2024-12-21 First act of the solstice: light the Yule fire from flint and steel. I wanted to use that method …
2024-12-20 Darcy works at Bath and Body Works and she reports that–five days before Christmas–there …
2024-12-19 Rachel and I are establishing a new holiday season tradition: playing gin rummy every evening with …
2024-12-16 United Health by Jesse Welles 🎵
2024-12-14 OpenAI whistleblower found dead by “suicide”
2024-12-13 The Given Life, part four
2024-12-12 Beans are cooking!
2024-12-11 I do wonder (especially after reading Dopamine Nation) if we are living in an age of widespread, …
2024-12-10 Once upon a time, Joshua Klein asked “should it be easy?” and that question has lingered …
2024-12-10 I’ve been learning how to cook with and maintain cast iron lately. The learning has been mostly from …
2024-12-10 “Resist the enclosure of the human psyche.”
2024-12-09 Finished reading Dopamine Nation by Anna Lembke. Thanks to @toddgrotenhuis for mentioning it. The …
2024-12-09 My only advice is never to give advice.
2024-12-09 Looks like I’ve been on micro.blog three years today. I was briefly on the service once or twice …
2024-12-07 One benefit of living in a small town: parades with fire trucks and classic cars and tractors and …
2024-12-07 Got a flint and steel in the mail today and I’ve successfully made a small fire from it. The plan is …
2024-12-07 There are many powers in this world. Which ones am I feeding with my time, attention, money, energy?
2024-12-05 Cheap man’s mocha: half a mug brewed coffee, half a mug milk (I used oatmilk), 1 tablespoon …
2024-12-03 I’ve added “The Owens House” as a blog category to contain all posts about the …
2024-12-03 I recently wrote a bit about the Schroers, who were the second family to live in our house. Over the …
2024-12-03 What if Trump isn’t lying so much as attempting to shape reality around himself? We know he was …
2024-12-02 Alan Jacobs: I cannot, of course, provide documentary proof for that claim. But as the Marxists …
2024-12-01 We got all festive today! This morning we cut our Christmas tree and decorated it. This is our …
2024-12-01 Good essay from @tinyroofnail: But here again Farmer stands out as an example. He did not begin by …
2024-11-27 Jamie Dimon says AI will lead to shorter work weeks. We’ve heard this one before. Screw you, …
2024-11-26 Watching the turmoil of my 78 year old mom has made me utterly certain that the doctrine of eternal, …
2024-11-23 Wendell Berry: This book, like several others I have written, is intended as a part of a public …
2024-11-23 Going to the store on a Saturday with some small plumbing part in hand always makes me think of my …
2024-11-23 Wendell Berry’s characterization of agrarianism (from his introduction to The Art of Loading Brush): …
2024-11-20 Bless Brother Ali. He can be righteously angry on one track and beautifully moving on another. …
2024-11-16 Ferdinand, IN
2024-11-15 I’ve found my Amish lumber source! A guy named Emmanuel. His lumber is a fraction of the Lowe’s …
2024-11-14 More from Uncle Wendell: I imagine the dead waking, dazed, into a shadowless light in which they …
2024-11-14 Wendell Berry, A World Lost: However we may miss and mourn the dead, we really give little …
2024-11-14 Claire Carlson, “Rural America Did not Push Donald Trump to Victory in 2024”: This data speaks for …
2024-11-13 Wendell Berry, A World Lost: From Dick I learned that the countryside was inhabited not just by …
2024-11-13 Remember when I built a house for our sickly neighborhood cat Morty? He came by on Halloween but we …
2024-11-11 This is an excellent, excellent post by Donny. The Jonah Goldberg piece he links to is also worth …
2024-11-10 I could go on a rant about these crap junction boxes, which we tried to work on at my mom’s house …
2024-11-10 Worth your time: An hourlong documentary covering four seasons in the life of a 76 year old horse …
2024-11-08 There’s nothing like having your preferred candidate unexpectedly trounced for making you …
2024-11-07 Don’t miss @dwalbert’s woodcarving sale from now until November 17. Some truly beautiful work …
2024-11-06 Worth your time: “The Abandoned Americans” by Peter Savodnik.
2024-11-03 I am not fragile. I am one of a species evolved over millennia to be survivors. We have survived …
2024-11-03 Came across this in my mom’s basement. I think everyone around here had this painting. Rachel’s …
2024-11-02 A few folks have been talking about Dougald Hine’s book here recently so I looked back to see what I …
2024-11-02 Watched Heartland (1979) this morning. Wanted something slow and calm, and this fit the bill. …
2024-10-31 Halloween is easily the best night of the year in our neighborhood. It’s like living in an 80s …
2024-10-31 thumbs up
2024-10-28 I don’t know what mailing list I got put on, but I’ve now received several free issues of …
2024-10-28 Nick Cave says something I’ve often heard from Christians: Freedom finds itself in captivity. …
2024-10-27 I am a Jack-o-lantern traditionalist: no stencils or fancy carving tools, just a pencil and a small …
2024-10-26 I mentioned a few weeks ago that a neighborhood cat has taken up residence in our backyard. Today I …
2024-10-25 Cool story of how Paul Sellers was commissioned in 2008 to make credenzas for the White House …
2024-10-24 Repaired and refinished a cedar chest I picked up over the summer. Before: After:
2024-10-23 Every year since Darcy was two, we’ve gone to Huber Orchard to get our pumpkin for carving. It’s one …
2024-10-23 Really good TED talk on humanity’s relationship with fire and how (as an animist might say) we have …
2024-10-22 The Excesses of God Robinson Jeffers Is it not by his high superfluousness we know Our God? For to …
2024-10-22 Wendell Berry, Another Day: Sabbath Poems, 2013-2023
2024-10-21 The Given Life, part 3
2024-10-21 The private property on the northeast side of Murray Forest is being logged. I’ve spent most of my …
2024-10-19 Today at the historical society’s research library, we discovered that our house was built in …
2024-10-18 Audit is officially over as of today. I’m started to feel normal after a weeklong cold. …
2024-10-18 Will there still be old men sitting in restaurants at 6am drinking coffee and talking about nothing …
2024-10-17 Rachel has more or less finished the floor refinishing project. I think it looks wonderful! She also …
2024-10-17 I’ll be so glad when this election is over. I always resist writing about electoral politics …
2024-10-16 The Given Life, part two
2024-10-16 The Given Life, part 1.5
2024-10-15 Good list of eight ways of connecting from Ted Goia. Some of these I was already doing okay with and …
2024-10-08 This morning I heard a bit from The Wayfinders by Wade Davis, a book about the Polynesian open ocean …
2024-10-07 To all the folks complaining about how popular Halloween is among adults today, I offered this as my …
2024-10-07 This is a good list of ideas for cleaning up your garden at the end of the growing season while also …
2024-10-06 Thinking about the research I did yesterday, what will future researchers do, given the demise of …
2024-10-05 Rachel and I are continuing to research the lives of our ancestors of place. Today we looked into …
2024-10-04 Rachel continues to do great work on the floors. The living room is now done; we can start moving …
2024-10-04 Had breakfast with the distinguished author today.
2024-10-03 Gave blood today at a drive across the street. Thanks to @JohnBrady for posting that one article …
2024-10-02 I hope you’ve had the experience of listening to someone recall people and places as you pass …
2024-10-02 When we first began our garden in 2020, we intended it not only as a collection of pretty flowers …
2024-09-28 We’re finished with the floors for today. Now I’m sitting here in this upset of furniture waiting on …
2024-09-28 Two rooms ready for sanding. Both have a rectangular section in the middle with an older finish. …
2024-09-28 You never know what you’ll find when you pull up the carpet on a 114 year old house. Someone covered …
2024-09-28 We’re pulling out the carpet in the front half of the house today. In every project Rachel and I …
2024-09-27 Rachel is repainting the front half of our house. All the books (plus some records and CDs) had to …
2024-09-26 The Given Life, part 1
2024-09-25 We are five days from “pencils down” on the audit. It’s been a tough one. No …
2024-09-24 I won’t pretend that I have a sophisticated understanding of AI or a nuanced idea of where and …
2024-09-22 Righteousness is a hell of a drug.
2024-09-19 Tomorrow Rachel and I will have a slightly early equinox celebration. The persimmons I’ve been …
2024-09-19 Look at the beautiful color of that persimmon pulp
2024-09-19 It’s persimmon season here in southern Indiana! The persimmons we have here (diospyros virginiana) …
2024-09-19 Ray Bradbury’s story of meeting Mr. Electrico is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.
2024-09-16 Disincentivize information warfare.
2024-09-13 The thing about Rachel is, she doesn’t take long to decide on something—and then once the decision …
2024-09-11 Charles Eisenstein: It may seem, from the infant’s point of view, that he’s achieving …
2024-09-10 I saw a hawk pin down then carry off a pigeon in the garden today. A few days ago I saw a hawk …
2024-09-09 Really interesting presentation this evening at the Lawrence County Museum about the history of …
2024-09-09 Content warning: paganism I’ll be linking to this post (partly jokingly, partly seriously) …
2024-09-09 The Old Farmers Almanac says that late summer drought conditions can lead to an early shutdown of …
2024-09-07 I’d like to find out more about this Divine Glory brand sandpaper I pulled off this old belt sander …
2024-09-07 Dahlia with bees plus Pete, one of the neighborhood cats who sometimes stops by to look over our …
2024-09-07 Showy sunflowers
2024-09-05 For a few years now, our two cats have had nice high spots to get away from it all. From the chair …
2024-09-04 “We have the wrong type of undead culture.” No ghosts; only zombies. Good post from Paul Watson.
2024-09-04 John Michael Greer, A World Full of Gods: An Inquiry into Polytheism: Much of polytheist theology …
2024-09-03 My friend and neighbor has a new book out today from Ancient Faith: Holy Fools: The Lives of Twenty …
2024-09-02 Sierra Ferrell’s harmony on this song takes me straight back to childhood in Trinity Pentecost …
2024-09-01 We just watched “Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre” (1996) and it was very good. I read the novel many …
2024-08-31 Two things about this: One of the smoothest key changes I’ve ever heard. Canst thou shred on a …
2024-08-30 I’ve thought about this video shared by Denny several times over the past couple of days. Our …
2024-08-30 Josh Radnor: The most trustworthy people in the world are those who have been to the underworld. …
2024-08-25 As of yesterday, I finished my two big summer projects: refinish my in-laws’ dining set and build a …
2024-08-24 A few months ago, a very generous friend decided to give me some of his grandfather’s tools: a bench …
2024-08-24 Hanging cayennes are so pretty. And that’s red switchgrass to the left.
2024-08-24 I like the “On this Day” feature here at micro.blog. Today it brought up a thought experiment about …
2024-08-23 People ought to be warned about middle age. My daughter is 18 and needs help dealing with …
2024-08-23 That’s some big tomatoes! They’re an heirloom variety; unfortunately the person we got them from …
2024-08-21 My newsletter subscriptions are shifting in the right direction: less cultural criticism, more …
2024-08-19 Picked up an unusual (to me), older nativity set today. The images are decals/stickers, not painted. …
2024-08-18 Entrance to the back yard. Watch out for hanging cucumbers!
2024-08-16 Bad news: I got a minor cut from one of my chisels. Good news: I’ve successfully put a sharp …
2024-08-16 Today is Darcy’s first day on her new job at Bath and Body Works. It’s a new chapter for …
2024-08-13 In episode 17 of the M&T podcast, Joshua mentions his influences and it’s all the usual …
2024-08-13 As with all opinions that don’t matter, I hold firmly to the idea that the Midwest consists of …
2024-08-12 Rachel and I are now lifetime members of our county’s historical society. This is not step one of my …
2024-08-12 We’re shifting to late summer and that means the buzzing drone of annual cicadas. Nothing …
2024-08-12 Over the weekend, Rachel harvested 3.5 pounds of Concord grapes and made jelly! I’m having some on …
2024-08-11 Easily my favorite, most used flea market tool is a Klein folding rule. Sturdy, compact, and better …
2024-08-10 Sometimes I go looking for Rachel in the backyard and can’t find her because of the density of the …
2024-08-09 I was glad to read this bit from Bill McKibben in his tribute to Wendell Berry: I’m lucky that I …
2024-08-07 William Stringfellow’s discussion of the Powers in An Ethic for Christians and Other Aliens in a …
2024-08-05 Happy 90th birthday, Wendell Berry!
2024-08-03 Have you seen these integrated LED light fixtures? “No bulbs to replace”—which means when the bulb …
2024-08-02 New song from Nick Shoulders: “Apocalypse Never.” Cling to joy, don’t let it die Like …
2024-08-01 As Andrew Belfield said yesterday: Well, between “friend” & Google’s Olympics ad, it’s been a …
2024-07-30 More on the signs of the reversal of technological progress: it’s interesting that Goia frames …
2024-07-30 I’m kinda glad I’m not a subscriber and can only see about a quarter of the 52 reasons …
2024-07-30 Lord of the Rings has obviously had a huge impact on me. I’ve mentioned before how the Litany …
2024-07-29 In other gardening news–to balance things out–the squirrels have absolutely demolished …
2024-07-29 Check out these Concord grapes! They’re still a touch sour but they’re almost ready.
2024-07-26 We found the graves of the first owners’ of our home today. We put some flowers from our …
2024-07-25 I read through the abstract for our house this evening and worked out the history of ownership. The …
2024-07-25 Two unlikely dreams re: the Bedford pie safe: Acquire one of the 16-20 known to exist and preserve …
2024-07-25 I found out this week that my hometown has a unique piece of furniture: the Bedford pie safe. It is …
2024-07-24 Pickled some banana peppers tonight. Should be about a week until they’re ready to eat.
2024-07-22 I visited Corydon—Indiana’s original state capital—for the first time on Friday. It was the capital …
2024-07-20 On a solo drive through southern Indiana today. First stops: the Medora brick factory and the Medora …
2024-07-19 Work has begun on my next project: building a cabinet for a friend. It’s in trade for some of his …
2024-07-17 I have a couple of friends who refuse to shop at Walmart because the Walton family have funded …
2024-07-16 Before and after on the table and chairs refinishing project for my in-laws. I have one chair (not …
2024-07-15 I mentioned recently that this apocalyptic humidity is wreaking havoc on the finish on the table and …
2024-07-13 Like Ray Charles’ “Night time is the right time,” Waylon Jennings’ “Amanda” is a song made by its …
2024-07-13 Paper ephemera in my copy of this Forster essay collection. Any ideas what 76/mvt means?
2024-07-12 I’m feeling the itch to go on another southern Indiana day-long road trip. Some previous …
2024-07-12 I note with some disappointment that a few new businesses in my town are called Star City [etc]. …
2024-07-12 This humidity we’re having. My in-laws want a polyurethane finish on their table and chairs. When I …
2024-07-11 The Adam and Eve story has always been a fruitful (heh) one for me. Two times I reflected on it: …
2024-07-11 I’m nearing the end of the table and chairs restoration project for my in-laws. It’s taking me a …
2024-07-09 Robin Wall Kimmerer: People often ask me what one thing I would recommend to restore relationship …
2024-07-09 Jon Stewart on why “get on board or shut the f* up” is not exactly a pro-democracy rallying cry.
2024-07-08 As if I wasn’t already behind on my projects, I picked up a chair today for $5. I don’t know …
2024-07-07 Steve Robinson on the death of his father. I know what this kind of conflicted memory is like. I’m …
2024-07-05 For as long as I can remember, my heroes have almost always been old men. Maybe because my first …
2024-07-05 From American Peasant, a new book by Christopher Schwarz: So then, what does the craft [of …
2024-07-04 First tadpoles we’ve seen in the pond this year!
2024-07-04 It’s always sad and yet predictable when small towns and nonprofits are victims of fraud. And it’s …
2024-07-03 Tom Johnson’s repair of this table leg is a joy to watch.
2024-07-03 Rhyd Wildermuth: A garden is a gathering of spirits, of old friends and new, of allies and …
2024-07-03 Old Farmers Almanac: The exact dates of the Dog Days can vary from source to source, and because …
2024-07-02 Darcy brought me two prayer cards from the Pisa Cathedral. One is for “Madonna di sotto gli …
2024-07-02 Darcy is home and we’re all very thankful. The Abels are not a traveling people. Rachel and I …
2024-06-28 Now having contributed–perhaps unwisely–to election talk, I return to ignoring politics …
2024-06-28 This, from over a year ago, still pretty much summarizes my outlook on the election. We’re …
2024-06-27 Sad coal mining song from Kathy Mattea. Of course it’s sad. There aren’t any happy coal mining …
2024-06-27 Good morning.
2024-06-26 This morning I read the chapter “A Mother’s Work” in Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass. In …
2024-06-25 This term—from blogging’s heyday—popped into my head this morning. Anyone else remember this?
2024-06-23 Went to my favorite junk store and spent a total of $11 for a Winchester and a Blue Grass brace bit …
2024-06-20 We sent Darcy off to Europe for 12 days this morning. (Spain then south of France then Italy.) That …
2024-06-18 Charles Brooks takes photographs of the interior of various instruments and the results are amazing. …
2024-06-17 A more elegant way of saying what I was trying to say yesterday. Robin Wall Kimmerer: When …
2024-06-16 Adam Kotsko: Simply put, the way we were taught the market for consumer goods is supposed to work …
2024-06-15 Communist Manifesto: Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all …
2024-06-15 Everybody makes fun of “prepper Jeremy” until the water main breaks. Now I’m sitting here having my …
2024-06-14 This 1975 documentary about a Kentuckian chairmaker is worth watching.
2024-06-13 How about some garden pictures? Kitchen garden (other vegetables and herbs are spread throughout our …
2024-06-12 Robin Wall Kimmerer: The animacy of the world is something we already know, but the language of …
2024-06-12 Thomas Berry: “the universe is a communion of subjects rather than a collection of objects.” (Via …
2024-06-10 I’ve just sent a chair restoration question to Tom Johnson of Thomas Johnson Antique Furniture …
2024-06-08 I got a bit aggressive while sanding off the old finish and it introduced a waviness to one side of …
2024-06-07 There are several sparrows dustbathing among the flowers and sitting in the shade of the grape arbor …
2024-06-06 I updated my Sanity Project page. This page is the story of our garden, from 2020 onward. Today I …
2024-06-06 I had forgotten about the Twitter house style until I recently followed some folks on Mastodon via …
2024-06-05 Isn’t this some beautiful kale and chard?
2024-06-03 I really like this working definition of enchantment from R.G. Miga: Enchantment is the process of …
2024-06-02 The opening line of “Carmel Point” by Robinson Jeffers has been on my mind recently: “The …
2024-06-02 I find myself in the strange situation that if I want to have any idea of what is going on with my …
2024-06-01 I did finally get the finish right on the leaf and now I’m stripping the table itself. I know it’s …
2024-06-01 On a human scale, nationalism is no better than globalism.
2024-05-31 I’ve been pretty okay with this whole high school graduation thing but then Rachel sent me this pair …
2024-05-31 I’m planning a post on my pet theory about the origins of the religious tradition in which I …
2024-05-31 My lovely wife Rachel made a video of our garden this morning. (Yours truly is the cameraman.) I …
2024-05-30 This, from Freddie deBoer (via @ayjay), is true. I picked up the opinions habit early on because I …
2024-05-28 The pileated woodpecker seems to be a regular at our feeders now. She has a distinctive, sharp call …
2024-05-27 Rachel’s dad was cleaning out his garage and offered me this rickety workbench. I took it home and …
2024-05-25 The honeybees are loving the lavender right now.
2024-05-24 Another good one from Cory Doctorow: Red Lobster was killed by private equity, not Endless Shrimp
2024-05-24 We have a gooseberry!
2024-05-23 Today was launch day for an endowment management system that a group of us have been working on for …
2024-05-23 It’s been a frustrating few days trying to get the finish right on this leaf of my in-laws’ …
2024-05-23 A clarification on what I posted earlier: I am not saying that everyone is right about the object of …
2024-05-23 The stakes are too high for everything now. This is a direct consequence of centralization, …
2024-05-22 Adam Savage’s lathe display (source)
2024-05-21 Rachel just harvested this huge pile of lettuce from one end of our raised beds and it didn’t even …
2024-05-20 It all started with a post from Alan Jacobs about that Apple ad, which pointed me to this post by …
2024-05-19 Recently my in-laws asked me to refinish their dining room table and chairs. They’ve brought it over …
2024-05-19 Starlings…sheesh. Not only are they: An invasive species whose introduction can be blamed on …
2024-05-18 Cory Doctorow: “AIs and self-driving cars are the new jetpacks” I don’t know if this will prove to …
2024-05-17 Pileated woodpecker at the feeder on our back porch. These are our celebrity sightings.
2024-05-17 Last day of high school for Darcy! It’s a bit sad, of course, but honestly we’re all …
2024-05-16 For a brief time in the spring here in the White River watershed, the redbuds fairly glow with their …
2024-05-15 Rachel and I went out to the nightmarescape that is our backyard in the dark after the rain. Slugs …
2024-05-14 A crow has showed up in our backyard a few times now to eat seed. We’re that much closer to …
2024-05-14 “How Jung and Tolkien Tapped into the Collective Unconscious”
2024-05-13 One of my finds from my Friday drive was a Stanley no. 80 cabinet scraper. $15, which I thought was …
2024-05-13 Wonderful, ten minute documentary about the Zuni Map Project—an art project to “depict the …
2024-05-12 I made a frame for a scanned copy of the Civil War letter from an ancestor.
2024-05-10 I’m on the road today—driving from Salem to Paoli to French Lick to Loogootee, looking for old tools …
2024-05-10 Beautiful lavender. Also, the grapes are doing something new! Turns out they’re flowering. What I …
2024-05-09 OFA on how to garden vertically. Because of our limited space, we’re trying to do more of …
2024-05-08 Phil Ford: Pleasure and pain, love and death, exist in an unresolved and irresolvable tension with …
2024-05-08 Rhyd Wildermuth: The longer the litanies of crises grow, the more favorable the winds become to …
2024-05-07 Columbine flowers, red and yellow atop long, thin stems: spring lanterns.
2024-05-07 Wow! Testimony of Paul Robeson before HUAC in 1956. Audio is a reenactment by James Earl Jones but …
2024-05-07 Matthew Crawford, on “eyesore” yards (yards containing scrap or spare parts): Nobody wants to live …
2024-05-07 Cardinal points of my politics: The nonhuman world is beautiful, fearsome, and faithful. It is …
2024-05-06 I am one-tenth of the way through Why We Drive by Matthew Crawford and—as expected—I have so many …
2024-05-05 A good weekend for cheap, reused stuff: I came across a thrift/junk store (location: secret) with a …
2024-05-05 Sugar snap peas, sweet alyssum, lettuces. We started planting sweet alyssum because it is a good …
2024-05-04 Darcy’s senior prom is tonight.
2024-05-03 R.G. Miga, on the current crisis sparked by both an overabundance of information and a lack of trust …
2024-05-03 A couple of cops had a car stopped in front of our house last night around 2am. Probably a drug …
2024-05-01 Paul Sellers: Soon I will be well again. I’m a patient man because I was trained to that end. …
2024-05-01 It’s May Day and you know what that means around here, don’t you? Watching Wicker Man! …
2024-05-01 Rachel and I have been complaining about these “whole body deodorant” commercials (which of course …
2024-04-30 Finished reading Sourdough and The Suitcase Clone by Robin Sloan. I liked Sourdough even more than …
2024-04-29 Letter from C.G. Jung: Dear Frau V., Your questions are unanswerable because you want to know how …
2024-04-29 Charles Eisenstein: It may seem, from the infant’s point of view, that he’s achieving …
2024-04-29 I don’t subscribe to that many newsletters/substacks/etc. but it’s clearly too many, …
2024-04-29 I mentioned over the weekend that a tree frog has been hanging out at our pond, calling late into …
2024-04-27 There’s a frog at our pond and he’s talking to some neighbors. I think it’s a gray tree frog. Here’s …
2024-04-27 At the pond store in Monrovia. A person is saying their bullfrogs have disappeared and they suspect …
2024-04-26 A couple of days ago I posted about the idea of a “Speaker for the Squirrels” and got …
2024-04-25 Garden fairy
2024-04-25 Could these actually be tiny, tiny grapes? This is very exciting.
2024-04-25 Emphatically agree with this article. And I do not say that as someone who cannot manage technology; …
2024-04-25 We were meant to be inspired when Business Leader said his rule was, “better than yesterday, not as …
2024-04-22 I was looking for the “always convalescent from some small illness” quotation a few days …
2024-04-22 Related to this: I’ve always loved the phrase “speaker for the dead,” though …
2024-04-22 There seems to be a natural affinity between animism and anarchism. Animism sees people everywhere. …
2024-04-21 Lovely video from Pete Larson on the rhythms of life.
2024-04-21 Rode down the Milwaukee Trail and came across several patches of stunning fire pinks growing out of …
2024-04-21 Don’t yuk someone else’s yum. Patrick Rhone …
2024-04-20 Went to the Spring Farm Day at Grass Corp. They seem like the real deal—a family farm, raising …
2024-04-20 Remember last week when I refinished a table my in-laws gave me? Well they liked it enough that …
2024-04-19 There are far worse ways to spend an hour of your day than picking four cups worth of lilac flowers. …
2024-04-19 Rachel got this video of our first hatchlings of the year. We have a row of four bird houses on the …
2024-04-19 Very useful distinction from Alan Jacobs: The goal of libertarianism is to increase individual …
2024-04-19 Replace Bradford pears with dogwoods. Now that’s a campaign idea we can all believe in.
2024-04-18 New video: April 2024 in the garden
2024-04-18 Finished reading Mr Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookshop and Ajax Penumbra 1969, both by Robin Sloan. I’ve …
2024-04-16 Our lilac bush is blooming and the scent makes me so happy. You can smell it all around the house. …
2024-04-14 Apropos of nothing, I’m thinking this morning about how a series of ironclad mutual defense …
2024-04-13 My in-laws are preparing for retirement and so are paring down their possessions. They gave us this …
2024-04-12 It is always better to pray for peace than for the defeat of your enemies because there is no …
2024-04-11 I know…it’s a TED talk. But trust me, this one is good: “Let your garden grow wild.” Relatedly, this …
2024-04-10 Tom Shippey’s marvelous exposition of Tolkien’s Ringwraiths.
2024-04-09 My employer says they will be celebrating National Deskfast Day this Friday by supplying coffee and …
2024-04-09 Beautiful, short film about 85 year old Helen Dew: For Helen, a key element in building personal …
2024-04-09 A quick video of the moment the eclipse happened at our house. You can hear some of the neighbors …
2024-04-08 Lots of people out walking and riding bikes. Beautiful day. Feels like a less hot July Fourth. We …
2024-04-08 The head of Indiana’s DNR (who is also my neighbor) says all campgrounds and state park lodges …
2024-04-08 Remember the weird post in the woods near my house? Well there’s a new development. Now …
2024-04-07 The treetop of Damocles
2024-04-07 Came across a guy in the woods walking his pit bull. “Out looking for mushrooms?”, he asks. “A …
2024-04-06 So there’s an eclipse coming, if you haven’t heard. We’re in the path of totality. In fact, we’re at …
2024-04-06 I built a serving tray out of a gate I found alongside the road a few weeks ago. Plenty of flaws, …
2024-04-06 We’re regularly getting woodpeckers at our feeders now. And a few days ago I saw an eastern …
2024-04-04 I received issue 16 of Mortise and Tenon Magazine today—my first one. It is, as I expected, a …
2024-04-02 I’ve been listening to the really excellent episode 108 of the Weird Studies podcast, on skepticism …
2024-04-02 Nearly every time someone mentions Eclipse Day (which I always imagine with capital letters), I …
2024-03-29 In episode 103 of the Weird Studies podcast, J.F. and Phil consider the Tower card of the Tarot. As …
2024-03-29 Can you believe that Rachel used to say she had a black thumb?
2024-03-28 Lower Cascades Park. Bloomington, IN.
2024-03-26 New staff member started yesterday. I think he’s going to be great. You know what’s not great? The …
2024-03-24 Pete Larson: “Why I Farm.” This is different from Pete’s usual videos, which are typically …
2024-03-24 Door is done! Now everything around it needs new paint.
2024-03-22 Two things that prompted the memory of quitting social media I just posted: Reading Nobody is …
2024-03-22 The clearest and most disturbing realization I had after quitting Big Tech/algorithmic social media …
2024-03-20 New video: Screen door, before painting.
2024-03-20 I published my blogroll as a page using Manton’s plugin.
2024-03-20 World Central Kitchen: During this sacred month of Ramadan, World Central Kitchen is working to …
2024-03-19 I have a new staff member starting next Monday. I’m excited to have him join, not least …
2024-03-18 Good post from DC: our energy “needs” are skyrocketing due to the demands of cloud …
2024-03-18 EFF: “Congress Should Give Up on Unconstitutional TikTok Bans.” This bit is particularly …
2024-03-16 I’m hoping to finish the screen door today. This morning I’ve been planing it to size. Maybe I’m …
2024-03-16 One of the highlights of early spring for me is seeing the Italian coast while watching the …
2024-03-15 David Graeber, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology: against policy (a tiny manifesto): The …
2024-03-14 If you ever take a notion to listen to some cowboy music, Don Edwards' album Saddle Songs is worth …
2024-03-14 OFA has an article on what to add to your soil in the spring. Here’s what we do. Three of our …
2024-03-13 I seem to have found myself in a terminological drift. Green Man’s Grotto originally referred to the …
2024-03-13 New video: March 2024 in the Grotto. Two videos in one day! Will he keep up this breakneck pace? …
2024-03-13 New video: Nessie lives!. Wherein our killer bullfrog appears for the first time this season.
2024-03-13 Rhyd Wildermuth has just published an excellent article on degrowth (paywalled). Put as simply as …
2024-03-12 Trillium on a moss-covered rock
2024-03-12 First spring ephemeral I’ve spotted in Murray Forest this year: cut-leaved toothwort
2024-03-12 Worth reading: “The IKEA Humans” by Samuel Biagetti Jennifer and Jason are drawn to …
2024-03-11 Peter Larson, A Year and a Day on Just a Few Acres: Every place on the Earth has its own, unique …
2024-03-11 Worth reading: “Here lies the internet, murdered by generative AI” by Erik Hoel Dougald …
2024-03-10 No one is more surprised than me that the screen door I’m building is square and the half-lap joints …
2024-03-09 Still the funniest video on the internet. Rachel and I think of this every few months and laugh …
2024-03-09 Two great ideas from the “In Defense of Maintenance” episode of the Mortise and Tenon podcast: …
2024-03-08 I’m looking forward to this book: Land Healing: Physical, Metaphysical, and Ritual Approaches …
2024-03-07 Rex Krueger says “don’t measure”—and I’m trying to live by that as I build a new screen door for our …
2024-03-06 My grandpa’s license plate. My dad’s tool box. He added the State Farm sticker; I added the Mortise …
2024-03-02 Lost Art Press is having a sale on their book Anarchist’s Tool Chest. Also, they have a great FAQ on …
2024-03-02 The Luddite comic I posted a few days ago mentioned a couple of movements I hadn’t heard of before …
2024-03-01 New use for chatbots: having it rewrite a blunt statement into a more professionally acceptable …
2024-03-01 Pretty colors across the street this morning.
2024-02-29 Elizabeth Oldfield: I want to be a conscientious objector to the culture wars. I want to hold fast …
2024-02-28 This is so good. “Welcome to the future. Sabotage it.” Jeremy …
2024-02-27 Despite an unusually warm February, there doesn’t seem to be any early wildflowers in the woods so …
2024-02-27 Ted Goia has a good follow-up post on his dopamine culture piece. In the follow-up, he focuses on …
2024-02-25 Two more things from the show last night: They opened with “The World Can Wait.” Linford said the …
2024-02-25 The Over the Rhine show last night was…well, they seem to get better with each passing year. The …
2024-02-24 Hanging out at the record store before the Over the Rhine show. I’m thankful to have such a great …
2024-02-24 I have a very special sweetgum tree in my yard. I’ll tell you the story sometime. But it does …
2024-02-24 Finished reading A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers. The best thing about this book was …
2024-02-22 Speaking of zines, here’s a good post from Jay Springett on the subject.
2024-02-22 First pro bike race of the spring Cobbled Classics, Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, in 48 hours! I will be …
2024-02-21 So whaddya say, folks, should we just start sending zines to each other through the mail? (via …
2024-02-20 Song in my head today: Marty Robbins, “Bouquet of Roses”
2024-02-20 Really illuminating post by James Shelley (via @patrickrhone): Whether papyrus or the internet, …
2024-02-19 I’ve lived in different areas of Lawrence County for my entire life–but everything …
2024-02-18 Ted Goia’s “The State of the Culture, 2024” is grim but necessary reading—and it contains the image …
2024-02-17 I always look forward to the spring ephemerals.
2024-02-16 We’re expecting a bit of snow today but OFA says it’ll be an early spring. …
2024-02-16 A friend and I were talking last year about our mutual need to over-intellectualize everything we …
2024-02-14 After our mishap last weekend, we got the new part in today and now we have a working stove.
2024-02-14 New video: Green Man’s Grotto, February 2024. A tour of our backyard garden at its worst, with a few …
2024-02-13 Adam Kotsko, “The Information Environment: Toward a Deeper Enshittification Thesis”: The near-total …
2024-02-12 New video: DIY gone wrong
2024-02-11 This morning I’ll be preparing the final tax returns for the beard products business I co-own …
2024-02-09 Is there any way to get the “new post” page on the web interface to remember (instead of …
2024-02-09 This is a great piece on Eminem’s boxes of rhyming notes. Via Austin Kleon’s Friday …
2024-02-09 Woodland crocus is always the first flower in our yard—and this year it’s even earlier. According to …
2024-02-08 This from Rebecca Solnit (via @sod) feels like a dispatch from a foreign war correspondent. “Do …
2024-02-07 Interviewing candidates today for a newly created financial analyst position. I’m comfortable …
2024-02-06 Well, other projects have been put on hold since our screen door has gone from “let’s fix that this …
2024-02-06 Video: Reading “The Beauty of Things” by Robinson Jeffers Yes, I opened an account with Evil Empire. …
2024-02-06 Anyone know of a way to see a list of posts that haven’t been categorized? Ideally, within the …
2024-02-05 Why I will not be compelled to speak publicly about [insert atrocity here]
2024-02-04 I’ve taken a notion to post occasional videos. Hikes, gardening, woodworking projects, …
2024-02-04 I was delighted to be reminded of Malcolm Guite this morning when I came across his YouTube channel. …
2024-02-03 Sometimes the world is terrible—but sometimes I just need a nap.
2024-02-02 Around here, Candlemas means crêpes by candlelight (even if it is the middle of the day).
2024-02-02 We (mostly Rachel!) made a decent dent in this weekend’s project. It’ll take at least one more round …
2024-02-02 So one of our projects is to rip out (almost) all of the landscaping on the south side of the house …
2024-02-01 Video of Bronson Cave, Spring Mill State Park
2024-02-01 Prayer after Eating Wendell Berry I have taken in the light that quickened eye and leaf. May my …
2024-02-01 I love this Imbolc essay from Rhyd Wildermuth.
2024-01-31 It’s 7pm and that has come to mean one thing at the Abel house this winter: it’s time for tea and …
2024-01-31 Gardening is afoot! Rachel is planting sweet peas and prepping some other indoor containers for seed …
2024-01-30 At the moment, my plan is to continue reading Wendell Berry’s fiction until I’ve read it …
2024-01-29 Not only is memorizing Dune’s “Litany Against Fear” during childhood not silly, I commend it as a …
2024-01-29 Any ideas what this might be?
2024-01-28 John Halstead’s post “Re-placing Ourselves” contains that blend of an animist worldview with Wendell …
2024-01-27 Either I’ve gotten trapped in a “woodworking + Maine” algorithm or there seems to be a high per …
2024-01-27 Eighteen years!
2024-01-26 Technology is a program of control. Within certain limits, this is good & necessary. Outside …
2024-01-26 Poor Darcy is spending her last day as a minor on the couch sick. Likely won’t be much better …
2024-01-24 The east fork of the White River has a lot of fog and ice this morning.
2024-01-24 A company offers free access to the Headspace meditation app, yoga classes, blood pressure monitors, …
2024-01-23 I like Ted Gioia’s seven heretical questions about progress. But, being the animist, …
2024-01-23 We’re in the “path of totality” for the solar eclipse on April 8. I found out this …
2024-01-20 I slip into sleep naming gratitudes: A litany against fear. Night-voices may wake and shake me, But …
2024-01-20 Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter (p158): Sometimes, a haunted old woman, I wander about in this house …
2024-01-19 Snow day at the Abel house! Green Man’s Grotto is chilly.
2024-01-18 Is there a mechanical need for motorcycles to be revved or are these men who feel like their voices …
2024-01-17 “Why return-to-office mandates fail” Remote work can be productive if managers are willing to adapt. …
2024-01-16 So, my daughter has an interest in doing some volunteer work before college–both in order to …
2024-01-16 Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter: There can be places in this world, and in human hearts too, that are …
2024-01-15 Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter: The living can’t quit living because the world has turned terrible …
2024-01-15 Our little pond is mostly frozen now, except where a little water flows. I wonder if Nessie is still …
2024-01-14 Wendell Berry reads “The Contrariness of the Mad Farmer”
2024-01-14 Finished reading Nathan Coulter by Wendell Berry. 📚 This was his first novel but my edition is the …
2024-01-14 I’m disappointed that it’s too cold to be in my garage working on my weekend project but I’m going …
2024-01-11 I have my weekend project: a router sled. Attempting to surface my low bench with a hand plane …
2024-01-11 In the barber shop today, the person before me and the person after me were having their mullets cut …
2024-01-10 Well worth reading: “Dancing in the Theatre of my Enslavement: Reflections on turning forty as …
2024-01-10 I’m going to have to make this pine needle soda. Easy and, according to Old Farmers Almanac, …
2024-01-09 The big winter storm is moving through our neck of the woods and the result is mostly relentless …
2024-01-08 There aren’t many videos on the Daoist Foundation’s YouTube channel but I was impressed by the one I …
2024-01-07 Woodworking notes 1/7/2024
2024-01-03 Happy 132nd birthday, J.R.R. Tolkien!
2024-01-02 My wired headphones went through the washer AND dryer and still work. And even if they didn’t I’d …
2024-01-02 Catching up on @dwalbert’s “Road to Jockey’s Ridge” this morning. Loved this …
2024-01-02 Skillful use of music in movies can heighten the mood to such an intense degree. Aren’t you …
2024-01-01 I made a New Year’s lucky lunch of sausage and sauerkraut and black eyed peas. I got choked on it. …
2023-12-31 Some day trips I want to make in 2024: Prophetstown state park in Lafayette Turkey Run and Clifty …
2023-12-31 For various reasons, I didn’t spend as much time in the woods as I would have wished in 2023. I hope …
2023-12-31 The second trimming of the tree. For the next few days the tree will be another food source for the …
2023-12-30 It is said that God is able to witness the multi-faceted suffering of the world, hear the prayers of …
2023-12-30 Has anyone read Human Scale by Kirkpatrick Sale? I had a nice copy of that book that I acquired from …
2023-12-30 I love Tom Johnson’s antique restoration channel. This video is one of my favorites because of his …
2023-12-28 There is a certain expectation—picked up from the tourism industry, perhaps—that the ideal place the …
2023-12-28 I never tire of opening a new bar of Dr Bronner’s hippie soap and seeing “All-One!” stamped across …
2023-12-24 My first attempt at a Black Forest cake won’t win me a spot on the Great British Baking Show—but …
2023-12-23 Today’s task: Black Forest cake for Christmas lunch. None of the elements seem particularly …
2023-12-21 Happy Solstice, everyone! The Winter Solstice has always been my favorite of the Quarter Days. I was …
2023-12-20 The times in which we live are almost enough to make me into a Gnostic. The stupidity on display …
2023-12-20 Wendell Berry, “It All Turns on Affection”: For humans to have a responsible relationship to the …
2023-12-19 In this house we say Happy Holidays because even though we celebrate Honda Days, others may …
2023-12-15 It probably says something about me that this is one of my favorite Aesop Rock songs.
2023-12-15 In a recent continuing education course on AI, the speaker said, “No one will lose their jobs to AI, …
2023-12-15 Just received a shipment of coffee that a neighbor recommended to me.
2023-12-14 An appropriate reading when you’re coming down with some kind of sickness: It isn’t hard to …
2023-12-13 Some of us have been saying to upset Christians for years that “Happy Holidays” does not …
2023-12-08 Amazing story (via @ayjay) on newly discovered ways that redwoods survive fire. We went on …
2023-12-07 Thank God for “thought leaders” who help us “pre-solve” problems.
2023-12-05 Matt Cardin: For much of my life, I read books and other things in a frankly desperate, craving …
2023-12-04 The holiday party at work did not go my way…
2023-12-03 Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is Polar Express but with Nazis
2023-11-30 Wendell Berry, “Renewing Husbandry”: I remember well a summer morning in about 1950 when my father …
2023-11-29 Finished reading Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry. Beautiful and heart-breaking. I think I’ll keep …
2023-11-27 Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow (p248): All I can answer is that I did love her all her life—from the …
2023-11-24 I’ve been an admirer of Wendell Berry for over twenty years now—but, weirdly, I’ve only ever read …
2023-11-23 We often hear about child development, less so about adult development. There does seem to be an …
2023-11-22 I readily admit that I know only a little more than nothing about classical music. A few years ago, …
2023-11-20 So the lesson from this weekend’s hullabaloo at OpenAI appears to be that not even the board of …
2023-11-20 Daniel Immerwahr, via @tinyroofnail: If small, rugged farms have not filled the countryside, what …
2023-11-20 If there’s a new Romanticism on the horizon, I’m here for it.
2023-11-17 There’s a tiny town an hour or so away called Pumpkin Center—universally pronounced “Punkin Center.” …
2023-11-17 Alan Jacobs makes a good response to Freddie deBoer’s assertion that people believe in religions …
2023-11-16 The number of books I’ve read has dropped over the last couple of years because I no longer …
2023-11-12 Finished reading When the Body Says No: Exploring the Stress-Disease Connection by Gabor Maté. Fewer …
2023-11-11 I made Indian Pudding and whipped cream. (Not exactly the most accurate or sensitive name for it.) …
2023-11-11 Finished reading Owning Your Own Shadow by Robert A. Johnson. Great, short introduction to the …
2023-11-10 New Aesop Rock album release day is a good day.
2023-11-09 Thankfully most of my CPA continuing education can be done via webinar—but today’s is on the north …
2023-11-02 James Hillman, “The Poetic Basis of Mind”: Because symptoms lead to soul, the cure of symptoms may …
2023-10-31 It was a great time tonight, despite the unseasonably cold weather. (36F!) Every year we have …
2023-10-31 Happy Halloween!
2023-10-31 Appropriately enough for the opening of Allhallowtide, the print shop finished the scan of an 1864 …
2023-10-29 I repeated a previous design this year. The star eye is a little lopsided so I’ve decided that’s him …
2023-10-29 The saddest mummy/archaeologist love story you’ve ever heard. 🎵
2023-10-29 Planning to carve a pumpkin today, so I’ve been looking at some of the ones I’ve done over the …
2023-10-26 I did some grave visitation today ahead of Allhallowtide. I’ll be busy on the actual days and I have …
2023-10-25 Speak softly and carry a big stick. (I cut a limb from a recent oak fall and now I’m lugging it back …
2023-10-24 A few days ago a friend sent me this interview with Robert Sapolsky on free will. It was well-timed. …
2023-10-20 Alan Jacobs: If you’re reading the news several times a day, you’re not being informed, you’re …
2023-10-19 It appears that the president will be making a case for more war funding tonight. Remember: he may …
2023-10-19 So I’ve been using Kagi for search and I like it. Unfortunately you can’t make it your default …
2023-10-18 Hopefully I’ll get back to the “These Weird Times” series at some point soon. When …
2023-10-16 Many thanks to @johnbrady for calling this to my attention in a comment on my earlier post …
2023-10-16 Once you decide that you are on the side of life, you suddenly have a lot more clarity about thorny …
2023-10-14 I built a candlestick out of a limb that fell from our sweetgum tree in the front yard. The base is …
2023-10-11 Watched Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise. We used to spend a lot of time doing nothing in the …
2023-10-10 U-pick, I pick, we all pick pumpkins. We’ve been doing this ever since Darcy was a baby. We’re not …
2023-10-08 I believe these are red oak acorns. Whether they are or not, I’m processing them using these old …
2023-10-06 Currently reading Gabor Maté’s book When the Body Says No: Exploring The Stress-Disease …
2023-10-04 Started using Kagi as my search engine after @JohnBrady recommendation and I’m already getting …
2023-10-03 Interesting haul at half price books today
2023-10-03 My local writing group’s prompt this month was to write about a dream. It’s a …
2023-10-03 History may move in cycles–but this moment in time feels like a stuck record.
2023-10-02 Alan Jacobs: Wherever power is, the corrupt will be drawn to it by an irresistible magnetic force. …
2023-09-29 So Blood in the Machine starts with an epigraph from Run the Jewels? Dude, I’ve already bought the …
2023-09-26 Cory Doctorow reviews Blood in the Machine, a forthcoming history of the Luddites. I’ve had it …
2023-09-25 Rachel made persimmon drop cookies!
2023-09-24 Indiana persimmon—straight off the ground and warm—an absolute delight.
2023-09-22 Powerful song by Derek Spencer on a real life tragedy in small town Kentucky. This guy deserves more …
2023-09-22 Happy Hobbit Day! Unfortunately I won’t have as much time for celebrating today but I will …
2023-09-21 It’s a Soundgarden Superunknown kind of morning.
2023-09-20 Made it through a thing today that had been giving me anticipatory stress. Also, two days from …
2023-09-17 Following on from the “husbands in cars” memory: Rachel made a good point that our services were …
2023-09-17 A phenomenon I associate with country churches in my childhood: an irreligious husband waiting in …
2023-09-16 “The Weird” versus “weird” {TWT02}
2023-09-15 Aesop Rock has announced a new album and it looks like he’ll be doing some tech critique. The …
2023-09-13 Nine days from the final draft of audited financial statements. Almost there! The bad thing about …
2023-09-12 Folks, Rachel found the bullfrog that lives in our pond eating a bird as big as the frog itself. …
2023-09-11 Last night Rachel and I watched “The Unbinding”, the new documentary from the Newkirks. …
2023-09-10 I saw that today’s photo challenge word was “cycle” just as I settled in here at Taste of Belgium in …
2023-09-07 Cory Doctorow calls tools like ChatGPT “plausible sentence generators.”
2023-09-07 The Mavericks 1994 album “What a Crying Shame” mostly reminds me of Dwight Yoakam, which …
2023-09-07 We have reached that point in the annual audit that I feel like an old-timey telephone switchboard …
2023-09-07 Well look at this: actual newsprint. From Heartwood, a forest protection org. Newsprint, by the way, …
2023-09-07 Added “Sketches of the Goat God in Albion” by Gyrus to my collection of sources on Pan. Excellent …
2023-09-05 Introducing “These Weird Times” {TWT01}
2023-09-04 So here I was listening to Sleep’s “Holy Mountain” while compiling a statement of …
2023-09-04 To be involved in the economy is to be materially implicated in corruption, destruction, and any …
2023-09-02 Erik Davis: Sometime it really pays off to be a perpetual student of religion and the occult. …
2023-08-31 Lovely post from Elizabeth Oldfield on “the ordinary grandeur of the ways we love each …
2023-08-30 My “make things, not content” t-shirt gets a surprising number of compliments. The number of people …
2023-08-29 Two ecosystem services provided by humans: gratitude and awareness.
2023-08-28 Martin Shaw, Bardskull: They say the best way to die is to let go of everything. To lack a centre. …
2023-08-27 Master Hsueh, as quoted in Road to Heaven by Bill Porter: You can learn the basics anywhere. There …
2023-08-26 Taoist and Buddhist shrines in China. Shinto shrines in Japan. Catholic shrines all over Europe. …
2023-08-26 Master Hsieh, as quoted in Road to Heaven by Bill Porter: Lao-tzu said to cultivate tranquillity …
2023-08-24 Weird country track of the day: “Turn on the Dark” by Nick Shoulders. 🎵 (Weird country …
2023-08-24 A thought experiment: Imagine consciousness as a tiny seed of light, and that multitudes of them are …
2023-08-23 Whew, this is good. So much here to think about. I wrote a denunciation of apps. Alan Jacobs …
2023-08-22 Ordered a copy of the I Ching through my local bookstore–and it happened to be the translation …
2023-08-22 Two songs that I discovered as covers and still prefer over the original 🎵 Mavericks, “All that …
2023-08-21 Rachel and I watched the Earthing documentary over the weekend. Basically, it makes the argument for …
2023-08-21 Michael Bogdanffy-kriegh—who is always worth reading!—has a good post today on the impact of some …
2023-08-21 Bill Porter, Road to Heaven (1993): One of the mountains we visited was Tailaoshan just inside the …
2023-08-20 About to do some herbal tea taste testing. Anise hyssop, spearmint, chocolate mint, peppermint, …
2023-08-19 Look, I’m glad people are re-discovering HP Lovecraft but some of us have been living in fear of …
2023-08-17 If you have interest in the film and/or paganism, The Sing-Along-A-Wicker-Man Scrapbook by David …
2023-08-16 View of the Ohio River at Troy, Indiana and the magnificent Christ of the Ohio statue overlooking …
2023-08-16 On the banks of the Wabash. (Near the Atheneum in New Harmony.)
2023-08-15 Another way to support the local bee population: plant enough basil that you can allow some to bloom …
2023-08-15 Another good documentary on New Harmony, produced by Indiana University. This one gives more …
2023-08-14 Good video about the remarkable Robert Owen, textile manufacturer, co-operative socialist, and …
2023-08-13 Grist mill at Spring Mill State Park. It’s our local state park and it’s easy to forget how …
2023-08-13 A friend invited me to take what I wanted from a stack of old records he inherited. Some good stuff, …
2023-08-12 Made a pasta tree for Rachel to dry her homemade pasta.
2023-08-11 Darryl Cherney and Judi Bari with some top notch Earth First! tunes. (In this case, BLM refers to …
2023-08-11 We’ve seen a monarch butterfly several days this week and yesterday spotted a yellow swallowtail …
2023-08-10 Once I get this next big batch of work to the auditors, I think I’ll take a day off. I want to …
2023-08-09 Sitting on my back porch during lunch break, I drifted to sleep while thinking about the back to the …
2023-08-09 Check out all these tiny bees (not sure of species) with their full pollen sacs on this sunflower.
2023-08-09 The Narrow Road to the Deep North: Finally, I sold my house, moving to the cottage of Sampū for a …
2023-08-08 If you’re looking for a plant to attract bees, you might try Joe Pye Weed. It’s not spectacular; …
2023-08-08 Rachel found four monarch caterpillars on the swamp milkweed this morning–and there was much …
2023-08-07 Viktor Frankl: Idealists are the true realists.
2023-08-07 Don’t forget to subscribe to @dwalbert’s substack, where he will be writing about …
2023-08-07 Earlier today, @ReaderJohn posted a link to a Joseph Campbell quote, which was behind a paywall. The …
2023-08-07 Wonderful TV interview with Jung. One bit to point out: both in regards to advice to older people …
2023-08-05 At Breckinridge Cemetery on the north side of Bedford, IN, is a monument to the unidentified Civil …
2023-08-05 Happy birthday, Wendell Berry! Read something of his in honor of the day. Maybe an essay like …
2023-08-04 Anna Havron has a really wise post today on how to function in a crisis. I’m not in a crisis …
2023-08-02 Andy Couturier, The Abundance of Less: “This is the same fire that burned with the blast from …
2023-08-01 I don’t listen to a lot of hip hop but, when I do, it’s usually someone from Rhymesayers. Today, …
2023-08-01 “Haven’t I said enough? Haven’t I said far too much?” 🎵
2023-07-31 I’m thankful that the heat wave seems to have broken. It’s a beautiful morning out there …
2023-07-30 A friend sent me a link to the No Labels organization and asked if I had any thoughts. I replied: …
2023-07-29 Spending the evening at a DIY music festival, listening to a bunch of local folk musicians. The …
2023-07-29 Rachel is already planning for 2024. This will more than fill out the backyard, a.k.a., Green Man’s …
2023-07-28 It’s hot today BUT we’ve seen a hummingbird and a monarch butterfly in the Grotto.
2023-07-28 A good article on working with the Five Remembrances
2023-07-28 Five Remembrances (Thich Nhat Hanh version): I am of the nature to grow old. There is no way to …
2023-07-27 Rachel made a zucchini pie and–you know what?–it’s really good. (Y’all, we …
2023-07-26 There’s a secret government program that has recovered nonhuman “biologics” and is working on …
2023-07-26 There’s been a lot of talk about discovering other users on micro.blog lately, so I’ve …
2023-07-26 Anonymous discord user, speaking the truth: A degree of stillness then a confrontation with the …
2023-07-24 “Children of Ted: Two decades after his last deadly act of ecoterrorism, the Unabomber has become an …
2023-07-24 Come and get it. Inspired by Rhyd Wildermuth: Gardening is only a political act now because of all …
2023-07-24 Walmart’s grocery pickup app now allows you to bring your own reusable bags instead of …
2023-07-23 Good talk by Lyla June, a Diné woman and scholar, presenting the lessons her ancestors have to teach …
2023-07-23 You know what? The pickled kale is fantastic. Crisp and sweet and sour. It would be good on …
2023-07-22 Today: pulling nails on salvaged, century-old 2x4s and listening to Colter Wall’s new album Little …
2023-07-21 The sunflower fully opened today
2023-07-21 My current and upcoming reading pile 📚 What’s in yours?
2023-07-21 Attempting pickled kale, using this recipe. I added two cloves of garlic and a jalapeño. Now it sits …
2023-07-19 There has been some welcome talk here on micro.blog about practical actions people can take to …
2023-07-19 Chai update: after making Chetna’s recipe and finding it lacking in flavor (which could very …
2023-07-18 Black Sabbath playing “War Pigs” live. Still one of the greatest anti-war songs. (That drummer, …
2023-07-18 Rachel got a great video of a bee enjoying one of the zucchini blossoms.
2023-07-18 Penda’s Fen, folks. I never heard of this movie before yesterday and now I can’t get it out of my …
2023-07-17 Neighborhood lions, carved in limestone.
2023-07-15 Make your own toothpaste: 4 tbsp melted coconut oil, 3 tbsp baking soda, 3 tbsp bentonite clay, …
2023-07-14 Pan, an ongoing collection of sources
2023-07-12 I’m more proud of this carrot than I have any right to be
2023-07-12 Touring the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering today. Maybe I’ll get to meet …
2023-07-10 My mom told me about a creepy guy who came to her door and I want to say, “Why are you answering …
2023-07-10 Asha Amemiya, in The Abundance of Less by Andy Couturier: “So, why do you think so many people get …
2023-07-10 Plans for my next woodworking project: Get one of my hand planes in working order Build Rex …
2023-07-10 I love vinyl records too, but you know what’s cheap and plentiful for the person who wants to own …
2023-07-09 Inspired by this video from Rex Krueger, I decided my best way into hand planing would be to go …
2023-07-07 Recording taken by me on the morning of August 8, 2020, at the Canyon Forest Nature Preserve. …
2023-07-07 Anyone have a good chai recipe for a newbie? I tried this one from Chetna of Great British Bake Off …
2023-07-07 Three things that (synchronistically?) fell into my world this week: Atsuko Watanabe, in The …
2023-07-07 Price, our scrawny black cat, somehow got out of the house last Friday. (He’s done this before. He …
2023-07-06 I am very grateful to David Walbert @dwalbert for two posts—here and here—in response to my posts on …
2023-07-05 R.G. Miga, who (judging by context clues) lives near Cayuga Lake, asks what the lake wants: It’s …
2023-07-05 Using apocalyptic sunbeams to make tea.
2023-07-05 I received my micro.blog sticker today and I’ve added it to the side of my laptop shelf.
2023-07-05 I have a shameful lack of knowledge about the history–and ongoing story–of Native …
2023-07-05 Well this is beautiful: short documentary about Alfie Jacques, one of the last wooden lacrosse stick …
2023-07-04 Taters from the garden!
2023-07-04 I had a four day weekend due to Independence Day and I spent it closing in about half of the open …
2023-06-30 I’m so glad to have maintained a log of the books I’ve read since 2005. Not least …
2023-06-30 Now moving on from a book about limits on tools to one about simpler living.
2023-06-30 Finished reading Ivan Illich’s Tools for Conviviality. Short book but not a quick read. Dense with …
2023-06-29 Ivan Illich makes an excellent observation on the ways in which science as a tool (remember he …
2023-06-28 This is a good example of my favorite type of Rhyd’s writing, and why I’m a paying subscriber. His …
2023-06-26 When everyone around you speaks of the apocalypse, the most radical act is to imagine the future.
2023-06-24 Darcy in today’s parade with the color guard and marching band.
2023-06-24 Today’s smoothie consists of greens and mint from the garden (left) and raspberries and chicory …
2023-06-24 I encountered Gary Snyder’s phrase “we are the primitives / of an unknown culture” this week and it …
2023-06-23 One of the foundational ideas in Ivan Illich’s Tools for Conviviality (see this post from yesterday …
2023-06-22 In Tools for Conviviality, Illich develops a theory of tools. Illich defines “tools” as “rationally …
2023-06-21 A little Solstice berry gathering along the Milwaukee Trail
2023-06-20 Purple coneflower. Joe Pye weed in the background.
2023-06-19 Rest in peace, Murphy
2023-06-19 So I’d like to visit some area cemeteries this summer and I’d like to mark them on a map app and …
2023-06-18 One of my favorite tools: my dad’s Petersen Manufacturing (Dewitt, Nebraska) Vise Grips, complete …
2023-06-17 The previous owner of my house left behind some heavy duty Lyon shelving in the garage. It is a heap …
2023-06-16 It’s been a rough week here with the sudden decline of our fifteen year old dog Murphy. Last weekend …
2023-06-14 It’s “Limestone Month” here in Bedford and this morning Rachel and I went on a tour of Green Hill …
2023-06-13 2 Samuel 5:24: And let it be, when thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry …
2023-06-13 I’m sad to finish Jung’s Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Next, I would like to at least …
2023-06-12 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p.356 It is important to have a secret, a premonition of …
2023-06-12 Now spinning: Beach Boys compilation “Endless Summer.” Not my usual music but it caught the …
2023-06-10 I know I’ve been posting a lot of pictures of local limestone sculpture lately but I’ve been trying …
2023-06-09 Now spinning: the Abyssinian Baptist Choir led by Professor Alex Bradford. Liner notes by no less …
2023-06-08 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p.300 We cannot visualize another world ruled by quite other …
2023-06-08 And then, as if to prevent me from getting too carried away in my praise of Memories, Dreams, …
2023-06-07 Purchased for the car. I can’t tell if I’m getting wiser or crazier as the days go by.
2023-06-07 Finally getting some rain! It’s been about a month since our last significant rainfall. …
2023-06-07 Today I learned that “archeology” is an alternate spelling for …
2023-06-06 Xenophobia plus bad grammar
2023-06-06 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p.235: Our souls as well as our bodies are composed of …
2023-06-06 I could read Memories, Dreams, Reflections all day long. It’s a book full of mysterious visions and …
2023-06-04 Thanks to @readerjohn for passing on this article about an 80-ton limestone carving of Washington …
2023-06-04 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p223: Gradually, through my scientific work, I was able to put …
2023-06-03 I rescued a good bit of old trim from a nearby remodel. It was just going to go into the trash! It’s …
2023-06-02 Ivan Illich, Tools for Conviviality, p.29 (pdf): A convivial society should be designed to allow …
2023-06-02 Entrance to Green Man’s Grotto is finally complete. We’ll see if the wood-burned sign …
2023-05-31 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections p.161: I was never able to agree with Freud that the dream is a …
2023-05-30 One last picture of the completed project. It’s definitely utilitarian carpentry but it solves a few …
2023-05-30 I’ve changed my ideas and practices a lot over the twenty-five years or so of my adult life. But one …
2023-05-30 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p.143-144: Among the so-called neurotics of our day there are …
2023-05-29 Rachel and I went on our first foraging expedition today and came home with a bagful of wood sorrel, …
2023-05-29 Now it just needs a few pieces of trim, some paint, and a pile of dirt. I’ll post a final picture …
2023-05-28 The supervisor inspecting our work. He has requested that we use the space to plant peanuts.
2023-05-28 Work on the raised bed within the back deck has begun in earnest.
2023-05-28 Lisa M. Rose, Midwest Foraging: The end goal of foraging actually isn’t gathering delicious …
2023-05-26 Really good Weird Studies episode on dreams, the underworld, and James Hillman. Appropriately …
2023-05-26 Monuments at Beech Grove Cemetery are not quite as impressive as at Green Hill. Still, a few nice …
2023-05-26 I found out this week that a high-stress accounting project I had spent months on was unnecessary …
2023-05-26 I may attempt this wall mounted tool chest from the New Yankee Workshop someday–but, of more …
2023-05-25 It’s not that the world is not our home; it’s that we have forgotten who our family is.
2023-05-25 On Top Gary Snyder All this new stuff goes on top turn it over, turn it over wait and water down …
2023-05-24 My town is the self-proclaimed limestone capital of the world—and despite it being very chamber of …
2023-05-22 Clive Thompson says there is a biophilia paradox—and I could not disagree more. The problem is that …
2023-05-22 Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections: Life has always seemed to me like a plant that lives on its …
2023-05-20 Here’s the question that matters: what would you do if you believed the world around you was …
2023-05-19 This is cool: collage artist turns a corner store into an art experience. Things like this can only …
2023-05-19 Been playing with the bird sound identification feature of Merlin Bird ID this morning. We’re in …
2023-05-18 We built a new raised bed this week. That’s not a trick of perspective: it actually is much …
2023-05-16 Parker Millsap Sometimes I remember. Sometimes I feel the magic. Amen, Parker.
2023-05-16 If you’re still holding out hope that renewable energy is the future, you might want to read this.
2023-05-16 Blue flag iris in our wildlife pond says good morning.
2023-05-15 So I’m a religion nerd from way back and one of my very favorite topics is the differences between …
2023-05-13 Parker Millsap’s new album is great. The title track is my favorite so far.
2023-05-13 We’re really good at accidentally growing mushrooms
2023-05-12 William Anderson, Green Man: The image of the tree that speaks, prophesies or warns seems to …
2023-05-11 “The Green Man”, a poem by William Anderson
2023-05-10 Megan Garber: In the future, the writers warned, we will surrender ourselves to our entertainment. …
2023-05-10 Rachel found the cleverest little frog taking a nap on our fence. I believe it is a gray treefrog.
2023-05-09 Sugar snap pea pods are developing!
2023-05-09 Dougald Hine suggests an approach to tradition that deviates from the default moves of both …
2023-05-08 First evening of frogs croaking at our little pond. What a lovely, lovely sound.
2023-05-08 Finished reading At Work in the Ruins by Dougald Hine. This book is worth your attention. Dougald is …
2023-05-07 Dougald Hine: The crude choices offered at the ballot box encourage us to reduce politics to such …
2023-05-06 We added a dozen bullfrog tadpoles and a dozen large snails (species unknown) to our little wildlife …
2023-05-04 It’s good to hear the music of the ice cream truck rolling through the neighborhood.
2023-05-04 Finally feeling better after a back injury and flu/covid–but now I’m so far behind on …
2023-05-04 Dougald Hine: The fossil economy breaks the possibility of such a cycle [of human reciprocity with …
2023-05-02 The universe is getting entirely too literal for my taste. In 2024, we face the likely prospect of …
2023-05-02 “A heathen, conceivably, but not, I hope, an unenlightened one.”—Lord Summerisle, and me.
2023-05-01 Happy May Day! Around here that means its time to watch Wicker Man. Possibly repeatedly.
2023-04-29 This is a beautiful pile of lilac flowers from the bush in our front yard. I’m making lilac simple …
2023-04-29 Today I was sitting on a bench at an Amish nursery near Loogootee, IN, listening to a couple of …
2023-04-27 “We all come from first peoples somewhere in the world. We have not always been trammelers of the …
2023-04-25 I read years ago (can’t remember where) that the difference between leftists and liberals is their …
2023-04-21 I’ve joined a small, local writing group. For the next meeting, I’m working on a …
2023-04-19 Re Spotify nonsense: I used to think I couldn’t live without Spotify for music discovery. Then I got …
2023-04-19 Loreena McKennitt sings a version of Yeats’ “The Stolen Child”.
2023-04-18 First lilacs of the season.
2023-04-14 Lilac will be blooming before long. Sweetgum leaves emerging from the buds.
2023-04-14 Three poets have been insisting on me getting to know them better: Yeats, John Clare, R.S. Thomas. …
2023-04-13 Goia says, “I’d pay more for trust.” What about those without discretionary …
2023-04-13 That’s a proper Hestian shrine my atheist wife has set up in the corner of the kitchen.
2023-04-12 Newly built window box is up. Lean out the window and there’s a salad waiting for you.
2023-04-12 Plastics storage facility in Richmond, IN, is ablaze, smoke is assuredly toxic, and will burn for …
2023-04-09 They shall change their cartridge boxes into screw boxes, neither shall they learn war anymore.
2023-04-07 Old Gods of Appalachia live performance last night in Indianapolis was great. There were three …
2023-04-06 Old Gods of Appalachia live show tonight!
2023-04-06 A word in defense of solitude
2023-04-06 Martin Shaw, Bardskull: Because for the sore awfulness of this century we need more fur, not less. …
2023-04-05 Listening to Martin Shaw’s interview on Rune Soup and, ugh, I really need to read Bardskull. Also, …
2023-04-04 The tragic death of Warren Dean Jones
2023-04-02 2016 Ford Escape: Battery is buried under a bunch of other stuff, made intentionally complicated to …
2023-03-29 Murray Forest 3/29/2023
2023-03-29 Spent a few minutes at an auction this morning. First time we’ve been to one in years so we …
2023-03-28 Twenty five years of marriage with this girl today!
2023-03-27 Woodworking notes 3/27/2023
2023-03-26 Anyone with experience growing amaranth? Anything I should know?
2023-03-26 The Tao makes no effort at all, yet there is nothing it doesn’t do
2023-03-25 Beautiful documentary of Red Pine revisiting the Chinese hermitages he made famous with Road to …
2023-03-21 Jay Owens More-than-human thinking isn’t just about recognising the near-to-human cleverness of …
2023-03-21 Green Man’s Grotto is showing signs of life! Phlox is blooming: Yarrow is back and is spreading …
2023-03-21 David Cain: “Most phone use is a tragic loss of life”
2023-03-21 I wear a black graphic t-shirt every day of my life. Last week I realized I could design my own and …
2023-03-20 Checking the PO box, saying hi to Joe Palooka.
2023-03-20 On music discovery: if you are fortunate enough to have a good, local record store like Landlocked, …
2023-03-20 Happy vernal equinox! Here’s hoping for a shift toward more spring-like weather. Rachel and I …
2023-03-16 I’ve been grinding through some numbers over the last few days so I’ve been half-watching the four …
2023-03-16 Alan Jacobs: The cultivation of taste, in morals as well as in art, is neither snobbish nor …
2023-03-15 The bookcase is finally completed and set in its corner of the dining room where I work. I’ve placed …
2023-03-15 Build things, not content.
2023-03-14 Woodworking notes 3/14/2023
2023-03-09 I’ve found myself dipping into this Red Pine translation of the Tao Te Ching this week. I …
2023-03-08 Amazing documentary about a would-be terrorist.
2023-03-05 JeffersCast Episode Three: “The Treasure”
2023-03-05 Newbie question here: any chance this is eastern red cedar? Definitely aromatic. Reddish brown. …
2023-03-05 Finished watching “The Woman King.” I don’t understand how Viola Davis was not nominated for an …
2023-03-04 Letters with @jsonbecker, week five
2023-03-03 Very wet here today. Poor squirrel at the feeder is soaked. Wind is whistling. It feels like …
2023-03-01 Thinking about this post from @patrickrhone tonight so I compared a cross section of end grain from …
2023-03-01 Following up on my previous post, it’s worth noting that he regards this as a counsel of …
2023-03-01 The heart of Jeffers’ Inhumanist philosophy is the turn away from the human, toward the nonhuman. A …
2023-02-28 “The Sun is Alive, and Why That Matters” by Charles Eisenstein. Interesting case for the aliveness …
2023-02-27 Letters with @jsonbecker, week four
2023-02-26 Progress picture on the bookshelf. I’m waiting to cut the joint for the bottom shelf until I get the …
2023-02-24 I’m just not built for the hour-long TV dramas; I’m more of a “rewatch favorite …
2023-02-23 Never has anyone complained about the neighbors so beautifully. (This is Jeffers, if you couldn’t …
2023-02-22 Snow trillium. First flower I’ve seen in the woods this year.
2023-02-19 JeffersCast Episode Two: “Hurt Hawks”
2023-02-18 Proof of concept for some shoe boxes I’m making for Rachel.
2023-02-18 Letters with @jsonbecker, week three
2023-02-17 Got my tickets for the Old Gods of Appalachia live show in Indianapolis!
2023-02-14 Woodworking notes 2/14/2023
2023-02-13 Rachel’s seedlings are doing great!
2023-02-10 Licensed driver!
2023-02-10 Poetry is a bodily art
2023-02-09 Letters with @jsonbecker, week two
2023-02-08 JeffersCast episode one: “Carmel Point”
2023-02-07 What have you done with one string lately?
2023-02-07 I’m curious. Do you have songs in your head never, rarely, often, always? Do you consider yourself …
2023-02-06 Woodworking notes 2/6/2023
2023-02-06 It’s letter writing day! I’ve just emailed my second letter for @jsonbecker’s Letters project. I …
2023-02-03 A fantastic essay from Paul Kingsnorth that captures so much of my own feeling. It even turns on a …
2023-02-02 It’s Candlemas!
2023-02-02 Now playing. It’s a good album, but I love the cover.
2023-01-31 Letters with @jsonbecker, week one
2023-01-31 Two paths ahead of us with regard to climate change
2023-01-31 I don’t recall what brought it back to mind but today I’m listening to Hem’s album …
2023-01-29 Bookshop.org has zero information about changing your password. How is this possible? I had to send …
2023-01-29 Dana O’Driscoll writes about “The Way of Wood”—about humanity’s interaction with wood, the loss of …
2023-01-27 The argument against conceptual clarity with regard to Ultimate Things: The Tao that can be told is …
2023-01-27 Sometimes I am so happy with the songs my brain brings up out of memory: “Rough Side of the …
2023-01-27 Celebrating this kid’s 17th birthday today!
2023-01-26 Excellent video of bobcats roaming the nature preserves stewarded by Sycamore Land Trust here in …
2023-01-24 My extraordinary wife Rachel has recorded a cover of “Oh Yeah by the Way”, a song from …
2023-01-24 Keep asking yourself: What sort of person do I want to be? You may fail to reach your goal. No one …
2023-01-23 When I saw that @ayjay was reading Matthew B. Crawford’s book Why We Drive, it inspired me to …
2023-01-22 The open future of the Tao
2023-01-21 I finished a wooden mallet today with some scrap leather on the ends. It’s very amateurish but I am …
2023-01-20 Okay I’m turning on this activity pub thingy that links to mastodon in some magical way I …
2023-01-19 Ted Gioia’s eight techniques for evaluating someone’s character. A solid list. Perhaps …
2023-01-18 Paul Kingsnorth on conscientious objection to the Machine
2023-01-17 Refusing Empire, telling a new story
2023-01-16 Three great apps I learned about from the micro.blog community that I now use every day: Ulysses, …
2023-01-16 Sam Kriss: Everyone now knows that the state is an instrument, a pointy stick which one group of …
2023-01-13 New motto: Anachronism forever!
2023-01-13 So Cory Doctorow’s new book is about an accountant?? I’m in. To be fair, it’s a book about a …
2023-01-10 I made very mediocre caramel cookies to celebrate Robinson Jeffers’ birthday. Get it? Because he …
2023-01-10 Happy 136th birthday to Robinson Jeffers, irascible inhumanist.
2023-01-09 I’ve added my mailing address to my bio so, you know, send me a letter or something!
2023-01-07 Stewart Huff killed it yet again at the Comedy Attic. Criminally underrated comedian.
2023-01-05 Now playing
2023-01-04 Excellent post by Caroline Ross on the value of small talk: As a form of simple hospitality, a few …
2023-01-04 Looks interesting: Sonorous Desert by Kim Haines-Eitzen 📚 This, of course, interests me because of …
2023-01-03 This looks good: Repair Revolution by John Wackman 📚 I do try to repair as much as I can. Sometimes …
2023-01-02 The song “Morning’s Here” from Friends is how I actually feel about mornings.
2022-12-31 Greg Moore riffing on the litany against fear in order to make a point about new year resolutions. I …
2022-12-30 We just started watching “Somebody Feed Phil” and the dude is like the Mr. Rogers of food and travel …
2022-12-29 I’ve been listening to Colter Wall’s “Western Swings & Waltzes and Other …
2022-12-29 The most important book I read this year: Wild Mind, Wild Earth
2022-12-27 The now-time of the hands
2022-12-23 Moving from human-centeredness to a land ethic
2022-12-21 Today’s solstice celebration food: Swedish meatball soup and pistachio drop cookies. Both highly …
2022-12-21 Happy winter solstice! I went into the woods yesterday intending to cut a larger Yule log from a …
2022-12-19 “Ten Theses on Intergenerational Stewardship” by Prince Michael zu Salm-Salm, a German aristocrat …
2022-12-17 French Lick trolley
2022-12-17 Lunch at the West Baden Springs Hotel
2022-12-17 Impractical utopians: a bit more on the smartphone conversation
2022-12-16 Finding a third way to address smartphone addiction
2022-12-14 Wendell Berry: from saving the planet to local care
2022-12-13 I’m making fire cider in an attempt to beat back all the sickness going around right now. …
2022-12-13 You know those paragraphs of SEO pablum on recipe sites these days? Annoying. But a garlic bread …
2022-12-13 A Fragment of the Creation Story
2022-12-12 I’ve created a linkroll page–a sort of directory to my favorite places online.
2022-12-08 What is the point of poetry?
2022-12-08 Ideology is too narrow
2022-12-06 “The Deer’s Cry”, Arvo Pärt
2022-12-01 I’ve decreased my Spotify usage this year—moving more toward Bandcamp, vinyl, and even CDs. That …
2022-11-28 Jack Leahy: Distraction is nothing other than a way to avoid, in the short term, the radical …
2022-11-26 Good news: Tribes celebrate plan to remove dams on Klamath. “The Klamath salmon are coming home,” …
2022-11-23 Floofy Pie
2022-11-23 Looking through this book again, which has been and remains influential on me (despite now falling …
2022-11-22 Preparing for winter
2022-11-22 Vermicomposting update
2022-11-21 Want to help regenerate your local ecosystem but circumstances limit what you can do at home? Look …
2022-11-20 Helpful video comparing both health benefits and environmental impacts of dairy and plant-based …
2022-11-18 The “free range fantasy”
2022-11-18 Cam Cole continues releasing blazing blues rock.
2022-11-17 Wendell Berry’s fateful decision
2022-11-16 The best hot chocolate
2022-11-15 My summer of not finishing books comes to an end
2022-11-15 In Limestone Country by Scott Russell Sanders
2022-11-12 A quiet, snowy afternoon listening to Ella
2022-11-09 So Amazon Drive is ending on 12/31/2023 and I discovered I have some mp3s hanging out over there …
2022-11-09 Frank Brown Cloud has posted an excellent essay on the role of belief in our economy—particularly …
2022-11-08 “Don’t obsess over politics”—click through to read a good quote posted by Patrick Rhone. It’s not …
2022-11-06 Walking through my neighborhood, seeing so many people living on small city lots using leaf blowers …
2022-11-06 Look at that butterfly. I asked him about Twitter and Elon and he just stirred his wings. I asked …
2022-11-06 Halloween 2022
2022-10-30 This year’s Jack-o’-lantern. Pictures by Darcy.
2022-10-29 My daughter Darcy has declared this Spooky Saturday. She says this involves Starbucks for breakfast, …
2022-10-28 Three songs so miserably sad it’s hard to listen to them more than once: Keith Whitley, “Don’t …
2022-10-27 I have no idea if the internet is already over, but this is a glorious essay. Via @joshua
2022-10-27 ”What Feminism Means to Me” by @Annie Mueller is excellent: I could do what I wanted, to a degree, …
2022-10-25 It looks like my Belgian tripel was somewhat successful. The ABV is low for the style but it tastes …
2022-10-25 Kill your lawn.
2022-10-25 Eight uses for fall leaves from the Old Farmer’s Almanac. We’re raking ours up, mowing …
2022-10-23 Another beautiful Fall day.
2022-10-23 Regenerative agriculture (like what you see in “Biggest Little Farm”) is animism in action.
2022-10-22 We finished the grape arbor. Now it just needs some paint and we’ll be ready to plant grapes next …
2022-10-22 Ok so I watched Biggest Little Farm and that was one of the most emotionally intense, beautiful, …
2022-10-22 It’s going to be a beautiful weekend here so one more big push to finish a few projects: finish the …
2022-10-21 What hath Jon Stewart wrought?
2022-10-20 Luxury surveillance
2022-10-19 Animism
2022-10-16 We’re having a beautiful Fall here in Indiana.
2022-10-14 Fall Break: Huber Orchard and bottling day
2022-10-13 A really excellent video on the complicated task of defining what we mean by the word “religion.” …
2022-10-11 Speaking of podcasts, I’ve finished season one of Old Gods of Appalachia and I absolutely love it.
2022-10-11 Theme music for Spooked podcast makes me happy every time.
2022-10-09 I’ve really been enjoying looking through blogroll.org, which (if I’m not mistaken) is the excellent …
2022-10-09 Why people change
2022-10-06 Some music from this evening: Townes Van Zandt sings “Pancho and Lefty” Iris DeMent sings “God …
2022-10-04 Tolkien, Lord of the Rings: “Bilbo used often to say there was only one Road; that it was like a …
2022-10-03 “The first commercially-available CD (Billy Joel’s 52nd Street) was released forty years ago …
2022-10-01 Camping at Hardin Ridge again, this time at a site with no electricity. So beautiful and quiet. …
2022-09-27 Choose reality
2022-09-27 Wendell Berry, “Family Work”: Children, no matter how nurtured at home, must be risked to the …
2022-09-26 Hypocritical asceticism
2022-09-25 Monarch on (what we believe to be) Jerusalem artichoke.
2022-09-25 Expanding Green Man’s Grotto
2022-09-25 A damp but thoroughly enjoyable morning at Hardin Ridge.
2022-09-23 A personal calendar
2022-09-22 Happy Equinox! Happy Hobbit Day! The Road goes ever on and on, Down from the door where it began. …
2022-09-21 Hobbit Day is tomorrow, September 22nd. Are you making your preparations?
2022-09-20 The death of the queen has some people pining for the Great Chain of Being. I’m also not a fan of …
2022-09-19 We’ve been hoping for a dragonfly or two to find out little wildlife pond. Well, tonight we have a …
2022-09-18 Finished reading The Hobbit. It’s been a few years since the last time I read it. Now moving on to …
2022-09-14 Douglas Rushkoff was invited to speak to a group of tech billionaires about the future of …
2022-09-13 Interesting page on permacomputing, a.k.a., “radically sustainable computing.” Plenty of links. This …
2022-09-13 The loss of the night sky
2022-09-13 The problem is our solutions
2022-09-11 Saturday at the horror convention
2022-09-09 The British royal family owns a considerable chunk of British land. If you want to preserve that …
2022-09-04 Brewed a Belgian tripel from a kit today. Haven’t brewed beer in a few years so I had some …
2022-09-04 Alan Moore: I worship a second century human headed snake god called Glycon, who was exposed as a …
2022-09-03 I baked a Pennsylvania Dutch funeral pie. Definitely has a mincemeat vibe.
2022-09-03 Done!
2022-09-02 Unknown/Unknowable
2022-08-31 What do we hold sacred?
2022-08-30 Finished reading The Green Man by Kathleen Basford. Actually, there isn’t a lot of text—mostly great …
2022-08-30 Having a really good time reading Neil Gaiman again. Right now I’m making my way through his short …
2022-08-23 Alan Jacobs makes an excellent suggestion, which I plan to implement: You can also listen to music, …
2022-08-20 Hobbit Day is 33 days away
2022-08-19 How to be a good ancestor
2022-08-18 What if climate change doesn’t kill us?
2022-08-17 The end of the my audiobook era
2022-08-16 Daily Dracula has been such a fun way to read the novel. And now the action is building up as we …
2022-08-15 Ridiculously cute frog actually sitting on a lily pad in Green Man’s Grotto. Maybe he’s …
2022-08-15 Principles of Permaculture
2022-08-15 “The Reassurer” by Wendell Berry
2022-08-10 There is no such thing as the “environment”
2022-08-07 God is Ultimate Concern
2022-08-05 I love the YouTube channel “Living Big in a Tiny House”. Not only are the houses cool, the New …
2022-08-05 Happy 88th birthday, Wendell Berry!
2022-08-05 Remembering Christian CounterCulture
2022-08-04 Sanity Project is a page I’ve set up detailing our effort to turn our backyard into a healthy …
2022-08-03 Thanks to @crossingthethreshold for mentioning Practicing Peace in Times of War by Pema Chödrön. …
2022-08-02 Backyard project updates: Rachel spotted what we think are dragonfly larvae in the pond. She also …
2022-07-29 This is a damn fine hour of stand-up by Stewart Huff, a really underappreciated comic. It’s at …
2022-07-27 Spicebush swallowtail on orange butterfly weed.
2022-07-27 An update on our worms. (Thanks for asking.) They’re doing well. We’re determining …
2022-07-27 So the frogs are clearly enjoying our pond. As I mentioned before, we found a generation of …
2022-07-26 Monarch butterflies have been put on the endangered list. Folks, plant that milkweed!
2022-07-24 Jug Rock and Hindostan Falls
2022-07-24 The Geode Grotto in Jasper, Indiana
2022-07-20 I got a great bit of mail from @aa recently! The color of the leather coaster is beautiful. Check …
2022-07-19 A few more plants have been added to the pond in Green Man’s Grotto. Tadpoles — both those we put in …
2022-07-17 Last night’s concert, the good and the bad
2022-07-16 Waiting for John Moreland
2022-07-16 Speaking of Green Lung, I’m too much of a boring middle-aged CPA dad sort of human to have what the …
2022-07-16 Now spinning — though with headphones since my wife and daughter don’t exactly like psychedelic, …
2022-07-12 If you build it, they will come.
2022-07-12 Think globally, act hyperlocally
2022-07-10 Chicken of the Woods. Spring Mill State Park.
2022-07-09 We built a pond!
2022-07-07 One of the perks of working remotely for the last couple of years: watching the Tour de France live. …
2022-07-01 Swamp milkweed
2022-06-28 This is worth watching (Netflix). Also good (if a bit less inspirational) is “Living Soil”. Watched: …
2022-06-28 Life within limits
2022-06-27 The next step we’ll be taking to increase relatedness here at our house: vermicomposting. We have a …
2022-06-25 Spotted at a local greenhouse: tiny iridescent frog nestled inside a tiger lily.
2022-06-22 Catching up: Vacation in California
2022-06-21 Inspiring, short documentary about Jadav Payeng, who has been planting a forest since 1979 to save …
2022-06-18 Bumblebee on purple coneflower 🌱
2022-06-08 Visiting Tor House and Hawk Tower, home of Robinson Jeffers and his wife Una, was an amazing …
2022-06-06 Nevertheless, I’ll be looking for you tomorrow, Jeffers.
2022-06-06 Day three. What can you say about these god-trees, the redwoods?
2022-06-05 Highlight of day two of our California vacation was the sea lions hanging out, watching the humans …
2022-06-04 California vacation day one: Travel hell.
2022-06-02 If all goes as planned, I am three days away from visiting Muir Woods, so I’m reading this in …
2022-06-01 Butterfly weed in Green Man’s Grotto is starting to bloom. Come on, butterflies!
2022-05-30 Ted Goia on fourteen signs that you are living in a society without a counterculture. This is true. …
2022-05-29 American Columbo is in bloom.
2022-05-29 I made some pawpaw muffins this morning using this recipe. I would have liked them to have a …
2022-05-25 Clive Thompson on the words he has never spelled correctly. Likewise. I’m a good speller but words …
2022-05-24 Trans-species collaboration
2022-05-23 In response to Jean, sharing my favorite picture of the Oregon coastline from our (best) vacation …
2022-05-22 Entwined being of plant and soil
2022-05-20 I’m a beekeeper now
2022-05-20 Hear me out: octopuses are aliens.
2022-05-18 Increasing relatedness on my city lot
2022-05-16 Waiting for An Evening with Neil Gaiman
2022-05-14 Bee friends (sweat bees?) pollinating our strawberries.
2022-05-14 Pleated inkcap mushroom popped up in the raised beds this morning. The raised beds sit on brick, not …
2022-05-10 Pretty excited to get confirmation of our tour of Tor House, the home of poet Robinson Jeffers, …
2022-05-05 Welcome to Green Man Grotto, a newly established native plant area in our backyard. The only thing …
2022-05-04 I believe the amount of anger in the world could be reduced if everyone had the freedom to take …
2022-05-03 Thanks to Austin Kleon for telling us there was a word for this: tsundoku. I work at my kitchen …
2022-05-02 Rachel and I took a quick walk in Murray Forest at lunch today. We saw a box turtle and both a …
2022-05-02 Harry Marks: And let’s not forget what everyone brings up when they talk about why “return to …
2022-05-01 It’s May 1st and you know what that means, don’t you? Time to watch The Wicker Man!
2022-04-30 It appears we have ourselves a holy fool skating along the boardwalk in San Diego: “Slomo: The man …
2022-04-27 Patrick Rhone: “The first approximation of others is ourselves.” Along these same lines, …
2022-04-27 Robin Sloan: The speed with which Twitter recedes in your mind will shock you. Like a demon from a …
2022-04-26 HOMEBREW 2, the second mailing of what I’m grandiosely calling an analog media project, was dropped …
2022-04-25 I really enjoyed looking through this collection of random pairings of books from Robert van …
2022-04-25 From the weekend: the view from a lookout point at Brown County State Park
2022-04-24 Big news today: the butterfly milkweed is coming back up!
2022-04-23 I picked up The Zombies on picture disc for Record Store Day. Meanwhile, at home, a squirrel is …
2022-04-22 Happy Earth Day. Later today, Rachel and I plan to mulch some open areas in our backyard for more …
2022-04-21 Robin Wall Kimmerer: The mosses remember that this is not the first time the glaciers have melted. …
2022-04-19 Spring wildflowers
2022-04-19 Something made me think of Lodge 49 today and I want to take this opportunity to recommend that …
2022-04-17 Introductory note: This poem surely lies behind what I’ve written lately about …
2022-04-17 The Gnostic Road
2022-04-15 Plans for our family vacation this summer are starting to come together. I was initially trying to …
2022-04-15 Jon Batiste: What a wonderful world 🎶
2022-04-13 Trust the method
2022-04-10 O happy fault!
2022-04-09 New Jack White!
2022-04-09 “How do I live a meaningful life?”
2022-04-08 My favorite Tiny Desk Concert: Cory Henry and the Funk Apostles
2022-04-06 An essential question: Who does this benefit?
2022-04-06 Activism is an ideology
2022-04-05 Dark Green Religion
2022-04-04 Looky what I got today. I believe it’s a Royal Empress. Once the ribbon arrives I can start clacking …
2022-04-02 It’s as if people respond better to a welcoming - as opposed to punitive - environment: “New York …
2022-03-31 What counts as success in the climate change crisis?
2022-03-30 I've kept a very inconsistent journal since 2006, beginning with my first Father's Day. I wish I had …
2022-03-27 Wrapping up Spring Break
2022-03-24 Spring Break, thus far
2022-03-21 David Cain: One financial lesson they should teach in school is that most of the things we buy have …
2022-03-18 Last night I was walking through Donaldson Woods, one of the few remaining stands of old-growth …
2022-03-17 From David Cain:
2022-03-16 If the ability to tell right from wrong should turn out to have anything to do with the ability to …
2022-03-15 David Cain: Self-imposed rules aren’t constraints, they’re good decisions made in batches. That is …
2022-03-14 After reading this post on canonical address books by @annahavron, it occurred to me that something …
2022-03-11 Oliver Burkeman on the reality distorting effects of the attention economy: As you surface from an …
2022-03-09 This is a great post that I needed to read today. “My point isn’t that we’re not living in a …
2022-03-09 When Rachel gave me a record player for Christmas, she included with it an album of Big Band …
2022-03-08 Started reading Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman. 📚 Quoting Seneca, Charles Eisenstein, and …
2022-03-07 Alan Jacobs has recently posted about his news consumption habits in response to a worthwhile piece …
2022-03-06 That there is a fun ride.
2022-03-06 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. (Psalm 51:7) …
2022-03-05 🎵 “I had a thought about darkness; a thought’s just a passing train.” - John Moreland 🎵
2022-03-04 Craig Mod: Boredom is everything, man. I think our loss of boredom in contemporary society is one …
2022-02-28 “Go to the Limits of Your Longing” by Rainer Maria Rilke
2022-02-27 Stopped in at the Gus Grissom Memorial at Spring Mill State Park today. He was the second American …
2022-02-26 When God placed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, he gave them a command and warning: do not eat …
2022-02-26 It’s Beer and Waffles Day! The first race of the season is one of my high holy days. 🚲
2022-02-23 So when I heard that Third Man Records had a 7” of “A Glorious Dawn” available, the only decision …
2022-02-22 Austin Kleon mentioned Betty Davis on the occasion of her death a few days ago - and what I want is …
2022-02-20 Yesterday a friend and I visited the Warren G. Harding Presidential Sites in Marion, OH - mainly …
2022-02-18 June 25-26, 2014, was a two-day window in which same-sex marriage was legal in Indiana. (More on the …
2022-02-18 Dan Olson’s video “Line Goes Up - The Problem with NFTs” is an excellent critique of crypto …
2022-02-17 The Black Belt was a region in the American South known for its rich, black soil. It was home to …
2022-02-16 Looking for writing app recommendations
2022-02-12 Once (2007) causes me such exquisite emotional pain that I have to put a few years between each …
2022-02-11 🎵 Sister Rosetta Tharpe - “God Leads Us Along” 🎵
2022-02-10 I’m on a sixteen day streak with Day One. I’ve never been able to maintain a daily journaling habit …
2022-02-09 I’ve finished all of the films in Steve McQueen’s Small Axe anthology and I can’t recommend them …
2022-02-09 This is an excellent video on how Amazon can afford to offer free shipping to Prime members. …
2022-02-06 I’ve now watched the first two films in Steve McQueen’s Small Axe anthology and both have been …
2022-02-05 Now reading: “The dropout: a history” at Aeon. I’ve been in a sort of project of …
2022-02-05 Now spinning: D-Vine Spirituals. It’s a new release of recordings of Black gospel groups from the …
2022-02-04 I’ve been making notes about the influences on my life. I noticed a surface-level …
2022-02-04 Washington Post: “An 8-year-old slid his handwritten book onto a library shelf. It now has a …
2022-02-02 Austin Kleon recommends studying something you love in depth - and it just so happens that I’m …
2022-02-01 From The Revenge of Analog by David Sax, on the story of digital progress: Our world would be …
2022-01-30 Plans for the next issue involve cardboard and spray paint.
2022-01-30 This is a great presentation by Doug Tallamy, author of Nature’s Best Hope, on the way people can …
2022-01-30 Fantastic documentary: Struggle: The Life and Lost Art of Szukalski
2022-01-29 I received my order from Half Letter Press, which focuses on booklets and independent publishing. …
2022-01-26 Robinson Jeffers, standing beside Tor House and Hawk Tower, his handmade stone outpost on the …
2022-01-25 The IRS will require you to use ID.me to access your taxes online. Last year, ID.me was locking …
2022-01-22 Chilly hike at Spring Mill State Park today
2022-01-22 Worth watching. I didn’t know anything about her previously. Colette
2022-01-21 Rob Sheffield says the CD revival is here. I’m going to stick with collecting records for now, …
2022-01-21 I’ve set up a page for a zine I recently completed. It’s a collection of some of my …
2022-01-15 In response to a recent post I wrote mentioning zines, @lewism pointed me to an episode of Rolf …
2022-01-14 🎵 Now spinning. I first heard Robert Finley on the Colbert show a few days ago and fell in love with …
2022-01-11 Austin Kleon’s latest (subscriber-only) newsletter issue is about the creative seasons. Two …
2022-01-11 A Russian farm has given its dairy cows virtual reality headsets in a bid to reduce their anxiety. …
2022-01-09 Sunday cooking: broccoli with garlic sauce, hot and sour soup, and vegetable spring rolls.
2022-01-08 Today I found a copy of Over the Rhine’s “let’s stay together” record. I’m thankful both that I …
2022-01-08 The Dig (streaming on Netflix) is a beautiful movie contemplating death and the past. Ralph Fiennes …
2022-01-07 “Amazon Prime is an economy distorting lie” by Matt Stoller. Really good explanation of …
2022-01-05 This article on the yin-yang role of gorse in the ecological concept of succession reminded me of …
2022-01-04 It’s a new year - and that means well-intentioned people making resolutions and other …
2022-01-04 Great article on the current legal fight over recognizing the legal personhood of Happy, an elephant …
2022-01-04 Austin Kleon: Cultivate a willingness to be bad
2022-01-03 Today’s record store purchases
2021-12-31 I love books and lists - and book lists most of all. This post by Mario Villalobos brought two books …
2021-12-30 Useful distinctions from Erich Fromm’s book On Disobedience
2021-12-30 📚 What I Read in 2021 📚
2021-12-30 From Erich Fromm, On Disobedience (nearly every line of this book so far is worth quoting): In …
2021-12-28 Fascinating piece by Nicholas Carr on GPT-3, an AI tool for generating text. It has been fed …
2021-12-28 When it comes to crypto assets, I lean skeptical but I hold that opinion loosely - since I …
2021-12-28 John Halstead has written an thoughtful post on prayer from a non-theistic perspective. (John …
2021-12-24 The HBO Max documentary “Beanie Mania” is worth watching. Beanie Babies seem to be one of those …
2021-12-23 In process: my first attempt at a zine, which will contain a few of my winter haiku. I was inspired …
2021-12-22 What would the world be, once bereft Of wet and wilderness? Let them be left, O let them be left, …
2021-12-21 I noticed my feet this morning….
2021-12-20 One of the things I’m most grateful for this year is the opening of an independent bookstore nearby. …
2021-12-18 I was reminded this week of Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley’s bonkers Evelyn Evelyn project. Webley …
2021-12-17 I’ve been reading a bit about surveillance capitalism (Privacy is Power and a couple hundred pages …
2021-12-17 Several days ago I watched Bright Star, Jane Campion’s film about the final period of John …
2021-12-13 Look into the trees, gentle your eyes, engage your ancient talent for spotting movement. Listen for …
2021-12-13 I’ve had my eye on this series at my local bookstore. They’re great books, obviously, …
2021-12-12 Went to see Over the Rhine - the best band in the world - at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater last night.
2021-12-12 For the last several months in response to all this, I’ve been reading about solitude and silence - …
2021-12-10 I love documentaries about extreme sports - probably because I am so unlike the people who do such …
2021-12-09 More from the Lilly Library: a 15th century missal and a Gutenberg Bible
2021-12-09 First illustrated edition of Canterbury Tales, 1484, at the Lilly Library
2021-12-09 Yellowwood Lake, September 2021