fnord

I am quite undecided about this turn of events in the housing market. Banks’ mail jingles as borrowers walk is the headline on a commentary by James Saft. For anyone who hasn’t come across the phrase “jingle mail” yet, it describes the phenomenon of homeowners walking away from a home because the debt owed is greater than its current value—and so, they mail the keys to the lender. The unmistakable signal jingle mail sends is, “I’m done here. The house is yours.”—thus breaking the mortgage contract. Is that wrong? I’ve seen a fair bit of commentary arguing both ways; but none of it has been from a pro-freedom perspective.

The least I can do is be considerate and put it behind the curtain so y’all aren’t unwittingly exposed to my nutty ravings.

Sigh ... Well, I thought I had things pretty well in hand when I went off yesterday afternoon to meet up with MAL and head for the Big City. Alas, once again I was overconfident.

Wow. I was out of town for a few days, and when I returned, the landscape had been transformed. Many waterfowl and songbirds had returned, and the snow had largely melted away. I thought that was a good thing—until I ventured into the basement.

If you’re thinking “cowbell”, guess again.

Things have been too serious around here lately. I have some important (to me, anyway) stuff on my mind, but can’t really string the thoughts together well enough to share ’em at this point. So maybe the new year musings will emerge tomorrow ... but for now, some music!

Today’s the day Prohibition was overturned ’lo those many years ago. It ain’t much, but in support of Repeal Day, here’s a concoction I’ve been enjoying of late.

In a rocks glass, place a generous pinch of brown sugar; I prefer dark but whatever is on hand will work. Pour a glug of bourbon over it, and swirl to help the sugar dissolve. Then pour in 4-8 oz. of grapefruit juice (not the pink kind), depending on how much bourbon you added and how stiff you want your drink. Add an ice cube or two if desired, and enjoy.

Lobo was the person who introduced me to the concept of a “way of being”. I immediately liked it; it sounds much more active than “personality”, which I think of as essentially the same thing as one’s way of being. Many people—myself included from time to time still—have a tendency to see one’s personality as somehow immutable under all but extreme conditions. And while it is accurate to describe many specific elements of personality as being genetically determined, it is crucially important to understand that “genetically determined” does not mean “constant” or even “highly predictable”.

Perfectly innocent items become instruments of pain. [Let the baking puns begin!]

Over the weekend, I moseyed over to The Economist—I honestly don’t know why—and got no further than the first article to catch my eye: An expensive dinner. My fascination focused not on the tale of rising food prices, but some of the strange memes contained therein. Picking through the entire article, since it may disappear behind a subscriber-only button at some point ...

At one of the most intriguing and fun stops of my recent travels, MAL and I met up with some folks in The Family whom we hadn’t met before. At some point in the conversation, one person said he’d dropped by here, and opined that “there’s not much there”. Overall, my assessment differs from his, but ’tis certainly true of late—I’ve been an infrequent contributor and when I do pipe up, it’s been with uncharacteristically brief bits. There are reasons for my shift ...

Yet another example of the perils of blogging while sleep-impaired ... my “evening with four gentlemen” wasn’t what some of you might be thinking based on what I said! Here’s a little something to provide a clearer mental picture:

When V uttered a similar phrase in the movie V for Vendetta, I was skeptical of the dismissal of coincidence. It seemed to me that doing so implicitly admits of some higher power, doing at least a little string-pulling in our lives. And of course, stubborn, independent snake that I am, I don’t much care for that idea.

The other day we went for a ride in a hot air balloon! It was my first time on such an expedition, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Everyone did, actually; and the crew seemed to like that we enthusiastically helped with packing up after the trip was over too. More, perhaps, when I’ve some time to devote to telling about the adventure ... but that may not be for a while, as we’re going to be on the move again soon.

Hope all of you are doing well and enjoying yourselves too!

I can remember, as a kid, spending a fair amount of time thinking about groups of people—I think it was the women’s lib movement that sparked this oft-visited line of thought—and rejected much of what I now know to be counterproductive ideas regarding groups. However, when I first discovered the freedom philosophy, I think I temporarily (and not consciously) set that aside. I suppose I thought that group of individuals could band together and make a difference. Okay, so I was just a little naïve back then ...

I haven’t read all of Butler Shaffer’s latest article, titled Identifying With the State, but reading these two paragraphs was sufficient for me to make a mental note to get back to it as soon as I can:

Through years of careful conditioning, we learn to think of ourselves in terms of agencies and/or abstractions external to our independent being. Or, to express the point more clearly, we have learned to internalize these external forces; to conform our thinking and behavior to the purposes and interests of such entities. We adorn ourselves with flags, mouth shibboleths, and decorate our cars with bumper-stickers, in order to communicate to others our sense of “who we are.” In such ways does our being become indistinguishable from our chosen collective.

In this way are institutions born. We discover a particular form of organization through which we are able to cooperate with others for our mutual benefit. Over time, the advantages derived from this system have a sufficient consistency to lead us to the conclusion that our well-being is dependent upon it. Those who manage the organization find it in their self-interests to propagate this belief so that we will become dependent upon its permanency. Like a sculptor working with clay, institutions take over the direction of our minds, twisting, squeezing, and pounding upon them until we have embraced a mindset conducive to their interests. Once this has been accomplished, we find it easy to subvert our will and sense of purpose to the collective. The organization ceases being a mere tool of mutual convenience, and becomes an end in itself. Our lives become “institutionalized,” and we regard it as fanciful to imagine ourselves living in any other way than as constituent parts of a machine that transcends our individual sense.

At this point, the only thing I can say in reply is, “Hail Eris!”

A friend pointed me in the direction of this article; and while I don’t understand all the banking/investment jargon, I get enough to increase my concern over the economic situation in the USSA.