Taomeow

Serengeti

Picture or it didn't happen.

"Foot support" is behind millions of injuries in runners (and probably people engaged in other shoed sports too) every year (according to the book me and Steve referenced, superbly researched). A foot immobilized by "support" loses much of its natural ability to develop toward supporting itself. It is prevented from gaining and perfecting sensitivity to hundreds of different types of terrain (they all feel the same to a "supported" foot so it never adjusts with particular kinds of fine mobility, or to put it differently, never develops kinesthetic intelligence). I always hunt for shoes that leave my foot alone and don't try to support it -- and if there's that bulky hump of an insert they love to stick in all women's footwear these days, the highest point invariably hitting my sole in an anatomically incorrect place (nowhere near where my natural arch is), I either don't buy them or tear the damn things right out and replace with a flat insert. And I can't even begin telling you how much foot support hinders the development of taiji skill in those who haven't figured it out.

If I were to run -- not that I'm inclined to, the ocean is what provides my endorphin hits -- I'd follow the Tarahumara methods, and footwear too, as described in this book which I found mighty enlightening: But I never went farther than making my DIY huaraches Tarahumara style. They were great. For walking over hilly terrain.

That's the spirit! Never tried Lunas though. Or running year round. Or at all, to be precise.

Camel toe... Cats... No! Ninja cats! Samurai cats! I'm a Japanophile in all things design. Those are ninja socks, aka tabi 足袋 --- suitable to wear with traditional Japanese footwear such as geta and zori and with SoCal flip-flops alike!

Those of Biden's champions who are diabetic and dependent on insulin for keeping their diabetes in check are now celebrating their victory in earnest. After all, they won the removal of the price cap on insulin criminally imposed by Trump in his misguided attempt to curb the pharma's appetite rooted in his wrongful and outrageous disregard for its superprofits. He was single-handedly responsible for the $60 a box price cap -- that's what insulin dependent diabetics were forced to pay in 2020 under his monstrous rule. Thankfully, Joe Biden removed that horrendous Trump price cap immediately, practically first thing he did once in office. Which resulted in a great new cause for celebration right away -- the price immediately went up to $328 a box. And that's only the beginning. Sky's the limit! So, special congratulations to the insulin dependent diabetics among the winners are in order. I know that some of you go through a box of insulin in a month, while others require multiple boxes each month. I know that this is not a medication of choice, you need your insulin, for the rest of your life, to stay alive. I know it can't be rationed so you can't use less, you have to use as much as you have to use per your doctor's prescription, and the amount is non-negotiable if you want to stay alive. I know that all of this makes you very happy. I rejoice with you. The only thing that pains me is knowing that people who didn't vote for Biden are in the same boat with you now even though they did nothing to deserve the honor. Maybe they should be forced to keep paying Trump prices for their insulin, they who tried to go against our pharmaceutical industry's best interest, who were willing to undermine its victorious march with their selfish concerns for their own and their family members' puny lives. Why reward them now with this chance to contribute they didn't fight for?.. Methinks they ought to be punished instead. $60 a box for them! They don't deserve to pay the hard-won $328 a box! Anyone who voted for Trump should be forced to pay the Trump price. That would serve the bastards right!

The cure: ( I own a few pairs. In February, San Diego summer ends around 3 pm almost every day. Many locals can't tell the difference and go barefoot in flip-flops even after 6 pm. Not me. I prefer to carry my winter wardrobe in my pocket, ready for the occasion of winter coming in the evening.)

The judge corroborated it too, saying, "yes, I can see that" when the cat asserted he's not a cat. I dunno... is he looking with his third eye or something? Does he see beyond appearances, like that taoist master who proclaimed, "what a magnificent black stallion!" when presented with a white mare? Maybe. Maybe his level of attainment is higher than mine. All I see is a cat. A talking cat who says he's not a cat. Well... butter me on both sides and call me a biscuit.

Since we're on the subject of cats once again, has everyone, by now, seen the cat who practices law in Texas? In case you haven't...

Nice choice. I've seen Vrubel's 1890 hit, The Demon Seated, in the original. It felt... well, otherworldy.

Outstanding. An apt illustration of what I meant when I said I always pay attention to voices that bring a sudden clear snippet of a conversation between some strangers passing by, or talking outside my window -- when all you hear is an indistinct mumbling of voices (or nothing at all) but then some word or statement stands out and sounds loud and clear. I usually take this as a comment to what I'm thinking, talking about or writing at the moment, and make a note of it. Once I was teaching walking qigong to a very disturbed, very unresponsive to any healthy interventions young woman, and she was behaving better than ever, cooperating and being uncharacteristically reasonable and open. I felt encouraged and hopeful. Some guys went by on bicycles, talking as they pedaled, and just when they were passing us one of them yelled, "Don't count on it, it will get much worse in three days." Maybe they were talking about the weather, who knows, but the statement came right on the heels of my thinking "maybe things will start improving with her," and it was the only part of the conversation I heard, so I couldn't help a mental "uh-oh..." Three days later, the young woman did something crazy enough to wind up in a mental institution. My pleasure. Yes, taiji sword is a practice very compatible with the qi of the year, generally speaking (i.e. if there's no personal bazi contraindications).

Someone sent me that link yesterday, and I took a trip around the globe too. My hometown across the globe was playing Venus by Shocking Blue. A true blue blast from the past. I settled on a station broadcasting folk songs from Senegal. (I miss my African dance classes...)

Cool stories, guys, thanks! By the way, "working class" in the title is perhaps a bit imprecise -- I didn't mean to exclude doctors or lawyers should they have their own profession-related paranormal tales.

From the Ph.D. thesis titled "Typology of fantastic characters in the folklore of miners in Western Europe and Russia," by Natalia Shvabauer “The image of Shubin is very popular among the miners of Ukraine. Shubin is known to all miners of Donbass: a similar character is found in the miners' stories of Krasnodon, Gorlovka, Grushevka, Makeevka, Kadievka. He does not possess zoomorphic features - his appearance is very close to that of a person. In one of the versions of the legends, Shubin is an old man who works underground as a duty officer in a mine yard. In another, he's the spirit of a former miner who quarreled with the owner and blew up the mine out of revenge. The spirit appears in the form of a familiar ("mine owner Koshkin"), a gray-haired old man with brightly glowing eyes (a distinctive feature of many mountain people), "an invisible man," a stranger in a miner's overalls with a bat on his shoulder. Its distinctive features are a nervous grin and eyes like glowing coals - "like a cat's, they glow in the dark." When such a creature greets the miner, one should answer the greeting with etiquette prescribed “blessed by your prayers.” The appearance of Shubin may foretell impending death - "to whom he meets, that means his end is near: he will be crushed" - or the end of development - “as soon as the last cage with the people comes out, he sits down in the cage and goes down into the mine as a gray-haired old man, after which the mine will surely be flooded." On the other hand, Shubin is able to predict a disaster and save the miner, pulling him out from the site of an accident. According to legend, the mountain spirit "pardons" only three times. Shubin cuts ore, often alongside a person. The spirit prefers to use the old-fashioned butt rather than a jackhammer, because "the sound gives him a headache" - the supernatural being's rejection of sharp sounds has been recorded more than once. He is said to have helped a miner who has spent all the money and is forced to work on a holiday. The guy loaded the trolleys, and the demon rolled them away. When the miner went outside, he turned completely gray. Sometimes Shubin subjects the miners to a test of physical strength and ingenuity and challenges them to compete with him. In some cases, the cunning mountain lord seeks to puzzle or humiliate the worker. Shubin's aversion to loud sharp noises extends to human laughter -- the spirit is forced to flee from it, supposedly because roaring laughter opposes its 144 infernal essences. " A local street art rendition: And the label of a local beer called "Kind/good/strong Shubin"

I've read that the reason they are almost gone is that they interbreed with domestic cats and produce fertile offspring, so living close to human dwellings (where domestic cats are ubiquitous) dilutes their genetic pool more and more. Of course the main factor is the shrinking habitat... like for all other wild creatures displaced by the expansionist pest humanity has been transmogrified into by "civilization." Some program to restore their population would be great though... It worked (at least to an extent, at least for now) for the Siberian (Amur) tiger -- a hundred years ago there were only 60 left, in the 1940s the population dropped to half that, but today there's about 580. This is not a high number nor a low one -- what's left of the territory they once inhabited (7% of it, the rest having been rendered uninhabitable for tigers) can only accommodate about as many...

Excellent gongfu!

Yes, I've had good experiences with traumeel too. I forgot to mention that one more prerequisite for a homeopathic remedy to be efficient is to use what the best, most reputable companies produce, 'cause there's a lot of junk out there masquerading as homeopathic remedies. The German producer of traumeel (Biologische Heilmittel Heel) is a reliable company, another one (perhaps the best, of the ones available in the US) is the French Boiron. (Of the "generic" remedies that can be tried without a precise diagnosis in most cases, they also have something excellent for eye strain of most origins -- especially if one's eyes are tired from staring at screens too long, feel dry/itchy, irritated, etc. -- their eye drops, Optique, are peerless. Many a TV series I would abandon before their finale if it wasn't for Optique. )

In most cases it requires a very precise diagnosis by a very knowledgeable master, there's no one remedy for any particular disease --this modality definitely treats the individual rather than a nosological unit. (Nosology is the branch of allopathic medicine that deals with classification of diseases.) To become a true specialist, a practitioner must invest as much in-depth study as one would expect from an MD, only they study altogether different things: an MD, what the pharmacological industry produces that can suppress symptoms, whereas a homeopath, what the whole of the plant, animal, mineral, and pharmacological environment produces that can either elicit a weakened version of the symptoms toward activating the whole system for resistance and/or resolution (not unlike the theory behind vaccinations), or remove the cause of the symptoms. Theoretically it is rooted in biophysics, not biology, which is one reason (political and economic in its origins) it is not acknowledged by mainstream narrative as a science -- our MDs neither study nor practice biophysics and haven't the foggiest what it is. Empirically, in my experience, it can work wonders if the diagnosis is precise and the remedy chosen correctly, but great practitioners are fairly rare, so one's mileage may vary. In my experience, homeopathy of "average" level of prescribing practitioner's expertise works far better in children than in adults -- it may have something to do with the remedy relying on "subtle" stuff, and a modern adult's system is too "noisy," too polluted with many interferences. Of the remedies that can convince a skeptic that seem to work despite these limitations, I'd suggest giving a try to homeopathic arnica for acute physical trauma. If you take it immediately, the painkilling effect is also immediate, and the swelling and inflammation one would expect with a particular type of trauma will be lessened drastically or won't develop at all.

It's not an awkward position. It's a position we systemically remember as the one we assume when ready to cross dimensions.

Our cops can dance and be merry and gay too. But a police officer is not one of those job descriptions where creativity and self-expression rule one's behavior, so it all depends on the tune played to the cops by their superiors. And that, in its turn, on the tune played to the superiors by politicians, and that, on the tune played by their corporate handlers. And that, on whether the director holding the baton is the devil himself or just one of his lesser disciples.

It could be that, or any number of other things that beg for felony charges. Wearing a shemagh on one's neck can easily be interpreted as a sign of paramilitary, militia, or terrorist radicalization. Sitting cross-legged with the knee up in the air instead of on the ground, as distortion of sacred teachings and/or an expression of privilege. Not looking the authority figure in the eye, as clear evidence of the suspect lying about something. (Looking in the eye, as clear evidence of defiance and noncooperation.) Or it was just our city in the spring of last year, when the beaches were off limits and some people were slapped with hefty fines for wrongfully watching the sunset from inside their cars, naively thinking that they were being compliant. No. Full compliance can't fall short of erasing without a trace the very knowledge, memory and cognizance of the ocean existing, and of our beaches being 70 miles long and criminally wide. And, ideally, of the sunsets one might be tempted to watch instead of the TV/computer/phone screen a compliant responsible citizen is expected to be looking at at all times. And better yet of the sun itself. High time to turn it off anyway. https://www.forbes.com/sites/arielcohen/2021/01/11/bill-gates-backed-climate-solution-gains-traction-but-concerns-linger/?sh=5d18524b793b https://bigthink.com/surprising-science/harvard-scientists-controversial-plan-dim-sunlight

Methinks there's a lot of truth in that approach. Anything can become a diviner's tool with the right mindset, it's just that some tools are more reliable than others, some yield to a "rational" explanation better than others, and some need a very deep understanding of the fabric of reality to be understood -- and relied upon to tell the truth. Chinese taoist divinational arts are in this latter category, and if mastered, allow the diviner to "roam the root of heaven and earth" and know what's what as well as she know her own kitchen. And, to continue with the cookie/kitchen metaphor, you can make many things out of what you store in your pantry and in your fridge if you know how to cook.