Porumbeii

Palomas, palombe, palumbus….. a Romanian pigeon site. Because Romanian IS a Romance language. Someone told me this was “Portuguese”. I went to it and more or less understood a lot, having French and some Latin, Spanish, Italian. But it looked… weird. Then I saw the “ro” in the url…. The “Carunculat”– the pigeon in the …

Read more

Iraq Iran

Re Rod Dreher’s Crunchy Con, a remark from Alan Dershowitz: “History may well conclude that America and Britain fought the wrong preventive war against a country that posed no real threat, and that fighting that wrong war stopped them fighting the right preventive war against a country that did pose a danger to world peace.” …

Read more

New Chernobyl?

David Satter wonders if another Chernobyl is possible in Russia, given their technology and a persistent culture of secrecy and unaccountability. Of course, in a fascinating book, Mary Mycio argues that Chernobyl’s effects were more complex and less simplistically devastating than the pop press or Greenpeace might have it (the area is now a vast …

Read more

Puppy Numbers

Mothers-to-Be How many pups will our Girls have? Steve and Val Kaeppler, fellow NM breeders, found a database based on 2080 saluki litters. 1 pup: 89 litters2 pups: 1043 pups: 1364 pups:1975 pups:3146 pups: 4197 pups3588 pups: 2669 pups: 12310 pups 5111 pups: 1812 pups: 413 pups: 1 Lash had six lurcher pups so I …

Read more

Redtail

Rebecca has a savage, lovely pic up, a wild redatail with a grosbeak right outside her window. “I try to replay it in my head and realize that even though I was looking, I experienced the moment rather than seeing it, too primal of an instant to do anything but react. I only saw red …

Read more

Real Dogs

Is there still a place for real dogs in our world? Yvonne McGehee contemplates the prospects. She is a borzoi breeder who lives in Idaho, still running the dogs the in the way that they shoould be run, and found, on a visit to Hungary, a single dog with the old fire: “… my beliefs …

Read more

Plus ca Change

Tom McIntyre found this NYT essay by Verlyn Klinkenborg comparing the blogosphere to the paleo- alternative media described by Catholic populist and controversialist Hilaire Belloc in the early Twentieth century. Update: have found it is now behind the Times’ subscription firewall. Still worth looking for if you subscribe.

The Writer’s Life

Prairie Mary gives us one of the best essays I have seen on the unglamorous side of the writer’s life, that is, life as we know it, here. “My income puts me four dollars over the poverty line, but this is a choice — as school teachers these days say in a blaming voice as …

Read more

Gun Stuff

A wonderful not- quite- new gun blog: Dave Petzal’s “Gun Nut”. Dave is possibly the most literate gun editor I ever (many years ago) worked with, funny, irreverent, and he knows everything– argue with him at your peril. He is also refershingly anti EVERY idiot. I quote a recent post: “Let’s look at the Bush …

Read more

AR Follies 2: Albuquerque

Meanwhile, close to home, Albuquerque residents soon can choose between having all their dogs neutered and microchipped or owning them under even MORE restrictive rules. I am not remotely exaggerating. The original “simple, fair” regs promoted by Albuquerque mayor Marty Chavez were ” that all dogs and cats be spayed or neutered, provides the service …

Read more