Tag: Good Guys

Quote Of The Day

QOTD, Seen On Campus

“Physical sciences is a VERY hard subject, which will require ALL of your attention and your FULL brain capacity (and for a large fraction of you, even that will not be quite enough).  You can ONLY do well (ie achieve your potential, which rightly or wrongly several people here assumed you have) if you are completely focused, and learn to enjoy the course.  People who just TAKE the course, but enjoy their social life, can easily survive in many subjects — but not in this one.  Remember that you are NOT at any other uni, where students do drink a lot and do have what they regard as a ‘good time’ — and you are NOT on a course, as some Cambridge courses sadly are, where such a behaviour pattern is possible or acceptable.”
— Professor Eugene Terentjev, Cambridge University

My hero.  It’s precisely what I would say to incoming freshmen if I were teaching a course at university.  (Which is why I wouldn’t last long.)

Predictably, all the Fainting Goats are outraged.

Helping Hand

Friends and Family

Sarah Hoyt and her husband Dan are two of my best friends.  They decided to leave Colorado for a better life and for Sarah’s health, and as so often happens, they’ve been caught between a rock and a hard place, and before they have their children sold into slavery and their new home repossessed by the Evil Moneylenders, they’re going to need some serious cash.

Not accustomed to asking for help, Sarah contacted me and asked my advice.  They could have got a bridge loan from said Evil Moneylenders, but as there’s no guarantee of when they’ll be able to sell their old house in Colorado, that wouldn’t help much.

We’ve all been there — and I more than anyone.  What follows is an abbreviated email exchange between us:

On 11/1/2021 11:51 AM, Sarah Hoyt wrote:  We’re going to need something like 50k in the next couple of months.  We’re hoping old house will go up in two days and sells that fast, but Colorado isn’t TX and we’re heading towards massive snow…. If it takes more than a month to sell, we’re probably going to lose everything including our (modest, and rather cute) new house, which we love.
I don’t want to do a GoFundMe.  It’s weird. When I can, I donate to my friends, and I’ve never viewed them as begging, but to ask for 50k, which is what I make on my TOP earning years feels shameful, like I spent it on furs and caviar.
I know you’ve done one before. I also know your circumstances were literally unforeseen, but I thought you might be able to give me some perspective, one way or another.
Sarah

From Kim:  Do the GoFundMe thing.  It literally saved my life, not in a dramatic sense, but in a “keeping all the money-related stress” out of it.
Don’t put yourself at the mercy of chance, the weather or the real estate market — none of which you can control.  Your home is more important than that, and losing your new house is not something to gamble on — even if you ignore of the effort of packing everything up and storing it, the costs thereof are considerable.
Don’t be silly.  This is what friends are for.  When you set up the GFM thing, let me know.  I’m probably good for $500 if I can do it over two months.
All love and affection, and my best to Dan.
Kim

On 11/1/2021 12:52 PM, Sarah Hoyt wrote:  Is there an instructable showing how to do this?

From Kim:  I just went to the GFM website, and followed the instructions on how to.
Just so you know, I hated doing it — asking for charity from others is so out of my comfort zone, you wouldn’t believe it. But at the same time, a HUGE number of people loved me, and Connie, and WANTED to help. The best example was from a Reader who had once visited the house and had dinner with us. When the GFM thing appeared, he donated $1,000 even though he was long past retirement age. Before I banked it, I emailed him and asked him if he’d misplaced the decimal, and if not, was he SURE he’d want to pay that much. His reply was epic. “It’s my money, and how dare you tell me how to spend it as I wish?”
I don’t know whether you’ll get up to the $50 thou, but my suspicion is that you will, easily. I raised over $30k in two weeks… and I hadn’t been blogging in over two years.
Remember to let me know when it’s up, so I can put it up on my website. Also ask Stephen to give you a punt on Insty so you don’t have to do it for yourself.
Go for it.

And she did.  I also know that she needs a LOT more than $50k, but she was too embarrassed to ask for more.  When you get to the page, you’ll be flabbergasted as I was — give anyway, because if anyone needs a break, Sarah does.  And if you want to know how much she is loved, check out the comments at Insty’s place.

Sarah needs our help.  Please go to her assistance — she’s one of the hardest-working people I know (in a field which doesn’t pay much — ask me how I know about writing as a profession).  Her writing income has also suffered not just through poor health, but also because her books are not “politically correct” and she faces a continuous barrage of calls to stop publication of her books altogether.

And anyone who’s read her posts will attest that she is a stout patriot and a beacon of sanity in a world bereft of same.

So please, I beg you all to go over to her GoFundMe page and help out to the best of your ability.

I’ve donated $250 myself, with another installment to come next month.

Bless you all for helping.

Update:  Sarah’s response, at hour 24.

Dept. Of Righteous Shootings

Righteous Shootings

Guy gets fired, is pissed off about it, goes home, fetches a gun, goes back to his former place of employment and starts voicing his grievance by shooting people.

This being rural Nebraska, however, there just happens to be a shotgun lying around, so the aggrieved assumes room temperature, but sadly, only after killing two people.

Of course, had he not looked down the naughty end of a shotgun, there’s no telling how many more people he’d have killed because as usual, the police were miles away — but that’s not the way it’ll be reported.

Oxi Day

Deep Thoughts, Heroism

From Longtime Reader Brad:

You tell of your Grandfather on a yearly basis… his quiet determination to live his life, support and protect his family, etc.
Perhaps you recall columnist John Kass from The Trib — he’s indie now — he bailed earlier this year immediately after lefty vulture “capitalists” bought The Trib.
I give you this …

I always liked to read John Kass back when I lived in Daley City, and this ranks up there with his best.  Wonderful, and humbling.

Thanks, Brad.

Well, Now

Politics, Sports

Here’s an interesting piece of news coming from Seffrica:

Members of the the South African men’s cricket team competing at the T20 World Cup in the United Arab Emirates have been ordered to “take the knee” before every match. A directive issued by the Cricket South Africa (CSA) Board late Monday night outlined the new requirement.
The move follows the team’s T20 World Cup opener against Australia on the weekend when players were seen variously standing, kneeling or raising a fist during the statutory pre-match BLM protest.

And then this subsequent situation:

South African cricket star Quinton de Kock withdrew from a major international competition Tuesday rather than follow a new policy requiring players to kneel for the country’s national anthem in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.
De Kock, who was named South Africa’s “Cricketer of the Year” in 2020, and who has served as the team’s captain, made himself unavailable for the team’s T20 World Cup match against the West Indies on Tuesday, rather than be forced to kneel.

I know that few Readers on this here back porch would be familiar with the game and players of cricket, so let me tell you:  this is a big fucking deal.  Quinton de Kock is one of the best cricketers in the world — ask anyone who follows international cricket — and as he’s the team’s wicket-keeper (catcher, in baseball terms) and a first-class batter who has more than once won games all by his own efforts, his loss to the SA team will be incalculable.

That said, Cricket South Africa is more of a political institution than a sports governing body, so they’re not going to make an exception — CSA is the bunch of fools who mandated that all SA cricket teams have to consist of x number of White players, y number of Black players, and z number of “other races”, regardless of talent.  So the teams are picked almost exclusively by color.

Anyway, De Kock has decided not to follow this BLM kneeling bullshit, and good for him.  His courage in putting it all on the line for his beliefs will not be forgotten.

Dept. Of Righteous Shootings

Righteous Shootings

I love stories like this one:

[A] North Dakota woman understood that, and even after taking out an order of protection against her on-again, off-again boyfriend after he allegedly assaulted her and threatened to kill her, she chose to have friends around in case her ex showed up at her apartment.

One of said friends happened to be packing a .357 Mag revolver when the off-again boyfriend showed up with malice in his heart, and the rest is history.

For true justice to take place, however, there should also be some kind of legal penalty for the asshole judge who let this choirboy out on parole, despite a history of violence.