This one is a high- quality modern version of the classic Colt 1911 by Kimber . It has some useful modifications like Tritium night sights and a better magazine, but the reason I have photographed it is the wonderful custom scrimshaw handles by Eagle Grips. The design is a composite– my drawing– of several Tokugawa-era– …
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Writing– the Continuing Series
I have been reading RobertKaplan’s good Mediterranean Winter and came upon this good advice given him by Patrick Leigh Fermor, the still- living greatest travel writer of the Twentieth Century (and if he completes the third volume of his trilogy before he dies, an early contender for the title in the Twenty- first). Fermor’s advice, …
“We were dreamers, dreaming greatly…
… in the man- stifled town;We yearned beyond the sky-line where the strange roads go down.” Kipling, of course. I become blue, even depressed, when unable to get away to somewhere strange, cold, and unhospitable but for people, who may stuff you with sheep or drown you in vodka. Or maybe to a hot place …
A Right and a Left!
Strictly speaking, shooting terminology. But two recent online esays from rather left and libertarian right perspectives– granted, on two different subjects– seemed to have a lot to say to me. In an article called “No people Allowed” in Orion, Mark Dowie argues that some westerners and conservation associations, however well- meaning, are decreeing new refuges …
A Serious China Essay
This rather dark and soberly analytical piece suggests that we may not prevail over an ascendant China either by trade or by military might. Must reading both for hubristic foreign- policy types and WSJ- type optimists.. Recommended, as they say.
Senior Trip
A tart guest post by Libby, who also has been known to have strong opinions (are you surprised?) on the senior trip in our small town. Remember, most of our roads are not even paved! “Out here is seems to be customary for the graduation senior class to take a trip during the last week …
I am just as surprised as you…
… but it appears that I am soon going to Kurdistan. Dogs, of course. More when I know more…
Another Ghost
A little late for Halloween, I present to you another of Connie Barlow’s Ghosts of Evolution, the devil’s claw. This one does better than some of the other survivors, like Osage orange and honey locust, because horses and other equids are “back” on their old home ground, and because humans and cows make pretty good …
Crowley’s Ridge Nature Center
While in Arkansas last month I visited the Forrest L. Wood Crowley’s Ridge Nature Center just south of Jonesboro. Their website is here. My father had been telling me about it since it opened last year, knew I’d enjoy it, and got us out to see it right away. Based on his description and with …
On the Nobility of Dogs
This is a guest post by my friend Patrick Porter of Massachusetts, botanist, flower grower, pigon fancier, hunter, and dog man. And did I say writer? It was an answer to a controversy but I think it stands alone: My credentials for this discussion are spotty. I am a botanist, not an animal behaviorist, but …