Hristo's FI Journal

[chenda]

SHUT DOWN THE CITY CITY TO ALL CAR TRAFFIC. The juxtaposition of a conservative candidate in an EXTREMELY progressive city running as a CC radical should make a headline or two.

Excellent! Btw it might have been mentioned in the thread but a conservative solution might include universal congestion charging. Wealthy people who can afford to pay it get to enjoy less congestion, a privilege which their industriousness and talent has rightly earned them. Poorer people get pushed off the roads and into public transport (I'm been a bit sardonic here of course but you get the idea Though it might not work at a city level, wait till your governor or president.

[Hristo Botev]

I'm hopeful that there will eventually be a space for us as a group in the public sphere somewhere.

I was having a conversation last week with a friend--who is another conservative--about the whole CC thing, and he asked if I ever just laugh to myself when I talk to people about CC stuff and they assume I'm a bleeding heart liberal. And while I enjoy the seeming dichotomy, I suspect the "space for us" will be in fighting against using CC as a Trojan Horse to dismantle subsidiarity and federalism.

[Salathor]

I'm definitely a fan of Berry and of The Unsettling of America in particular; his Library of America set of essays in one of my most cherished items in my library. Like the Bible and the Catechism, it's one of those rare books on my bookshelf that I can just randomly flip open and find some real nugget of truth and wisdom.

Thanks to your references on here, I just picked up The World-Ending Fire by Berry from the library. I just finished the third essay and am finding a lot of value in it.

[Vaikeasti]

I'd vote for you (if I could).

How are you and the kids doing?
I'm really envious of your wife's work arrangement. You seem to have a very solid relationship together and with your kids.

All the best to you.

[Hristo Botev]

Thanks to your references on here, I just picked up The World-Ending Fire by Berry from the library. I just finished the third essay and am finding a lot of value in it.

I'd be interested in reading Kingsnorth's intro in The World-Ending Fire (I'm assuming he has one). I'm such a MASSIVE fan of Kingsnorth, ever the more so since he publicly announced his conversion to orthodox (also Orthodox) Christianity. Glad you're liking Berry. I need to read more of him--both fiction and the essays.

How are you and the kids doing?
I'm really envious of your wife's work arrangement. You seem to have a very solid relationship together and with your kids.

All the best to you.

Very nice of you to say so; thanks!

The Botev clan is doing well. DW's new work arrangement started on Sunday, and she worked Sunday through Wednesday of this week, and now she doesn't go back to work until NEXT FRIDAY (and she's not taking any PTO days!). It's fantastic. The grocery bill (our Achilles' heel) is going to drop drastically, as DW loves to cook from scratch but just hasn't had the time to do it much. So, we're now effectively a household with two part-time working parents; she works 5 days every 2 weeks, and I work roughly 30 hours/week, with the flexibility (mostly) to choose which days I choose to leave early, or come in late, etc.

I've been reading a lot. I finished the Iliad and am halfway through The Odyssey (had my first seminar for the Odyssey last night). I've read CS Lewis's 4 Loves and Abolition of Man. I read Walker Percy's Second Coming (doing a "book club" on it with my dad!). Also finished Franklin's autobiography, and I'm currently working on Dune and Asimov's Foundation, as I'd like to read those (re-read in the case of Dune) before seeing their most recent screen adaptations. I'm also part of a side-seminar on Nietzsche, which is starting with Birth of Tragedy. And of course I've been gobbling up Kingsnorth's "Machine" essays (only 1 more left!). I'm also coaching my son's 3rd grade basketball team this year, and as I know nothing about the game and never played, I've been taking copious notes as I read through every "how to survive coaching youth basketball" book that the library has on its shelves. The basketball thing has been fun, as I never really understood the game, apart from the basics, and I already have a much better understanding of the intricacies of what's happening, such that I'm actually starting to enjoy watching the game--to see how the players move with and without the ball, what sort of defensive schemes are at play, etc. Anyway, I coached a few seasons of my son's soccer, but that was back when it was really just about "touches" and otherwise herding cats. This will be different because I'm actually expected to teach them the game (3rd grade is the first year kids can play in this league, and there's a huge emphasis on teaching fundamentals, equal playing time, and ball movement and playing as a team). So, I'm looking forward to the challenge.

I've stuck with my 3x5 card note-taking system, which has proved super helpful in many different areas of my life. And I see that it's already starting to change the way I think in small ways. E.g., when I have something like a brief or a letter to write at work, I no longer just open up a word document and start typing, organizing my thoughts as I go. Rather, I write down each of the points/refutations I want to make on individual cards, with separate cards for the support for each of those points/refutations, and then I organize the cards such that by the time I open up a word document I know what needs to be said and where I want to say it, and all that is left is the wordsmithing. My work product is much better, and the more I practice this strategy the more efficient I'll get. I see no reason why I can't extend this strategy to other writing as well. E.g., I've always wanted to write a small history book focused on some local thing--like the history of my parish, or of my neighborhood, etc. And with this 3x5 strategy I'm able to take notes as I do research, and then come back to those notes right where I left off, maybe weeks later; I no longer need to set aside huge chunks of time and block out distractions to get big writing projects done.

So, so many possibilities with this way of organizing my thoughts. Another benefit, I'm reading much less Internet click-baity junk than I used to, and a big reason is because my mind is already starting to be trained to expect to pull at least some card-worthy note/idea/quote/etc. from everything I read; and, well, that's just not going to happen with your typical "news" article that populates from my news aggregator.

Finally, the BIG thing that's been weighing on my mind lately (and DW's mind) is whether we make a move somewhere up north in 2024, when DD finishes middle school. We're struggling with the decision, and are 100% confident one way on Monday, then 100% confident the other way on Tuesday, and back and forth.

We shall see.

For now, the plan is to take a trip to a couple of the places we're looking at over spring break.

[Salathor]

@Hristo Sounds like our reading tastes are dialed in. I read Foundation just a year or two ago, and am also planning to re-read Dune before watching the movie. One of my favorite SF books. Last year was my big CS Lewis kick. I don't think I read either of the two works you reference, but I read his Space Trilogy and most of the essays included in the Signature Classics collection, as well as Mere Christianity and a few others. (EDIT: I see they were included in the signature classics. Not sure how I missed them; I got it from the library so maybe I just ran out of time.)

Kingsnorth did indeed write an intro but I only skimmed it. I generally tend to avoid reading introductions to collections until after I have read the material inside at least once (I like coming to the material blank and then going back to read the intro, or I'll read the intro right away if I have read the collection other places already).

[Hristo Botev]

Kingsnorth did indeed write an intro but I only skimmed it. I generally tend to avoid reading introductions to collections until after I have read the material inside at least once (I like coming to the material blank and then going back to read the intro, or I'll read the intro right away if I have read the collection other places already).

Golden rule of the reading group I'm in: DON'T READ THE INTRODUCTIONS! (Well, you can read them if you want, but only after you've made your way through the primary material first.)

[Hristo Botev]

This guy just gets me EVERY TIME https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/h ... 0537009887

[guitarplayer]

Thanks @mt, could you perhaps share the deodorant "recipe"?

I have been using this for years now:

Coconut oil (most part of the deodorant)
soda bicarbonate (this makes it work)
corn starch (for texture)
essential oil (lavender e.g., cosmetics)

Great, cheap and works post factum as well.

[Hristo Botev]

I have been using this for years now:

Coconut oil (most part of the deodorant)
soda bicarbonate (this makes it work)
corn starch (for texture)
essential oil (lavender e.g., cosmetics)

Great, cheap and works post factum as well.

What do you know, since I posted that question DW figured out her own recipe, which is exactly what you're using. We're on our second jar, and it works as well as we'd hoped. (We also use lavender.)



I'm realizing now that DW used an old mustard jar for that one; unfortunately there's no mustard smell in the deodorant, however. For our toothpaste I use an old pimentos jar--but again, no pimento flavor in the toothpaste, sadly.

[Hristo Botev]

(EDIT: I see they were included in the signature classics. Not sure how I missed them; I got it from the library so maybe I just ran out of time.)

4 Loves is fantastic, though there are some sections that you can definitely skim through pretty quickly--but lots of great insights (my notes on the book are at home, or else I'd share a few of my favorites). Regarding Abolition of Man, it's taken from 3 separate speeches he gave on relativism. It's incredibly prophetic, though as I understand it, perhaps more than prophetic it was descriptive of what he saw happening in academia at the time (early 1940s?); which makes it all the more relevant today now that what he was describing seeing in academia has spread to the culture at large.

The book is probably most known for being the origin of Lewis's favorite "Men Without Chests" image.

[Ego]

essential oil (lavender e.g., cosmetics)

We stopped using lavender and tea tree oil after reading this....

https://factor.niehs.nih.gov/2019/9/fea ... /index.htm

[Hristo Botev]

I think I'm going to start learning Latin in January. This seems like exactly the kind of thing I need in my life: https://wcdrutgers.net/Latin.htm

[guitarplayer]

We stopped using lavender and tea tree oil after reading this....

https://factor.niehs.nih.gov/2019/9/fea ... /index.htm

Interesting. Looking at the source article, sample size was 4; 3 young girls and 1 boy.

'Whether the level of lavender oil estrogenic potency is sufficient to cause these effects is unknown. '

Still, plenty of choice of essential oils to substitute.

@HB way to go, stoic classics in original!

[Married2aSwabian]

I have been using this for years now:

Coconut oil (most part of the deodorant)
soda bicarbonate (this makes it work)
corn starch (for texture)
essential oil (lavender e.g., cosmetics)

Great, cheap and works post factum as well.

Yes, DW uses same recipe w/o essential oil. She started making it about two years ago and that’s mainly what we use - works great. Started down that path after reading that many manufactured deodorants have aluminum in them - not the healthiest thing to put on your skin.

[Hristo Botev]

So, so prescient: https://paulkingsnorth.substack.com/p/you-are-harvest

[2Birds1Stone]

Give us your password......

[Hristo Botev]

Give us your password......

Ha! No chance. Spend the $5 and take the month to read the essay collection from start to finish, and then cancel the subscription.

The guy's a writer pretending to be a homesteader--it'll probably be a few more years before he can actually feed his family with the homesteading alone.

[Hristo Botev]

"If we stare too long into the Machine, the Machine will stare back into us. ‘No man can concentrate his attention upon evil, or even upon the idea of evil, and remain unaffected,’ wrote Aldous Huxley. ‘To be more against the devil than for God is exceedingly dangerous. Every crusader is apt to go mad.’ These are wise words. Maybe I will pin them on my wall."

https://paulkingsnorth.substack.com/p/end-of-part-one (no paywall with this one)

My takeaway: build new things that are good, rather than try and protect (i.e., "conserve") things that were maybe once good, but that are now being eaten from both within and without by evil.

Also, from this morning's Nietzsche reading:

"The best and highest possession mankind can acquire is obtained by sacrilege and must be paid for with consequences that involve the whole flood of sufferings and sorrows with which the offended divinities have to afflict the nobly aspiring race of men."

-The Birth of Tragedy

[Hristo Botev]

"Therefore, considering retirement in light of virtue, we can see that classically and naturally man prepares for old age by prudently securing three things: family, work, and productive property."

https://newpolity.com/blog/should-men-retire