in sieve, water in pot. Running water over beans. You can work out the mechanics.
  2. Put the 2C beans in at least 4C water and bring to a boil.
  3. Remove from heat, cover and let sit for at least one hour.
  4. After soaking in the hot water for an hour, pour off the water and add more, fresh water to cover the beans (about 2″-3″ over the beans).
  5. NOW let ’em soak overnight. The next day, they’re ready to cook. NO SALT WHILE THEY’RE COOKING at first. Save that for the LAST step.
  6. Pour off the water again, add the beef stock and enough water to cover (again, by about 2″3″. Then, bring the beans to a boil and back the heat off to simmer. Cover. Let ’em simmer about an hour or until you can remove a bean and make the skin curl off by blowing on it or it just tastes/feels done to you. Meanwhile, while the beans are simmering, assemblle the rest. Dice the onions, garlic and jalapeño, then lightly saute them in the olive oil. Chop the tomatoes, etc.
  7. Now that the beans are done, add all the other stuff and let it come together at a simmer for at least 20 minutes… while your rice is finishing up.

Serve scoops of the beans over rice.

Funny… but sad

Regular readers will know The Boys. My son’s dogs are outside dogs, allowed in the house for what is for them a special treat. Except that now, for Big Boy—Leo—it has become less of a treat and more… terror!

The other day, I had The Boys in to be fed, cos it was lousy weather outside. Leo was merrily chomping away, in his oh-so-messy way, when one of the cats startled him.

Now, I didn’t know this about dogs—or maybe it’s just Leo. When startled, they (or at least he) grips his footing with their claws, apparently for better traction.

Doesn’t work so well on tile flooring.

Leo went sprawling, tried to get up (still attempting to grip the floor with his claws) and fell again. He sprawled like that, with terror written on his face, all the way to the french doors to the deck. Never could get his footing.

Now, ever since that incident, when I allow The Boys in, Buttons is just happy as a lark and Leo, poor Leo, tries once agaion to get a grip on that slippery tile flooring with his claws, sprawls, panics and just WILL NOT STAND UP.

It’s funny, but kinda sad. Going to look up the dog nail clippers I have and get his claws as short as I can, safely. Maybe that’ll help the guy. Otherwise, he’s doomed to no more pleasure trips inside.

Saturday Mishmash #x—around and about

(yeh, I’m too lazy to check my archives and see how many of these I’ve done or on what days. So sue me.)

Saturday was originally a day “someone” (not you, Mr. Big–you’re cool, dude. 🙂 had me listed for an Open Trackbacks Post, and I did one last weekend, so if y’all wanna consider this an open post, feel free. See the instructions below my collection of “not-quite-NIF” style links (NIF’s baaaaaaack! Sorta.)

In important news, Ferdy discusses priorities. 🙂

Conservative Teen posts Dems Fail to Put Money Where Their Mouth Is. (Well, duh. They were being asked to use their own “money”. heh) Cao and many others (here, here and here for example) are all over this, so I’ll let them do the heavy lifting. Cao’s most telling comment?

“When my son was home from Iraq a few months ago, he said there is no way we’re going to leave Iraq.”

You tell ’em Mama!

Cao also posts about Women Over 30. (She adds a disclaimer 🙂

Oh, and she reminded me to check in with the Protest Warriors (haven’t been there in a while.) Check out this video.

Jay needs help! 🙂

Check out some Dr. Seuss Parodies! And do NOT miss your P.E.R.V. meeting! Lallygaggers will be planted…

How ’bout the Dafydd ab Hugh? Great post, as usual: Agnostic Defends Faithful Against Atheist. Or how about Lies and the Lying Congressliars Who Lie Them, eh? Building a blog, one great post at a time… Spend some time at Big Lizards.

Committees of Correspondence asks the rhetorical question, Can Blogging Be Addictive? (well, duh!) Then points to something that’ll stop your blogging for a bit…

In the news…

Congresscritters mug taxpayers… again.

Al-Zarqawi threatens to shoot himself in the foot. (What a doof! He’s almost as stupid as those Muslim idiots who kidnapped Ghurkas last year… speech impaired piscines…)

No France for Depp. Poor baby. Too hot for ya?

Point/Counterpoint: Fair Tax v Flat Tax-I’ll keep pushing this til I hear some voices!

Bush stands firm on Iraq. Yeah Bubba!

S’all for now.

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Also linked at The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns, The Political Teen, The Uncooperative Blogger, TMH’s Bacon Bits, MacStansbury, Point Five, California Conservative, Jo’s Cafe, Bloggin Outloud, Basil’s Blog (thanks again for the Haloscan hack!), bRight & Early, Whizbang!, Outside the Beltway, Holly Aho, The Florida Masochist (who does not take the cake in knucklehood-dom, as long as I’m around! heh) and Choose Life!

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Open Post info: Edit a post (or posts 🙂 of your own that you want to have featured here to include a link to this post. Trackback to my trackback URI (just right-click on “trackback” at the end of this post and select “copy link” or “copy link location”–however your browser indicates). If your blog software can’t send trackback pings you can use Wizbang’s Standalone Trackback Pinger. If you have trouble, please leave a comment. I’ll try to help.

Open Trackback Alliance

Intelligent Design v Neodarwinism v Creationism

This is not an attempt to argue the scientific merits or lack thereof of any of the specific positions of Neodarwinists, Creationists or Intelligent Design researchers.

But just consider for a moment this snippet from a blog post by Scott Adams (yes, Dilbert creator-not a scientist, but an apparently honest and intelligent man):

“Intelligent Design accepts an old earth and even accepts the fact that species probably evolved. They only question the “how.” Creationists have jumped on that bandwagon as a way to poke holes in Darwinism. The Creationists and the Intelligent Design folks have the same target (Darwin), but they don’t have the same argument. The average person who has a strong opinion on this topic doesn’t understand that distinction because the political agenda of the creationists makes things murky.” _1_

While Scott makes the error here of not taking note of the political agendas of Neodarwinists, he does show an understanding of some of the differences between Intelligent Design and Creationism-an understanding almiost entirely lacking in Mass Media Podpeople ranks, as well most in the ranks of Academia Nuts and Blogger Pseudopundits. He also makes the mistake, IMO, of assuming a monolithic “evolution” camp of thought, even though most evolutionists today are Neodarwinists.

The rest of his post is a darned good place to start in debunking much of the B.S. that both Neodarwinists and Creationists have pushed and that simple-minded (read “stupid”) Mass Media Podpeople have promoted.

Then there is this, from someone with impeccable scientific training, longtime experience in hard and “soft” (he would say has said, “voodoo sciences”) sciences, engineering and the arts. A very smart and knowedgeable man, a specifically non-scientifically jargoned comment:

Either there is a purpose to the universe or there is not. If there is not, then we have the problem of deriving purpose to our own existence. Existentialists say there is now. Existence precedes essence, and does not imply purpose; and thus our lives are absurd. After which Sartre became a communist. Apparently Marxism substituted for purpose. Camus concludes that life consists of doing one’s job; but he could not get far behind that statement, and though less alienated than some, remained essentially a stranger in a strange land.-Jerry Pournelle _2_

Let me encourage you who read this to junk whatever propoganda being bruited about in the media or in B.S. sessions in the blogosphere or wherever to assess the claims of “fact” and arguments of parties in the debate according to central scientific principles:

Is what is being said fact, hypothesis, unintentional falsehood or a lie?

What is the degree of confidence for whatever fact is brought forth, and are any conceptual/prconceptual biases of the observers being injected into interpretive statements made about the facts? If so, what degree of confidence can you attempt to assign the representations of fact? Why?

And lastly, and most importantly,

Is the argument a statement of falsifiable hypothesis subject to testing or is it a statement of faith, not subject to testing or falsifying?

Right now, Neodarwinists mostly just do not want to debate on fact or submit to examinations for falsifiability. Creationists are for the most part cherrypickers and twisters of fact with no falsifiable positions. Only ID research is-for the most part-still doing serious science of any kind, it appears.

None of the three camps have completely clean hands, but at least the IDers do not yet seem to be outright liars like the other two camps.

But-MOST OF ALL-do not take my word for that statement! Check for yourself. The Wittingshire blog has some decent links to start folks off at the layman’s level, as Scott Adams did. Try it out. Look around. Ask questions. Oh, and check Bloggin Outloud for a timely ID post.

Linked also at TMH’s Bacon Bits’ Misappropriating Intelligent Design and Overstating Evolution.

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