caesar novus

For once I am hatching new year resolutions to tackle these stressful years. Perhaps to fight like Rome did against Hannibal; don't lose hope or accept defeat, but grind onward towards eventual success. Pace myself sustainably but maintain purpose. For example preserve health by pushing away food and drink that's bad for me, except for a bit needed to preserve sanity. Push away toxic relationships, whether they be medical, financial, or social except for those needing more time to replace. Avoid idleness or mediocre entertainment while seeking worthier pursuits.

Later insertion to post below: I see Mary has 6 hours of sober sounding lectures forming a basis for the book starting at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8p9o7xYsUE which I will sample and maybe change my concerns in original blather below: --------------------------------------------- (deleted by me)

Oh, I spelled it wrong; just drop my O and see if your library offers access. I saw a notice Ancestry is shutting down free US access nationwide by new years, so you may just have time to line up local library access and ram a few family names thru the system. I used free win app "my family tree"" to put results in standard .ged format for storage and display. I found a hundred in my direct parenting line (not counting siblings/cousins) over 671 years. The tool is hit and miss in finding info even when it is there - just keep at it from different angles. Rely on maiden names at least for first attempts. Wow, I see lifespans often around 90 even hundreds of years ago, and late starting families around 40 yrs back then. The shorter lifespan theory must be warped by child mortality (and birthing mothers).

I like the subdued colors, which would be easier to live with than Pompeiian red etc. Does anyone have photos from a tour of Nero's golden house? It was opened with such little publicity that I must have missed it twice.

What youtube channels repeatedly come up with excellence, at least a couple of times? I mean a level above the fray, with insight, gravitas, or serendipity. I will post my candidates either linking to a channel menu or else specific notable vids, and assume anyone interested can further seek by clicking on channel name and then click on videos category. Epic screwball comedy movie with massive classic cast from 60 years ago is avail free in youtube's sample movie channel. A series on engineering integrity, especially in concrete, and more recently the top forensic communicator about pancaked buildings such as in Miami. I post an example of his rundown of unethical steps that led to that huge loss of life, although earlier vids on specific construction faults are gripping too. I think this story is why my similarly built apartment is rising a brutal 4X in insurance fees. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk2hmytlDg8 Amazing and generally unknown feats of aviation recalled by retired pilots, generally in secret cold war operations. They are about hour long lectures that seem almost too short. The series has been on a pandemic pause, but has a rich backlog. https://www.youtube.com/user/PeninsulaSrsVideos/videos Ancient Roman and Greek misc channel, whose best value to me is willingness of author to answer questions in the comments. https://www.youtube.com/c/toldinstone/videos Air accident review channel (among other things), with admirable restraint, gravitas, and cautionary lessons. In the example I post he explains a particular illusion problem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gk7fi7P0i3s but I wish he talked about another one attributed to crashes for which I will post a provocative short paper https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330415156_The_somatogravic_illusion_during_centrifugation_sex_differences. Researchers find women pilots generally aren't subject to this illusion, which you can only find near the end of paper because they only dared put weasel words where it belonged in the top abstract. They are torn by pol-incorrectness of declaring genders different even if the "correct" one looks better. I found evidence it's due to the illusion not being in pilots mind, but the inner ear is tilted slightly different between the sexes - something you may see me bring up in comments there. One of the highest quality sail cruising vlog channels https://www.youtube.com/c/RANSailing/videos Youtube audiobook channel for which I will post an example in two parts because they are almost 2 books. Rolling stone Keith Richards gives a memoir of an earnest struggling band key to the youth culture wave of the 1960s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l03GQCDCBPg followed by bouts of epic self indulgence of a half-billionaire in the drug culture of 1970s+ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4q4bIn_wFtY. It keeps finding unexpected ways to amaze me on the bohemian lifestyle, like frequent use of gunfire to shoo folks away which so far in the book led to no visits from police or hotel security. He does seem to have a responsible heart, but may be not be telling the full story behind various times he escaped burndowns of hotel rooms or rented homes due to "electrical problems".

The above addressed recent attempts to make stay-at-home incarceration a little more bearable; now I cover earlier buys to make up for gym and recreation closures. Pardon me if I have mentioned these before but I seem to be losing the ability to remember to whom I have or haven't mentioned things. All devices were quite affordable although took much searching to find free (air) shipment of their heavy weight, and are surviving outside weather surprisingly well on a balcony Favorite #4: Inversion chair (not the more usual table). You know how you can never get on some gym machines because they somehow encourage folks to veg out and check their phone all day? This is the ultimate home example with plush seating and interesting external recliner framework. Actual inversion is probably a crock health treatment or even risky, but you can get some gliding arm exercise in modest tipping up and back down. It was shipped from a club warehouse source in a thousand pieces and was incredibly challenging to assemble properly. UNfavorate #4: Maxiclimb machine. Only way for me to get free shipment was to buy refurbished version from the mfr source. Turned out to be simply damaged, not fixed. So I improvised some fixes, altho the latest internal grinding problem seems inaccessible. This was so disappointing because the machine has a small efficient footprint. It exercises both arms and legs well in a sort of pseudo wall climb and is the only model that has actual resistance cylinders. Favorite #5: The classic infomercial total gym. Normal sources are expensive to fund their massive marketing, but they leak out a slightly simpler version quite cheaply thru club warehouses. This folds up easily, altho I leave it set up in sun and rain with only a little greasing of seat bearings and rust spots. I don't do the reconfiguration of umpteen options, but pick one setup that allows a reasonable variety, Their half hour promo is constantly playing on obscure cableTV channels, and is about the last commercial not revamped into today's bizarre and patronizing social engineering effort where 80% of actors must sport dreadlocks or huge afros.

More historical organized pirates of east Asia:

You will be highly rewarded by checking out one more home made documentary by the above channel. It is an absolute bombshell that may be removed by youtube at any time. He has gotten interviews with the children of the most famous mystery hijacker (two time actually) who had been silent to protect their now dead mother from prosecution. It is more polished than above but super long and marred by personal attacks in the first hour that seem gratuitous until later account of botched investigation. I will try to ease your way into it with links that cue up at the summation in last 12 minutes (2:36:36 or 9396 seconds) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UuRpW8wdVA&t=9396s Next backing up to re-enactment of first parachute with money and transition into second hijacking (1:09:51 or 4191 seconds) https://youtu.be/7UuRpW8wdVA?t=4191 Below is the whole thing. He normally does wonderful short punchy muck raking videos but struggles in longer subjects. He lashed out at my critique of his flying Tarzan video, but seems to have improved a bit anyway. The blundering FBI he depicts was at the tail end of J. E. Hoover's directorship and I wonder if he was steering the investigations while losing mental sharpness near end of life. P.S. you may have to cue this last one back to time zero manually.

What is your favorite (or least fav) consumer item gotten recently by gift or online or whatever. Not big ticket items or mail order spouses; I am thinking of more modest things we all might brainstorm as something to acquire or stay away from. Favorite #1 at $19: Sheet tangle preventor for wash and dry cycles https://wadfree.com/ . It makes the whole load orderly and thoroughly cleaned, not bunched, twisted, or wet wrapping other items. Possibly could do it yourself with a zip tie bringing corners together, or? UNfavorite #1 at $78: Proprietary "mixpresso" machine. Compact and elegant but very limited compatible coffee pods. Amazon own brand was affordable but accurately described in comments as wet ashtray flavor, and their thin foil bursts with air shipment pressure changes. UNfavorite #2 & #3: 15 and 16 inch laptops from Dell and Apple. The Dell touchpad intermittently fails even after being replaced twice, so added a refurbished Macbook which also carried an open box discount. Forgot that Apple refurbs tend to be years old (mine 2019) and the open box came from shock that this generation alone lacked all but a few ports. It has taken ages to personalize the two machines to at least half work, together making one functional unit. Favorite #2 & #3: Same high res laptops now offer good redundancy and surprisingly the Apple pro can now read Win format portable hard drives. The Dell has a pen that has makes quick work of pdf paperwork I have to annotate and sign. I got adapters cheap to work with Mac ports and maybe I will request another free touchpad when Dell warrantee about to expire.

Above sailboat is now at west end of La Palma chain, so should have something to say about conditions in future videos released every friday. I will attempt to post a dynamic map showing where they are, but first wanted to show the sight of floating hot lava. Beware of roiling clouds of lung-scalding steam near spots where lava drops into water: https://www.vesselfinder.com/?mmsi=265781780

Really nice decorative elements from classy to whimsical. Where is the traveler on this forum who used to comprehensively post exhibit pictures; maybe still on flickr? Location seems to be out of the tourism mainstream except for Unesco fortress Carcassonne. Closest tourist hub appears to be Barcelona.

Nice, my library has a downloadable copy. But it does spread itself thin to encompass the traditions and religion instead of just philosophy, so I will have to consider other Tao e-texts.

Two months seems brief to me. Here is Hawaii's volcanos, where pink zones over the decades are labeled "essentially continuous activity". Granted it is an unusually slow and steady example: What I do for viewing is visit on a calm night. Then should develop a catabatic gravity wind flushing fumes downslope and offshore. Night means less officialdom to shoe away visitors and easy ID of hot glowing rock that just looks dull grey in daylight. My biggest fear was falling thru crust over a receding magma channel. So I only did this once in my life, and in a super vigilant state like a cat burglar. Carry backup flashlights, and don't stray far from other crazy visitors. In fact, simply watch a 4k youtube video by a daring intruder; I know some show floating, glowing bubble lava reaching Hawaii waters. I watch a couple sail cruising channels that visit these Canary isles for provisioning. One passed thru just as the eruption was starting and only experienced thicker than usual cloud cover. Now my favorite such channel is approaching there with a little toddler. I wonder if they will be bold and visit, maybe letting the little one get close in a lesson of Swedish self sufficiency, or?

Worth checking out if the museum is financially healthy enough to not only buy, but protect coins over time. I killed an idle hour just to the east of that museum in Portsmouth or Southhampton in the town museum and it was hardly more than a collection of historic postcards. Probably small gov't funded museums may be on a shoestring budget. Private museums at least in the US can often be seen in liquidation auctions, especially lavish displays in small towns with low attendance, a dead founder, and amateur trustees. A huge tank museum in northern California lost their zillions of private bankrolling by mistiming the 2009 investments crash, and never really opened to the public. Hope that never happens to the UK's fabulous Bovington tank museum.

I thought the Roman practice was to water down wines just before drinking. The alcohol served as a preservative in long term storage or transportation, then you use your local source of reliable water to take the hangover edge off it and maybe hide off tastes of water. I also hate water, maybe after seeing our untreated well uncovered to see slimy yuck vegetation inside. I cannot get excited about wine and only use one of the better boxed variety to squirt an ounce of red into resealable bottles of diet cola to mask the fake sugar taste. After you reseal, do a slow head over heels tumble of the bottle and you can usually reopen the bottle without volcano of foam. Yummy and supposedly healthy, although I can't understand how red wine antioxidants can be more healthy than those in tangy grape juice which I stir into applesauce. I have one weakness in the alcohol realm, which is non-Bailey Irish Cream Whiskey. Bailey is so overpriced and candified (I once found an eyeball sized lump of hopefully caramel in their bottle). Carolans for example has a better, clean taste at half the price and is avail in large 1.75l pirate jugs with large handles. If the Roman alkies had access to this velvety way of pickling their brains, maybe fewer monuments would have gotten done.

Here is a poor quality substitute for the fantastic video that seemed to have just been removed above. It depicts early rehearsals/arrangement for the Stones sympathy for the devil. In youtube comment section you can jump to various sections, such as an unrelated live concert of the song near the end. They mercifully omit the 35 takes needed for the actual recording. For some reason I am more interested in historical human drama than the song, and will yak a bit about it below the video. The docu-filming was by famous Jean-Luc Godard for a dud movie. It's amusing to see some of the stones and their girlfriends self consciously overdressed for the occasion. The session piano-god Nicky Hopkins seems dressed and haircutted for church instead of his usual homeless look (partly from digestive disease that would kill him). The blond founder of the stones seems disengaged and patronized with possibly guitar mike switched off, and on his trajectory towards being fired and subsequent death. Too bad because in early songs he contributed really catchy embellishments. The girlfriends who kiss and cuddle while helping with the chorus aren't just bystanders. The caped one inspired the lyrics due to a Russian novel she gifted to Mick. The other girl has famous involvement with the founder - was she the one he chronically beat up and had to be kind of re-assigned to another stone? Anyway the caped one suggested the signature woo-woo chorus, and that and conga drums finally elevated a kind of limp lamentation song to brash pop immortality.

I gather that last couple years of archeo digs have found evidence of admiration of Nero by everyday Romans, and perhaps his golden house was intended to serve public as well as selfish purposes. Has this revisionist view held up recently? One of the more articulate examples of this view found in https://www.thecollector.com/emperor-nero/

What if he didn't enforce the Nicaea decision on holy ghost/spirit, aside from any resulting combat? Altho he didn't influence the decision, he wanted to stifle untidy disagreements. It strikes me as a committee type compromise - would history be much different if alternatives naturally rose to dominance? I hear a US cult church (tarzan piloted plane crash church) used the trinity structure to assign their leader to holy ghost/spirit status over worshipers.

Here I try to use the cue-up option to skip the first 39 boring seconds of this song. It is a pleasant digression into psychedelic music by the normally bad boys of the rolling stones. I am following K. Richards (latest?) bio audiobook on youtube, and started reflecting on Jaggers usual angry tone, which is absent here. It was odd since they started as evangelists of US blues, but added the twist of maze-smart white boys who were prepared to go beyond regret and kick down the walls of a stifling establishment. It seemed to surprise them that teen girls became excited to the point where Stones feared for their lives. I guess the girls gravitated to bad boys who could offer an alternative to stifling 1950's father figures shaped by WW2 even on the home front. Stones songs more literally pandered to males neanderthal side, and maybe promoted that except in a few songs like this...

It may be possible to deal with this, as does Hawaii with tons of active volcano tourists over decades. As a last crazy feat of my teflon youth, I made a night hike along a lava flow and followed it to the ocean where it actually floated glowingly due to bubbles! I was right next to the flow with no worry of fumes due to a reliable catabatic offshore flow of wind which I was very familiar with having waited to paraglide off a 13000+ volcano there for day after day. I flew and survived a violent collapse that day, so had leftover adrenaline to deal with collapse of cold lava crust with an instant leap to safety. In between the flight and lava walk, I think I also swam with giant manta rays, an expenditure of energy and danger avoidance that seems inconceivable to my existence now. P.S. I follow various sail cruising channels, and it is odd that none quite ran into the volcano timeframe. It is a common last resupply stop for European boats to follow favorable winds and currents to the Caribbean, and seems somewhat backward in terms of services the sailors can call on for repairs or whatever.