Come train with me

This is a shout-out to all martial artists and would-be martial artists in the western Philadelphia exurbs, especially: Phoenixville, Spring City, Collegeville, Mont Clare, Upper Providence, Lower Schuylkill, Valley Forge, Charlestown/Malvern, Kimberton, Audubon, and Lower Perkiomen. I train under Sifu Dale Yeager at the Kuntao Martial Arts Club in Phoenxville, and my school has a… Continue reading Come train with me

Namedropping “ESR”

For at least fifteen years my name and its tri-letterization has been something with which you could conjure up a lot of attention among hackers and other sorts of geek. This fact presented the more clueful of my personal friends with a delicate problem: under what circumstances would it be proper for them to invoke… Continue reading Namedropping “ESR”

Does firearms competency testing do any good?

My distant friend Kent Lundgren, one of the most capable and thoughtful firearms instructors out there, has written a blog post addressing the tricky question of how we might filter potential carriers of concealed weapons for competence without involving the government.

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Categorized as Firearms

Progress in small things, and learning to fly

Storm Pax hit my area today as we were just recovering, still a bit dazed and reeling, from Storm Nika. This brought me 14 inches of snow, and it brings you a tale of progress in small things and how odd the brain’s information-retrieval process can be.

Operator rules

Everybody knows, or should know, the basic rules of firearms safety. (a) Always treat the weapon as if loaded, (b) Never point a firearm at anything you are not willing to destroy, (c) keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to shoot, (d) be sure of your target and what is beyond… Continue reading Operator rules

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Categorized as Firearms

Storm Nika crisis is over

I’m back home with the power on. Normal hacking and blogging will resume. There’s four days I don’t want to have to do over again. Cold, stress, constant fatigue, consequent inability to concentrate…being a disaster-displaced person, it turns out, is psychologically difficult even if you have money and a good support network and a hotel… Continue reading Storm Nika crisis is over

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Categorized as General

From an undisclosed location…

The title was a joke. The rest of this is not. Cathy Raymond and I evacuated from our home this morning. We’ve never had to do that before. Storm Nika has totally messed over the five-county area around Philadelphia. I’ve seen more downed power lines today than in my entire life until yesterday. Many roads… Continue reading From an undisclosed location…

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Categorized as General

How…does this even work?

Here is a curious fact. My wife Cathy is using Duolingo to learn German; she wants to be able to read sources on Iron Age and Viking costume in the original. Duolingo takes her through a lot of pronunciation drills. I’ve learned something by listening to her – which is that somehow, somewhere, I have… Continue reading How…does this even work?

Down the feminist rabbit hole

I fell down a rabbit hole today. By reading this: An Incomplete Guide to Feminist infighting. Bemused, I chased links and read manifestos and counter-manifestos for a couple of hours until the sources just began to repeat themselves. But in some respects my confusion was just beginning. As I was falling through all these diatribes… Continue reading Down the feminist rabbit hole

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Categorized as Politics