Item the 1st – What’s the deal with autographs? Personally never understood them; what’s the attraction? Why do people find them valuable? Sure, one can sell them, but that just assumes the premise. Why do people assign a value, any value, to something that has the scribble of some famous person on it? Related – OK, I have a guitar/bat/football/jersey previously owned/used/worn by someone who is well known. I suppose the autograph adds ‘authenticity’. But why does that object have value in the first place that one sees authenticating it as useful? But at least you have an object, even if you’re never going to use it for the intended purpose. But scribbles on a piece of paper? I just never got it. Eating your enemies heart or smearing their blood on your face may be seen as gaining some of their living vitality and that probably traces back to the evolution of primates to emulate the successful to gain insight and survival benefit from others and across generations without having to discover every nuance of successful behavior yourself. I suppose having an autograph is just a very diluted, pale reflection of that underlying human trait.
Item the 2nd – Blow-back. The idea that bad things happen to you down stream from military action. It’s one of those things I always assumed is true. But have I accepted because it seems right – of course an individual is going to be upset with you if you harm them or their family and friends – and often the implication or how it’s deployed happens to align with some of my policy preferences? But it certainly doesn’t seem to be universal. What are the examples? Afghanistan leads to bin Laden lead to 9/11 – but that wasn’t you’re blowing up our cities and children, that was you’ve armed us and helped us against the Soviets, but now you have bases on Holy Land. Is it blow-back from intervening on behalf of the Afghans in service of Cold War policy? But then what’s the difference between ‘blow-back’ and consequences of action. Every action has consequences, why do we call it ‘blow-back’ in certain, seemingly limited, circumstances? Did the Soviets suffer blow-back for Afghanistan? Consequences to e.g. their economy and support at home, but no particular ‘blow-back’ from Islamists that I’m aware of – They perhaps have an Islam problem in Chechnya and environs but that seems more on going low level war for control, not blow back for a 40 year old Soviet invasion. Closer to home, we napalmed the crap out of Vietnam, committed atrocities, kill women and children. There didn’t seem to be anything that resembles the usual interpretation of the term blow-black. Similarly, I don’t see any ‘blow-back’ for the Iraq invasion; didn’t really turn out well for the region and hence our interests, but I haven’t seen anything I consider blow-back – e.g. everyone would be our friends except we invaded Iraq so now they righteously hate us. Maybe the Marines in Beirut in the 80s – but again, that seems more like combat operations than blow-back. Similarly Japan – can’t get much worse than nuking two cities, indiscriminately killing civilians, women and children, but there was no ‘blow-back’. Arguably the bombing of Germany leading up the invasion could be thought to be worse than Japan even, but there’s no blow back in the sense it generally implies. What is blow-back – how do you separate it from combat or any action that changes the timeline and has downstream consequences (as does every single action large or small)? Where is it manifest and why? It often seems to be used as a blanket reason to avoid interventions or military actions that we, rightly or wrongly, object to (I’m not defending nor condemning any particular military action here). And it often seems to act only in a single direction, the ‘other’ is often assumed to have no autonomy or choice but to respond to our already assumed to be bad action.
Shorter, it often seems to be a term specifically selected to constrain one side of an action, not a coherent concept. I’m all for engaging with consequences and cost/benefit analysis including moral and ethical components, but the term blow-back seems to be preloaded with a bias calculated to tilt the argument in favor of one outcome.
Item the 3rd – “With axes, gnawing, biting, breaking, hacking, burning! Destroyers and usurpers, curse them!” Turning a tree into planks. As you may be able to tell from the previous items – I’m just asking questions – I’m scraping the bottom of the barrel for random thoughts, so this is less random thought and more random “working my wood”.
The short of it, I have a dead-ish tree. I need to get rid of it. Might as well turn into planks.
OK, now I have a bunch of logs, some large, some small. How to I get planks without a mill? Well, there’s a company that makes chains saw attachments to turn them into something that can pass as a mill for small projects. And I happen to have one. So attack the logs.
For the first cut, you need a flat reference – I just attach a flat board to the log; depending on the size and uniformity of the log, you may need to make a few rough cuts to make a flat-ish surface to attach the reference to. Then the ‘fence’ runs along the flat surface with the blade set an adjustable distance below the fence on the log, I used 1.5 in – just make sure the depth of cut is more than the width of the board + the length of screws used to attach it to the board or you may find a chainsaw blade coming back into your face. After that first cut, the log itself acts as the flat reference.
So I got through the 4 smallest logs, the large unwieldy ones yet to come. These words have never before passed my lips, but I fear that my length and power may not be sufficient for the task on the larger specimens. The chain bar length and chainsaw power, you pervs. We’ll see, but I should manage to get a few more board feet of decent wood out of it. What to turn them into, now that’s a question for a different day.
I can understand an autograph as a momento of meeting someone you admire.
I can’t understand just buying them on the internet.
For me the momento is the conversation with the person (ignoring for now that those sort of meetings are usually performative and have very little depth), I don’t understand what value a scribble on a piece of paper adds to that.
Of course, I will pick up a few interesting, unique looking rocks from places I visit/hike to so I don’t really have room to be judgemental, but I reserve the right to be confused.
a memory and a physical momento are two different categories.
different categories, sure. That doesn’t explain the value of a scrible from someone on a piece of paper. Of course, I don’t understand the value of ‘meeting’ a person I admire in the context of how autographs are usually done, e.g. meet-n-greet, swipe of a pen walking off the court (queue video of Ruby-Rod paint brush) anyway, so I don’t seek out those memories either.
So different categories, but same minimal-to-zero value from my perspective. But my fellow humans seem to see a value in it so I can’t discount that I’m missing something valuable/useful.
Getting an autograph in those assembly line settings is no better than buying online.
Pointless, because you idn’t actually meet them.
We went to Steelers training camp about 15 years ago.
My son wanted some autographs (he was around 12), so he waited in line with his white Steelers ball cap and a marker.
He got Ike Taylor (his favorite player), Brett Kiesel and a couple others.
He wanted to get Troy Polamalu’s also, but as soon as Troy came over to the area, it was a stampede.
I don’t know what happened to that hat, might have gotten lost or be buried in one of our closets, but that was a fun day for him.
I have a Gregg Lloyd Autograph my daughter bought me for father’s day.
I don’t really care about the autograph, but I was impressed that she remembered he was my favorite all time Steeler.
Similarly Japan – can’t get much worse than nuking two cities, indiscriminately killing civilians, women and children, but there was no ‘blow-back’.
They totally pwnd us in the eighties.
And the blowback…
https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/japans-lost-decade/
Living well is the best revenge.
It depends.
Sometimes, revenge is the best revenge.
I feel like an idiot. I recently learned that my axe, that I’ve owned for many years, is a felling axe not a splitting axe. I also have a shorter axe that I got more recently and that one is a splitting axe.
What are the differences between the two?
Felling axe is narrower and intended for cutting across the grain. Splitting axe widens more quickly to split the wood apart when cutting with the grain.
Thank you.
In our house, a felling axe is what lumberjacks and rich families have.
Regular folks have *an* axe, which is actually a splitting axe but if you only are going to buy one axe, that is what you buy.
Then, as a teenager you wonder why the guy in the lumberjack competition on TV cuts these giant, cleanly sliced chips out of logs while you sort of gnaw your way through a tree with these tiny little flakes that splinter and fray.
You lit the TOK signal with that first image. The Blackhawks used to have a yearly conventions with autograph sessions and such. I took a throwback jersey and got a half dozen players from my favorite era (early 90’s) to sign it. I also brought a book one of them wrote and got him to sign it to me personally.
I don’t really collect, but to me those are some cool keepsakes that are fun to have.
I have a former teammate that has a home office, and it’s wall-to-wall with signed Blackhawks pucks and White Sox baseballs. He got all of them personally, by going to conventions and showing up early to Sox games. Again, just a fun story.
Well, in the case of the Hawks, you’ll always have the signed jersey to remind you of better days. Maybe Betard is someone to be built around if they keep him around, but I’m not seeing a big turn around for a few years. Though they did *start* this season pretty strong…
My dad and I used to watch games together, and he took me to several at the old Chicago Stadium. One year my wife got me really great seats at the new place, and I took my dad. There were some staffers next to us wearing Stanley Cup rings so we got to see those in person.
So yes, it all has a strong nostalgia element which I enjoy.
There sure is a lot of wood working going on around here lately.
I’m going to be staining some wood planters I slapped together.
Might even make more. We’ll see.
Staining after slapping your wood.
These euphemisms.
Relics have been a thing for a long time, and in the pre-selfie days, getting an autograph was proof you had met someone famous.
In the modern era, I can ask a computer to draw me a picture of me meeting Joe DiMaggio, and if you ignore the number of fingers, it’d look as real as any of those selfies.
That crystalizes my confusion that I was having trouble expressing, thank you: What is the intrinsic value of meeting someone famous?
Having a conversation with them, learning from them, sure, assuming their fame is downstream of accomplishments in a useful endeavor. But simply meeting, being in the same room for 5 minutes? Maybe we generally can’t separate the two situations so the later substitutes as some pale facsimile of the former?
I am not disagreeing with you, just noting that the magickal Law of Contagion is (AFAICT) universal across all cultures. It’s hardwired into the species.
My old man has an autographed photograph of John Wayne, on the set of In Harm’s Way. Dad was stationed at Pearl Harbor while they were filming, and actually took the photograph and got Duke to sign it. It’s an interesting keepsake with a cool story behind it.
I have not and would not buy an autograph, because to me the story is the most important part.
You can get ripping (also known as “skip-tooth”) chains for your chainsaw that will help with the power.
Or in my area, you can hire a fella with a mobile sawmill to come slab up your wood. They usually charge mileage to your place, a $100/hr active saw time, and a charge for any blades they break when they hit a nail. The advantage is more usable wood (thinner kerf = less sawdust).
Sounds like a handy service.
Shame I don’t have any trees, and the milage to my house would be killer.
I don’t know of any mobile mills in this area, but there is a place you can bring logs to and they’ll mill them for you. Looked into with the last tree I took down but it was considerably more expensive than what you are quoting above. I figure for $10 gas and $40 in chain(s), a bit of sweat and time spent on the sharpener, I can get the same result. OK maybe not as good a result, but the satisfaction of accomplishment. For whatever pittance that’s worth.
As far as what to do with your wood, these guys sometimes show cool wood projects: https://www.lumberjocks.com/
The whole blowback argument never sat right with me either. Yes your actions have consequences but so do the actions of other actors. I see it more as move and countermove. Some moves are going to be better than others. Blowback assumes your action will always have negative consequences. It also seems to be used in only critiquing US actions. That denies agency of other countries/actors.
It’s because the argument was always about making the US an idle actor, and to blame for every bad thing everywhere.
Do you wonder if Osama Bin Laden and Ramzi bin al-Shibh ever sat down and talked about whether there would be blowback from the 9-11 attacks?
I can guarantee you that they did not.
Or perhaps, the blowback was the entire point?
Ron Paul has always used that argument. I think there are plenty of reasons to avoid foreign conflicts but that argument isn’t too solid.
What about people who buy drinks for their famous heroes? Fuck that. He’s rich. He should buy me a beer.
It’s a bribe to try to buy some of their time.
Blowback assumes your action will always have negative consequences.
I assume you mean NET negative consequences. There are always costs. The question is whether the benefits outweigh them. The problem comes when people completely ignore those benefits, like the ecofantasists who think all oil and minerals should be left in the ground.
I have met and been around famous people. I don’t have a single autograph to “prove” it.
Since my government checks are auto deposited I never see who autographed them and I really don’t care. Just show me the money on my electronic bank statement.
Who will save Democrat-ocracy?
“The public at large is in the midst of a very antiestablishment moment, and I think that is particularly true for base Democratic voters,” Payne explained. “There is a hunger for voices from outside the system, and those who have experience within the system are carrying baggage with them politically.”
There’s no question there is a lot of anger and frustration within the Democratic base.
This anger has been sparked in part by the disappointment in losing to Trump in 2016 and 2024, when candidates backed by party leaders lost in November to the GOP’s lead outsider candidate.
——-
“People are fed up and they don’t see solutions,” Del Percio said. “In either party, no one wants someone who’s tinkering around the edges. They want bold.”
“They don’t expect someone within the system to change the system,” she added.
Where is our Maoist savior?
“Candidates backed by party leaders”
Backed by…
Yeah…. that is one way to put it. I mean, they rigged both primaries. But yeah… that includes the backing of the party leaders.
Any political consultant who talks about what “the base” want should be tied to a fence post and whipped with a knotted plowline.