• Three new chapters this week in Jake MacGregor’s novel The Advisor. Chapter 19 and 20 on Tuesday. Chapter 21 last night.
• Good news from the lemonade wars. Well, if anything can be considered good news in this business of cops and code authoritah shutting down kids’ front-yard ventures. Can you imagine the kind of person who would — with “official” blessing — go out of his way to yell at little girls for selling lemonade? The mind boggles.
• But then, I suppose we’re supposed to be grateful that the criminal little lemonade pushers weren’t beaten and tasered to death. (NOTE: Heartbreakingly graphic photo. But OMG, read the quote from the murdered man’s father, who used to be a LEO.)
• Okay. After that we can use something light. And this, too.
• This is a very handy little book — and an excellent getter-starter for friends and relatives who may feel daunted by preparedness: The Prepper’s Pocket Guide: 101 Easy Things You Can Do to Ready Your Home for a Disaster
• Eejits. Don’t they realize this will never — and I mean never, ever, ever — even be possible, let alone desirable? How absurd that all this talk of “ending anonymity on the Internet” keeps coming from alleged techfolk. Do they have no clue what an Outlaw wonderland would result if anybody tried this? (Tip o’ hat to D.A.)
• “Hideouts or Sacred Spaces?” Weird in either case: the story of Europe’s mysterious underground chambers.
• Hope they mean it.
• Finally, in the category of stylish Outlawry: Did LulzSec trick police into arresting the wrong guy?

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The local downtown (such as it is) features a series of tiny parks — just green squares, really, maybe with a badly carved and crumbling wooden statue. Each of these parkettes is named after somebody. Always somebody I’ve never head of. Usually somebody even local old-timers can’t remember. In one case (I know because the plaque says so) it’s a man who owned a print shop that lasted until 1936.

These sad plaques attempting to honor forgotten people got me thinking about legacies. Getting something named after you is usually supposed to be a tribute (not always, as in the notorious and NSFW case of Rick Santorum), but it almost seems as if it’s a guarantee of obscurity.

Oh, I don’t doubt that the men and women behind the eponymous parkettes were once vital members of the community. To whatever extent they actually contributed to the place and didn’t just do politics, I salute them even though I’ll never know who the hell they were. Still, the whole getting-stuff-named-after-you business is, IMHO, strictly to be avoided. Definitely a very poor way to ensure a legacy.

At best, it makes you seem boringly institutionalized. They do not name parks, bridges, and public buildings after Beat poets, guitar-smashing rockers, or psychedelic drug gurus. At worst, it tells the world you were a monumentally corrupt porker.

And legacies can be unpredictable. You may want to be remembered for one thing, then by accident of history become a legacy laughingstock. Even folks who are lucky enough to get a chance to exert some “legacy control” during their lifetimes, might still be grossed out by the outcome.

So as I say, I got to thinking. About legacies. I have some ideas about what I’d like my legacy to be (assuming I have one), and on how I hope it’s expressed. Of course, that’s largely up to the Fates. But thinking about how one would like to be remembered can make a difference in the choices we make and the way we live.

So what about you? What would you like your legacy to be? And what are you doing toward building the legacy you hope for? Use the comment section if you want to or keep it to yourself — but give it some real thought.

Please forget stuff like “I’d like to be remembered as the woman who found a cure for cancer” unless you’re really working on it. No “I want to be the man who led the world to eternal peace.” That’s hooey.

You being you and your life being what it is — or what you can make it — what legacy do you hope for?

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A first-class rant from an ordinary small business person, Jim Garvin:

Sad that he still feels a need to talk with the minions of Mordor at all. But I’ll bet you millions of folks who eventually listen to this will be cheering, “Yeah! What he said!” — starting with his very first question to His Betters: “Are all of you completely crazy???”

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• August 20 is Lemonade Freedom Day. “Because selling lemonade is not a crime. (H/T C^2)
• The Farmer Veteran Coalition. Beats the heck out of them coming back and joining the LAPD or the Podunkville “finest of the finest” SWAT team. (Thanking J. for this one)
• Yes, your dog really is reading your mind. (P :-) )
• Are you the addictive type? Sez here you might be leadership material.
• From Ellendra in a recent comment section who says, (finally) “even the Wall Street Journal is starting to notice” that there are too many federal laws and regulations. And that the feds are discarding more than one ancient legal principle as they metastisize all over the land.
• And now for a little illicit puggery: Thug Pug, Steam Pug, Merpug, and Pug Boat. And I gotta get me one of these, only bigger.

I haven’t forgotten that I owe y’all the next (and hopefully last) installment of “Responsibilities of a Resident of the Police State.” Just been too busy to sit down to a long rant.

When not earning money today, I spent an hour and a half with my Friendly Local Contractor examining a) why one side of the bathroom is several inches lower than the other and b) why parts of the foundation of the house don’t appear to be attached to anything. (My astounding powers of deduction tell me that these two facts may be connected!)

Some parts of the foundation touch the ground but not the house. Others are stoutly attached to the house but fail to reach earth. Very interesting. I think this house may have been designed by Rene Magritte.

Good news, though. Friendly Contractor tells me a) that all the important bits of the house are, in fact, supported by something other than air, b) all the bits that went haywire went haywire decades ago and have long since stabilized, c) the worst-looking damage is cosmetic, and d) (oh, bless you, Friendly Contractor) the fix will be dirt cheap.

It’s nice (and rare) when an old house surprises you in a good way.

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• Radley Balko, who posts a lot of photos on his blog, has just posted the best two ever, bar none, no possible comparison: Cory Maye as a free man.
• How come Al Quaeda is always responsible, even when Al Quaeda isn’t responsible?
• “Playing to Your Strengths.” For some, this might be a no-brainer. But for others (e.g. who were forced or simply fell into their career paths), not so.
• Charles Hugh Smith is a wonderful thinker. He’s just come up with the best analysis of what the Euro really is and what the current goings on in European finances really are.
• “The U.S. Government and Activist Technology.” (Tip o’ hat to C^2; I think he’s also the author of the piece, but there’s no byline.)
• And similarly … “Subtext, and Saving the World.” Brilliant!

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Fred Reed nails it. As usual.

This ties in nicely with my ongoing rants & is why I titled them for residents of the police state, not citizens of.

Via Rational Review News.

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Well, how about a raffle ticket for a used gun?

Or maybe bid on an auction for a used gun?

See, here’s the deal. A person calling himself the Easter Bunny (seriously; he doesn’t dare go by Anonymous because these days the FBI will bust you for that) has offered me a gun to raffle or auction.

Here’s the further deal. His catch is that I design my own camo pattern (he suggests Peeps and melons but I dunno about that) and offer this as the world’s first (and perhaps only) Claire Camo firearm.

The probable gun is a Mini-14, older but nicely tricked out. It has a six-position stock. Other possibilities are an AK47 or a bolt-action .308, but he and I are both leaning toward the Mini. In any case, it would be professionally semi-professionally amateurishly uniquely painted with DuraCoat & you guys might even get to help design the new camo.

So back to the question at the top of this post: Would you be interested in bidding on this if I put it up for auction? Or would you buy a $10 raffle ticket if this were the top prize (with second and third prizes to be named)?

All the legalities would be observed, including shipping the firearm through an FFL in the winner’s state if a FTF transfer isn’t possible.

Color selections are frighteningly limitless, including such options as “Goddess Purple,” “Barney Purple” (yes, that Barney), “Harley-Davidson Orange,” “Furious Mike,” and “Bronx Rose.” Mr. Bunny’s offer is almost too generous, and DuraCoat and the equipment to apply it are a bit of an investment, so I’m only going to do this if people are enthused.

Interested? Suggestions? Tell me!

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Two more chapters of Jake MacGregor’s globe-spanning novel The Advisor just went online.

Chapter 17, in which we get a little blessed relief.

Chapter 18, in which we don’t.

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