Johnny Appleseed Didn't Sleep Here

I'm so disappointed -- my property is on a hilltop near the town square (I can see the buildings around the square when the trees are bare). The property used to be an orchard. I've seen an old hard-drawn "map" of the city from the 1800s showing the orchard; I don't recall the date on the map, but it was before Glessner Ave [the street 1/2 block north of my property] existed.

Anyway, I'm "disappointed" because the thought suddenly came to me today to wonder whether Johnny Appleseed [John Chapman] had planted the orchard that was on this property Apparently, while his city lot wasn't too far from here, his nurseries were further outside town.

It Wasn't an Act of Kindness

After this Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, “I thirst.” Now there was set there a vessel full of vinegar; and they filled a sponge with vinegar and put it upon hyssop, and put it to His mouth. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, “It is finished.” And He bowed His head and gave up the ghost. -- John 19:28-30 (KJ21)

Crucifixion was intended to be painful, prolonged, and humiliating. The Roman soldier was not offering a kindness to a dying man, but rather he was getting in a final humiliation to the man they were torturing to death. For understand, the Romans used a sponge on a stick to wipe themselves. 

On "All Your Job Are Belong to AI"

AI is hype, it has always been hype, and it will always by hype. There will *never* be an AI that *actually* thinks, that *actually* knows/understands, that *actually* reasons.

There is presently a lot of concern -- valid concern, in fact -- that as AI models are refined in the coming years, AI will eliminate huge swaths of "white-collar" jobs. But, understand this: AI may indeed eliminate these jobs not because the AI is so "advanced", or (laughably) "better at thinking that humans are", but rather because the jobs are pointless RIGHT NOW. The jobs are make-work "jobs", not *real* jobs, for they do not produce real value -- in fact, such "jobs" actually destroy value by wasting the ultimate resource, which is a human's potential to produce something of value.

Here is an insightful comment someone posted in response to the linked video -- "I think that the singularity is when a model has collapsed to such a degree that it gives the same answer to every prompt."

Presumably, that answer will be "42".

Via YouTube, George D. Montañez, PhD: Model Collapse Ends AI Hype

On Cement-board Siding

This is the text of an email I sent a friend about my experience and thought on cement-board siding --

=====
Around here [north-central Ohio], there were two options: "Hardie Board" (James Hardie Co.) from Lowe's, and "Alura" from Menards.  I used the "Hardie Board" on the sunroom (2nd/3rd floor addition), but overall I used the "Alura" even though it was more expensive. 

[Edit: I bought the siding from Menard's even though, ever since they went full "face-diaper nazi" during the Plandemic, I do my best to not give them any business. The prices at Menard's are generally lower than at Lowe's and Home Depot, but I *never* go to Menard's unless I can't find what I want at Lowe's or Home Depot; that's how much they pissed me off harassing me about not wearing a face-diaper. On top of which, while they "officially" ban mere pets from the premises, the use the HIPAA laws as the excuse to ignore that particular policy.  Odd: you don't dare make an assumption -- nor query -- about the health-needs of that person who clearly has brought a mere pet, not a service animal, into the store, but you're fully qualified to determine that *my* health won't be injured by forcibly/artificially restricting my breathing with an utterly useless and pointless cloth.]

I'll try to list what I see as pros and cons.

At Lowe's, the cement-board siding was in stock (*), and I could buy pieces individually, as I wanted/needed them. That (*) is because there are two widths, and in the end they didn't have enough of the width I was using. Or, perhaps it's that they started stocking pre-finished, rather than the "raw" I'd been buying.

On the other hand, the "Alure" from Menards was special order; a full "pallet" being 256 pieces (or, 1536 sq.ft. coverage).

"Hardie Board" — As far as I can tell, it comes only as "textured" to look like aged cedar which had been allowed to weather for many years without a proper coat of paint.  I *hate* the fake "wood grain" they put in vinyl siding, and that hatred is the main, or even only, reason I went with the "Alure", despite it being at least $2.00 more per piece.  Though, as it turns out, once the "Hardie Board" is painted, I doesn't repulse me, as I thought it would.

Pros — cheaper per piece; higher cement content (which results in some 'cons', and what might be a very big 'pro' in the long-term); available as unfinished (which for me was a 'pro', though obviously, other people will prefer the pre-finished);

Cons -- higher cement content: thus, heavier per piece, and more brittle; also more dense, meaning you'd need to drill pilot-holes if you use screws as attachment (just with the 12-15 pieces used on this project, we dulled a cement bit while drilling the pilot holes).  If I recall correctly, they make special nails for this siding, but I much recommend using screws, as one slip of the hammer could ruin your day.

By the way, the reason I put off re-siding the house for so many years after it was clear that I need to do so is that I was fearful of the cement-board being *too* brittle. The vinyl that is on most people's houses was never an option, I despise it that much. I was hoping to find a third option, such as a *solid* (and smooth surfaced) vinyl.

"Alure" — Like the "Hardie Board", it comes "textured" to look like aged cedar, but they also make smooth, untextured.  It can be either pre-finished (Sherwin-Williams paint) or "primed" (I use scare-quotes, because I couldn't see any priming on what was delivered to me).

Pros — lighter, due to being made of more fibers and less cement than the H-B; being less dense, drilling pilot-holes wasn't absolutely necessary, as the "self-tapping" screws we used were able self-tap; being less dense, it was easier to cut the pieces, and it was possible the "trim" or "fine-tune" it with a utility knife.

Cons — more expensive per piece; buying less than a full "pallet" of 256 pieces adds a surcharge for "breaking" the "pallet" 

Potential Con -- it seems to be composed of compressed layers; the potential 'con' is that several times, perhaps because we made some pilot-holes too close to the edges, the layers of small areas at corners de-laminated. 

==============

As mentioned, I bought unfinished siding, and painted it myself.  As Providence arranged it, right after I ordered the siding, I happened to come across 20 gallons of paint formulated for decks and floors (including for cement) on clearance at Lowe's for $20 per gallon. I bought it all. It wasn't exactly the color I had in mind, but it was close, and I really like how it looks contrasted with the yellow of the trim.

Telemarketers: Why Not At Least Pretend to Respect the People You Annoy

What's with these people constantly calling, pretending to want to buy my property? It goes in waves, one or two per day for a few days, then stops for a while. With most of the calls, you can tell that it's from a telemarketer/call-center before the call-center computer routes the connection to "the next available representative".

One of my *speculations* is that at least some of these call are being made for the county tax-man, as a cheap way to do the property tax re-evaluations.

And, speaking of telemarketers -- the whole "industry" is vile enough as it is, but that they don't even respect me/us enough to bother me/us with "representatives" who at least speak English really annoys me.

Concerning 'randomness' and the freedom of the will

This is a comment I emailed to my internet-friend, Kristor, in response to his recent post, linked below.

A claim of 'randomness' is a claim of lack of correlation between two events or states. Thus, to say that State-A changed to or became State-B 'randomly', is to say that the change happened without cause; which is absurd. 

Making such a claim about state-changes of the will is even more absurd than making it about merely physical state-changes; and, for that matter, more absurd than the typical mere denial that the will is free. For, once again, a claim of 'randomness' is a claim that there is *no* correlation, no relationship, between 'this' and 'that'. But, of course, and even were it true that the will is not free, there is, of necessity, by definition, some sort of correlation between my decision at 'Instant-A' to do 'X' and my subsequent decision at 'Instant-B' to not do 'X' after all.

Kristor: Contra the Most Succinct Argument Against the Freedom of the Will

Tipping is not only un-American, it's downright anti-American

Tipping is not only un-American, it's downright anti-American. Even as a child, I understood it as a vestige of medievalesque class snobbery.

And while tipping in America may go back into the 19th Century, the widespread "tipping culture" -- which so many Europeans see as a baffling and uniquely American custom -- goes back only into my own childhood; that is, about 60 years ago.

I *know* that the general America populace did not tip 60 years ago because, even as a child, I used to read the 'Ann Landers' and 'Dear Abby' columns; and those two broads (*) periodically ran columns to "educate" their readers on: 1) how to tip. 2) when to tip, 3) what to tip, and 4) the "moral" obligation to tip. And, one of the thongs I noticed over time is that the "proper" percentage to tip increased over the years, with the "explanation" being that inflation necessitated it ,,, but no acknowledgement that inflation had worked its magic on both sides of the equation.

(*) those two actually bear a lot of the blame for the present-day moral degeneracy of American culture, for they were pushing "non-judgmentalism" (**). That is, they offered people, especially women, who were their main audience, a new set of "moral" expectations to replace of the ones that God gave us.

(**) which, in the end, turns out to be ultra-judgmental, just with the judgments based on morality turned on its head.

Matt Walsh: The History Of Tipping Culture, And How We Got To The "Tipping" Point

On "You Can't Legislate Morality"

Douglas Wilson: "Few statements are as vapid as 'You can't legislate morality.' As a matter of unvarnished fact, it is actually impossible to legislate anything else."

Amen.

My father was an intelligent man; I would say, a very intelligent man. But, even very intelligent people are products of their times, and tend to absorb and echo the perceived "elite consensus", same as everyone else does. My father was born in 1927, so his "time" was the last few years of the era of Prohibition and the aftermath of the repeal of Prohibition; and in that time, the "elite consensus" was very explicitly that "You can't legislate morality." (*)

Once, when I was quite young, in trying to explain to me why Prohibition turned out to be such an abject social and legal disaster, my father even said to me, "You can't legislate morality." As I recall, I was still at that young age wherein one tends to not seriously dispute one's parents pronouncements about how the world is. At the same time, even then the claim didn't sit well with me. I don't mean to imply that as a child I rejected the claim and could offer a logical and philosophical rationale for that rejection. Rather, my attitude was more, "I'll think about this when I'm older."

And, thinking about it when I was older, yet still in my teens, I came to the conclusion that, "As a matter of unvarnished fact, it is impossible to legislate anything else." That is, all prescriptive and proscriptive law is, in fact, the legislation of some morality or other. The question is never, "Shall we legislate morality?" but rather, "Which morality, how grounded, shall we legislate?"

(*) That "elite consensus", coupled with the fact that nearly everyone in our society accepted it as Gospel, is *why* all the immoral ills currently destroying our civilization were able to be inflicted upon us by our "elites".

Douglas Wilson: How to Bonk Heads With Yourself

So, What's Up With Candace Owens?

I used to catch the Addisons (in the linked video) on the radio when I was driving a lot more than I do now.

Lately, many people (*) are asking, "What has happened to Candace Owens?"

So, what *has* happened to Candace Owens? In a word: Catholicism. To be a bit more precise, much as leftists in general, "right-wing" Catholics tend to imbibe Jew-hatred. Obviously, not all do, but it is a general tendency. Also, as a convert to Catholicism, it's not at all surprising that she is going to start trying to equate Protestantism with Satanism.

(*) Though, Bob Parks is probably not asking that question, as he never trusted her "conversion" from leftism to conservatism was genuine.

Shock: Candace Owens believes Protestantism is rooted in Satanism

The Food Stamp [Recipients] Are Officially Out Of Control

The title of Matt Walsh's linked video is "The Food Stamp Influencers On TikTok Are Officially Out Of Control", but I like my version of it better.

At the start of my 10th grade year, so more than 50 years ago, my father was laid up for months due to a broken hip(*). Then, less than a year and a half later (**), he was laid up again with the *other* hip broken.  

SO, for a while, my family relied on Food Stamps -- and it was damned embarrassing, it was shame-inducing.  Once I was old enough to have a part-time job, when I had the money to do so, I'd buy the family groceries with my own money and return the food stamps unspent to my mother, just to avoid the embarrassment of pulling the damned things out in public.  I also planted a garden in the back yard to grow some of our food.

But, as I said, that was 50+ years ago; and my, how times have changed.  These days, people *boast* about being government dependents (***), living as wards of Big Momma Government, rather than as functioning adults; people *boast* about using their vote to install politicians and bureaucrats who loot you and me to subsidize themselves (meaning, both the voters and the voted-for).

(*) As he was crossing the street -- legally, in the cross-walk, with the crossing-light -- a young woman stopped at the intersection, distracted by arguing with her boyfriend, must have slipped her foot off the brake.  Anyway, she rolled forward, struck my father, and his hip broke.

(**) He was heading downtown on foot one winter day, As he passed the spot where a building had been demolished the previous summer, he stepped on a piece of ice-covered busted-up sidewalk that hadn't been fixed after the demolition, and down he went.

(***) I recently saw a video clip of a couple of fat lesbians (one of whom pretends to be a man), boasting about free-loading off you and me.  The one literally called herself "professionally disabled" -- that is, she's on welfare because she "can't" work to support herself -- and added that "he" (i.e. the other lesbian) is "paid to take care of me" -- that is, she is enrolled in another type of government-run welfare-scam to fleece you and me for the benefit primarily of the bureaucrats and secondarily of their clientele. 

I recently saw another clip of a woman bitching because she could no longer use the EBT card to pay to have her nails done. Horror of horrors, she had to use "her own money" to pay for the utterly useless and pointless nails.  Or, as she lamented, "Now, how am I going to pay the rent?"

=====
In America, "poor people" aren't "poor" primarily because they have no money, but because of their own choices: either to not work and earn money in the first place, or to frivolously waste what money they do acquire. In America, being "poor" is a choice.  In America, most "poor people" are "poor" because they are damned lazy.

Matt Walsh: The Food Stamp Influencers On TikTok Are Officially Out Of Control