RetrophischFor anyone under the age of 18, a stamp was used to send real paper letters from one place to another. They are not required for e-mail.
Postal Rates Increase for Stamps, Postcards | NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth
Actual tagline from actual news story.
(via tbridge)
So it’s come to this, apparently.
A militia when properly formed are in fact the people themselves … and include… all men capable of bearing arms. … The mind that aims at a select militia, must be influenced by a truly anti-republican principle.
Richard Lee, Federal Farmer LIII
The militia the Founders envisioned had nothing to do with the National Guard or Reserves.
Books as physical objects matter to me, because they evoke the past. A Métro ticket falls out of a book I bought 40 years ago, and I am transported back to the Rue Saint-Jacques on Sept. 12, 1972, where I am waiting for someone named Annie LeCombe. A telephone message from a friend who died too young falls out of a book, and I find myself back in the Chateau Marmont on a balmy September day in 1995. A note I scribbled to myself in “Homage to Catalonia” in 1973 when I was in Granada reminds me to learn Spanish, which I have not yet done, and to go back to Granada.
None of this will work with a Kindle. People who need to possess the physical copy of a book, not merely an electronic version, believe that the objects themselves are sacred. Some people may find this attitude baffling, arguing that books are merely objects that take up space. This is true, but so are Prague and your kids and the Sistine Chapel. Think it through, bozos.
If I wrote a story about an apprentice-wizard farmboy, an old wizard, a princess, a pirate, a dark knight and a talking bear, and there’s a dark castle and a mission to save the princess, the audience reaction to it is going to be based on how well executed the story is, not on how tired people might think the common plot elements are. Done wrong, it’s some bit of horrible pulp that rots on an assistant editor’s floor. Done right, it’s Star Wars.
Jim Butcher.
Just a reminder that it’s the story that matters, people. So, yes, count me in on Lucasfilm + Disney. Because maybe, just maybe, the movie of Colonel Indiana Jones of the OSS gets made now.
(via tbridge)
I have money ready to spend RIGHT NOW on such a film.
Laws that forbid the carrying of arms … disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes… Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.
When you’re a Tiger, challenges aren’t trouble. They’re hors d’oeuvres.
There is no maxim, in my opinion, which is more liable to be misapplied, and which, therefore, more needs elucidation, than the current, that the interest of the majority is the political standard of right and wrong.
—James Madison, letter to James Monroe, 1786
The United States is a nation of laws, not men.
The other option is to forget about creating rules and lists and instead get an effective anti-spam utility. And when I say effective I do mean C-Command Software’s $30 SpamSieve. We don’t dish out five-mouse ratings lightly, but in this case it’s completely deserved. I’ve relied on SpamSieve for years as have many of my colleagues. It really is the best way to deal with this crud.
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Admittedly, I’m biased, as Michael Tsai, the man behind C-Command, is a personal friend. I was on the original beta test team for SpamSieve, and have used every iteration since 1.0 hit the ether. If you’re a Mac user, this is the first app you should buy.
I wanted to personally thank Baton Rouge, LSU, Coach Paul Mainieri and the amazing LSU fans for the tremendous support they showed the cadets and fans from the United States Air Force Academy this past weekend. I had heard that LSU supporters were some of the best in the country, and they certainly did not disappoint.
I can honestly say that our team will never forget the unparalleled hospitality they received while visiting your great city and institution. Giving our team the opportunity to play and compete against such talent as Paul Mainieri and the LSU baseball team, in such an unbelievable facility was an experience our players, coaches and fans won’t soon forget.
Those of us wearing Air Force blue this weekend, in a sea of purple and gold might typically feel a little bit uneasy. However, your fans seemed genuinely appreciative of the cadets at the Air Force Academy and their future service to our great nation. To receive standing ovations during the middle of a Division 1 collegiate baseball game is an experience that is difficult to put into words. Nothing in my 20-year military and coaching career could have prepared me for that response and outpouring of support.
While we would have liked to walk out of Alex Box Stadium with a few more W’s this weekend, what we did walk away with simply cannot be matched.
You all should be very proud to be a part of such a great city and institution. Best of luck to all of you this season, and I think you may find you have a few more fans, who when not rooting for AFA will be pulling for LSU! It was Priceless! Thank You!
Michael “Kaz” Kazlausky, head baseball coach
United States Air Force Academy
USAF Academy, Col.
The price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay that price. … It is time for us to realize that we are too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams. We’re not, as some would have us believe, doomed to an inevitable decline. I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.