It was a light cooking week in my rustic, #freedomnomnom #keto kitchen since I fasted from last Sunday night to Friday at 6pm, FIVE DAYS. (I’m working on a piece about the fasting that I will share this week.)Those who follow along–THANK YOU!– may have noticed I skipped a few weeks. I had other priorities, and something had to give and the time I spend on this on Sundays was it. But, instead of continuing to slack, here I am reporting for duty! Not to anyone. Not to people please. For ME. This habit informs many other positives in my life. It makes me cherish and guard my Sundays. It makes me chose healthy, locally-sourced foods. Cooking gives me flow, and this makes me appreciate what makes me unique in the kitchen. In short, it keeps me healthy. And, health is wealth, as Andy Warhol used to say. I just watched the 6 part series on Netflix. Learned a lot & was inspired to create more art, whatever that means. Or maybe just create more, period. The act of creating demands having command of your own attention span, your own mind. Anyway, enjoy this week’s meals, and let me know or drop a pic of what’s cooking in your kitchen in the comments below!
Blog
I have been a fan of Ai Wei Wei for a long time and was thrilled to hear him speak in NYC years ago. I’ve caught his exhibits in Brooklyn, Prague, and online, and watched several of his documentaries. My favorite piece of art is his marble surveillance camera, because the incongruity of the marble brilliantly cements Big Brother in such an inconceivable, permanent way.
This can and should happen. https://t.co/qmDupHdhQB
— Nick Hudson (@NickHudsonCT) March 9, 2022
I love my life in New Hampshire! As someone who moved from New York City in February 2008 (during, yes, a blizzard because LIBERTY IS WORTH IT!), and as someone who has been actively involved in increasing Liberty in Our Lifetime here in the Free State since then, it is SUPER VALIDATING to see the massive interest and growth in the Free State Project that is happening right now, including yesterday’s “pre-game” events that took place across the state before our SOLD OUT Liberty Forum 2022. [Looking to get a flavor from the past? Check out this Bitcoin Magazine coverage from 2014.]
Firstly, the bus tour! Dennis Pratt, Chef de Village at PorcFest, has been putting together several regional luxury bus tours to showcase this incredible little country-state we get to live in to newcomers. Everyone I spoke to said the tour was amazing!
I met up with the passengers for lunch at Brian B’s Appeal to Heaven spot in Weare, where he is renting his property to a brand-new homeschool initiative, Granite Minds Homeschooling, spearheaded by Michelle McC.
Brian put together the lunch, catered by Lauren N, with venison or vegan stew and salad, to show off the barn on his property that recently became available after an antique store closed. I love me a good roughhewn New England barn (hey, we all our have our weird loves!) so I wanted to check it out for myself, and I was not disappointed. This beautiful old barn is a great space that will likely get snagged by the homeschoolers, but it would, nudge nudge, wink, wink, make a great interim FSP Museum while I figure out the final location. [HERE? HMU if you want to invest!]
About 70 people attended the luncheon, and Brian spoke about his journey to NH, how he moved in 2016, left for a while and as he travelled extensively, realized ONLY NEW HAMPSHIRE AND THE FREE STATE make sense as a long-term strategy for freedom for him, personally. So he came back. While it still hurts when people leave (but you can’t control other people’s choices), everyone who comes back gets forgiven! 😉
Late afternoon, I headed over to Liberty Forum to help set up the merch table, and ran into these incredible women working tirelessly to expand liberty for themselves and their children. If you want a Porcupine Day VI mug or a copy of my book, The Ecstatic Pessimist: Stories of Hope (Mostly) please stop by today ($20 each). You can also sign up for the hosted dinners for tonight, so make sure to stop by and say “hi”.
We’re the fab women of the Free State and we’re making Liberty in OUR lifetimes happen in the @FreeStateNH. Excited to share our community with newcomers at Liberty Forum this weekend! @RachelBTCsmith @chrislopez2004 @Constance_603 pic.twitter.com/6F7dhhOSnh
— Carla Gericke, Live Free And Thrive! (@CarlaGericke) March 4, 2022
Ran into some of my favorite visiting speakers, including Brownstone’s Jeffrey Tucker, who is a stalwart speaker at our events. He looked dashing, as always, with his bowtie and sporting a new, somewhat superhero-y cape. It gets cold in New Hampshire in the winter so as one fashionista to another… I geddit!
Louis and I topped off the evening by hosting a dinner at 110 Grill on Elm Street in downtown Manchester. About a dozen people came and we chatted about life and liberty, about where people live now and what it would take to persuade them to move (A.B.C., baby!) and even some locals came [<–#winning]. Of course, Covid-Mania was the main topic, but it was cool to learn about the activism and passions driving people interested in the Free State Project. I hope y’all move (or stay!).
Today, Saturday, March 5th 2022, kicks off with Rachel Goldsmith, Liberty Forum 2022’s main producer, opening the event at 9AM and then there is an amazing day of speakers. Nothing beats learning from some of the greatest free thinkers of our times!
I’ll catch y’all over there for Jeffrey Tucker’s 10AM talk, and then I am very much looking forward to hearing from Wikipedia’s co-founder, Larry Sanger, especially since Jimmy Wales, the other Wikipedia founder, refused to speak at Liberty Forum back when I invited him years ago because I supported Ross Ulbricht and encouraged Lyn to speak at our events.
I’ll report back with more details as the weekend progresses, but follow me on Twitter to stay tuned in the meantime!
Pfizer’s Nine Pages of Horrific Side Effects & Other Things They’d Rather You Not Know
Sometimes you can glean more from what isn’t said… these redactions tell you Pfizer is creating a department to deal with the “large increase of adverse event reports” while admitting “the magnitude of under-reporting is unknown” (report is only for 3 months from 1/12/20-2/28/21). Is this good enough for you?
There are also NINE pages of side effects now listed. This initial report is well-crafted for minimal disclosure, and as a lawyer, I will say the legalese, acronym usage, cross-referencing and footnote magic dance for maximal obfuscation is pretty impressive.
Copy and paste link into browser for PDF of report: https://phmpt.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/5.3.6-postmarketing-experience.pdf
Another Piece of the Totalitarian Takeover Puzzle: Your Employer is Going to be Left Holding the Bag if You’re Harmed
For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out the reason why the government kept pushing private employers to institute vaccine mandates. I argued the government was creating a workaround, making private employers do their dirty unconstitutional work for them… and well, not only was it that, it also appears I have figured out a missing piece of the Bio-Fascist Totalitarian Takeover of the Globe… AKA The Great Reset…
Because of the Emergency Authorization under which vaccines are being produced and injected, no vaccine maker can be sued if something goes wrong. Since it became clear that Big Pharma bore no legal responsibility (and thus have 0% incentive to be an honest broker) I’ve been trying to figure out the play…
The government is supposed to be the insurer of last resort for claims that arise, but since they’ve paid out around 1% or less of previous claims for vaccine harm over the past 30 years, I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Then, I ran across this insurance blog, and ding, ding, ding, now the incredible push to force companies to do the government’s dirty work makes sense! Big Pharma and Big Gov have colluded to make business owners and their insurance carriers liable for claims… I’m willing to bet insurance companies will be asking for bailouts in the next year or two.
No matter how you slice it, those who should be held culpable, will not be. And, no doubt, those who were harmed, will never be made whole.
“But it’s for your own good.” C. S. Lewis on tyranny
NOVEMBER 1, 2013 BY PETER ENNS
Original link, h/t Curt Howland.
“I was having a productive day until a friend of mine sent me the following famous quote from C. S. Lewis in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics, which appeared today (11/1) in the Wall Street Journal on page A17. Now I’m all riled up and I won’t get any more work done.
My contention is that good men (not bad men) consistently acting upon that position [imposing “the good”] would act as cruelly and unjustly as the greatest tyrants. They might in some respects act even worse. Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under of robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber barons cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some points be satiated; but those who torment us for their own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to heaven yet at the same time likely to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on the level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.
Abuse of power in Christian contexts justified on the basis of “it’s for your own good” is uncomfortably common. As “tyrannical” as this may be when even “good men” (as Lewis says) engage in such behavior, it is all the worse when guardians herd the masses toward the “right” conclusions under some sort of explicit or veiled threat, claiming “it’s nothing personal,” but only in service of the greater “good.”
I hope it goes without saying that leaders do indeed have the responsibility to lead, and there is often a fine line between leading and coercion. But I am reflecting here, as is Lewis, on the dehumanizing abuse of power that crosses far past that fine line and is, at least as I see it, more common than it should be in the church.
I’m sure many of you can fill in the blanks from your own experience.”
Cops killed someone in Walpole this weekend. Feel free to reach out to me if you have any details to share. $100 it gets ruled a “justified shooting,” after a kid glove investigation, but on the plus side, the AG’s office is creating expansive definitions of what is legally regarded as “self-defense” under NH law. I’m partial to that one where you can justifiably shoot and kill a person fleeing in a car from behind like they ruled in Weare back in the day.*
* Everyone knows I am an agent of peace. Just pointing out the vast hypocrisy applied to “the law” depending on who is doing the shooting… In the De Jesus case I am referring to, even retired cops were like, WTAF, yo? The AG simply didn’t decide AT ALL, whether that shooting was justified… Like, oops, we can’t figure this out, and we just like, don’t want to deal, m’kay???
Another shooting occurred in Walpole back in December 2021. Read AG’s announcement. What does this mean? Do we even know if it’s the same officers? Where’s the final report? Any accountability?
UPDATE 11:15AM: “Per protocol, the trooper involved is being withheld until a formal interview is conducted.There were no body or cruiser cameras at the scene.” You don’t say… isn’t it AMAZING that we’re paying millions of dollars for body cams, and yet?!?
News links to yesterday’s shooting:
https://boston.cbslocal.com/…/walpole-new-hampshire…/
https://www.reformer.com/local-news/video-officer-involved-shooting-in-walpole/video_1ce9eda6-b132-5f04-b2e3-b2e4c7d15a9b.html
I turn 50 today! This seems like… a lot, but honestly, I feel like I’m just getting started! I told Louis the other day that I believe I will live until 150, and that I am DEFINITELY going to space. Maybe nothing beyond the equivalent of getting high enough (hah!) to float in Zero Gravity like a once-in-a-lifetime rollercoaster ride, but I’m going to make it happen. Now y’all know why I want Elon Musk to be my bestie.
A couple of years ago, I set the goal of learning to surf by 50. Then Covid happened, the world turned stupid, and we all suffered. I did go to an indoor surf class once, and I stuck the ride, much to the surprise of the college kid who was helping me. Then I stuck it again. And again. Then I fell… hard–ah, so THAT’S what the helmet and knee pads are for! I did recently get a RevBalance board, and do use that in my home gym, so I’m chalking this one up to “tried, failed to meet the deadline, but I’m still working towards the goal.” Maybe when I’m 60? Until then, Hang Ten, yo!
I had delusions of grandeur about throwing a Fancy Pants Soiree at The Currier Museum. Then Covid happened, people got stupid, and I refuse to support any place enforcing a vax pass, so… yeah. Then, for a hot sec, I considered renting a house in Mexico or Malta, and inviting all my friends from across the world meet me, but then Covid was still a thing, governments were still being stupid, and… yeah.
Fortunately, I live an intentional life in a large community of awesome people, so when I threw a Big Party to celebrate a past community success two weeks ago, my friends surprised me with a heartfelt rendition of Happy Birthday, my own cupcake, and a giant Porcupine cake. Thank you!
I had only one other goal for today, and that was to fit in this Little Black Dress… I’m healthier at 50 than I have been since my 20s. I am definitely healthier than I was when I turned 40, and that is an accomplishment that I am super proud of! After making a commitment to prioritize myself, I decided to deal with my shit, and become more of the person *I*–not society, other people, or anyone else living rent-free in my head–want to be.
While I’m still figuring out who that is, while I am still learning, evolving, growing, failing and getting back up–something I will always do because I believe this is the recipe for happiness in life–I know she looks smashing in that dress!
To Future Me, to the next 50, to 2072 when I will be 100, I say, keep at it, find all the big and little things to love, and then LOVE the world with all you got, grrrl!
Read about the steps I took to change my life.
Read about how I learned to love myself.
PS: The best gift I was given this year was Obi, our new puppy who will keep me on my toes for the next decade and more!