Speaking of social skills,

I was reminded of something my littermate said to me years ago, when I was first talking about divorce.

LM- "You know, a lot of the women out there have children. I'm... wondering... how you will deal with that."


SH-"Of course I will treat them just as well as I would anyone."


LM- "That's exactly what I was afraid of!"

Disgusting behaviour in the hunting field...

I cannot believe that this happened, in MY home pack! In plain view, even of children. What a terrible example to the hunters of the future.



I know, people pawing each other is perfectly unexceptionable.

But these two are married.

To each other!

Hunting is going to hell on a greased skid.

A commenter writes, "Pot Kettle Black".

SO not true. If married people want to be affectionate, there are plenty of places to do that. The hunting field is not one of them. Exhibitions of marital devotion will ruin the reputation we have fu-, er, worked so hard to obtain.

It's bad enough to see these giant mushroom helmets that make us look as though we are afraid of a little more dain bramage.

I once hunted with a Master who was proudly described by the members as "the greatest adulterer in England". If people start thinking we are all devoted and monogamous and stuff, then all we have left of the brand is drink and stupidity. We may as well be football devotees then.

HURRRRRRAAAAAHHHHH!

FMD restrictions are lifted!

Hunting holiday is BACK ON.

It looked as though I would have had to go to France for the whole time.


Whooooooooo WOOP!

Madness? This is Staghounds!

Madness? This is Staghounds!

Which movie was this quote from?

Odd Russian pistol...

Oleg and Tam should know about these!




I wonder if these are firearms in New York?

The OSA sidesteps this technicality by billing itself as a non-lethal weapon, a sort of beefed up BB gun. But BB gun it ain't. The OSA is a bonafide kinetic energy weapon that can cause some real damage at close range. Although it doesn't shoot metal-tipped bullets, it shoots just about anything else: rubber bullets, flares, and small shock grenades (which are capable of blinding and rendering an entire room of individuals unconscious). Any Russian citizen can buy one.

Magnet school madness...

Please help me understand here. I read this article, and the "Magnet School campers" were mildly amusing. Good to want a child to learn, and all that.

But then I got to the antepenultimate paragraph, and had a question. I thought "magnet schools" were supposed to be success greenhouses?


And then a bigger question. I thought this was AMERICA, and we had done away with public priviledge based upon inheritance. I mean, the NEA is always talking about how great public education is.

So why on earth are highly competed for places at this special first rate school reserved for

siblings of current magnet students, children of teachers and students who are held back?!?!????

National Enquirer versus the New York TIMES...

So the Enquirer has alleged that the Breck Girl is carrying on. I don't know, but I will say this.

If I had to bet on the accuracy of a NE story over a MSM one, the NE would get the wager.

In my own experience, when I have been personally involved in stories reported by them, the NYT, WaPo, or network's story will contain a mistake- ranging from significant errors to easily fact checked things like names and dates- about half the time.

On those occasions when I have been personally involved in NE reported stories, they have been dead right in every detail. Often their stories are exactly the sort of thing that will cost them millions if they are wrong. They don’t often get sued.

Handling dynamite makes one careful.

The great midcentury Tory traditions...

"...carrying forward the great midcentury Tory traditions of duty, plain speaking, courage, male companionship, reticence, decency, scorn for affectation and pretense, skepticism of government, dislike of intellectuals and religious enthusiasts, love of gossip, and dedication to tobacco and booze, into an age that cherished all the opposite things."



Not a bad epitaph.

This SHOULD be Columbine 's most famous student...

But he won't be. No one will write books or make movies about him. No talking heads on the stupidity machine will yammer on and on about his childhood, his difficulties, his motivations. No one will "try to understand" him.

He didn't murder anybody.

"Luke came home, sat in the dark with his mom and cried, saying that he was done going to memorial services and talking about the shooting..."

Fake mysteries...

In trying cases, I often have to guard against jurors' desire to create a mystery where none exists. Sometimes things ARE exactly what they appear to be, and sometimes the mysterious is just random.

Here's an interesting post on that whole idea, starting with a famous naked woman and including Faust, x ray analysis, supermarket displays, and horoscopes.

...take a dull thing, like some broken Chinese plate, and jump from there to talk about the soul.

Yes, I know hunting people's brains are mostly between our knees and our breast bones, but some of my reader could be stuck with nothing to do. So perhaps boredom might inspire some above the neck thought.

Since we're not hunting BECAUSE OF @#$%^&*#$%^&*#$%^&* DEFRA and its evil overresponse to foot and mouth.

#$%^&* global warning...

It's supposed to look like this by now!

The Fug Girls just sold me a CD...

Thank you!

The last of the wildlife doom set...

Pass the cream, please!