Link Log for January 11

Sarah Arrow lists thirty prompts that seem to be aimed at commercial-type blogging...

http://www.whatisablog.co.uk/what-do-i-blog-about/

As noted at Google +, it may be important to use this technique only when you want to "fall in love with" someone who's free to return your passion. And I'd recommend that those under age 50 turn it waaay down, if we use it at all, when business, same-sex friendship, or platonic cross-gender friendship is the goal. Nevertheless, here's a safe and effective Love Spell that definitely works for and on Christians...

http://ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com/3536540.html

For all proud Irish Crocheters...

http://crystalbutterflycreations.blogspot.com/2015/01/shamrocks-and-4-leaf-clover-crochet.html

Essential oils can be blisteringly strong, although herbal fragrances are a natural, sometimes frugal way to repel all kinds of pests. Most people who use essential oils drip them, one drop at a time, into a tablespoon or more of a scentless, skin-safe oil. At one time Hartz used herb oils and borax to make a natural-scented flea repellent that didn't give me or my cats any unwanted allergy-type reactions. I've used it sparingly, in years when flea populations were high. Most years my cats find and roll in fresh pennyroyal as needed. A bag of dried pennyroyal, not even opened but stored in corners in a ziplock bag, works well to encourage fleas to avoid the house. However, last summer, when flea populations skyrocketed, I broke out the flea powder. Although Heather, Irene, Ivy, and Sisawat had never been dusted with flea powder before, they recognized the scent and crowded up to get their shares. "No, Ivy. Not you. You are nursing kittens. It's not recommended for kittens." Ivy looked disappointed--and Sisawat very sweetly rubbed her freshly scented head right under Ivy, to make sure the tiny kittens were exposed anyway! Luckily, perhaps because the powder had been stored for at least eight years, it didn't noticeably harm the kittens.

http://www.dogpawsitivetidbits.com/2015/01/tick-repellent-essential-oils-for-dogs.html

Birds don't seem to care whether bird feeders or nest boxes are decorated in ways humans find cute, as long as they're the right size and not accessible to predators...but humans do. Here's a cute one:

http://essentialwildlifegardeninggifts.blogspot.com/2015/01/gift-of-gorgeous-decorative-wooden-bird.html

Feel-good story about a liberated woman from Terresa Monroe-Hamilton:

http://noisyroom.net/blog/2015/01/10/when-fiore-speaks-tongues-wag/

Did the Irish save civilization? Did the Jews invent it? Move over...here's a book about how the English (and English-speaking people) modernized it. (Which is an indisputable historical fact, and stop wailing, ethnic-minority Americans--you speak English and were part of the process too.)

http://noisyroom.net/blog/2015/01/10/book-review-inventing-freedom-how-the-english-speaking-peoples-made-the-modern-world/

Rarely, and only in order to snuggle up with the right man, will I sit through a whole football game, but even I had to appreciate the smoothness of this move. Even if it was part of the clobbering of one of the teams I tend to favor.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/11/this-play-is-rare-in-the-nfl-and-the-ravens-looked-like-they-werent-expecting-it-at-all/?

Wal-Mart continues to employ...was "imbecile" the category one step above "moron"? "A person of extreme and probably permanent confusion"?

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/09/the-crazy-reason-a-walmart-clerk-refused-to-print-an-engagement-photo-that-it-happened-in-texas-is-crazier/?

It's the timing that makes it so hard for me to "believe the women" claiming to have been date-raped or groped or whatever by Bill Cosby. I can believe that really bad dates exist; I can believe that it's when, and because, a woman feels attracted to the man but reluctant to do some specific thing, that the line between persuasion and violation becomes blurry; I can believe Cosby and women he dated used to mess around with booze and pills, mess around with each other under the influence, and have really lousy dates. I've had a couple of nasty guilt-inducing times, not merely with men generally considered desirable, but with men I personally desired; I know all about the "No, don't do that, but don't stop doing that" date-ruining syndrome. I could even believe that the lack-of-consent factor was serious enough to qualify what they've reported more as gropes than as rapes as some sort of criminal assault--if the women had complained within a year, five years, even ten years. It's the fact that they've waited until there were grandchildren to be hurt by their nasty talk, and until Cosby retired from acting and focussed on urging people to say no to the welfare addiction, that makes me tend to believe that these women are (at best) Prozac-demented. And I also think the word "rape" has one specific meaning, which does not include mere grabbing, groping, fumbling, fondling, or any other way people make themselves tiresome, and "rape" should not be used to describe even assaults that leave bruises on other parts of the victims; "assault" is a perfectly good word.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/09/hecklers-stand-up-chant-these-four-words-at-bill-cosbys-canada-show/?

I've seen what at least two correspondents circulated as the cartoons that triggered riots and terrorism in Paris. It's not just my inability to pay for them that keeps me from reposting them here; despite their historical significance they are rude, obnoxious, tacky cartoons. One showed a caricature that looks like a typical Talibani, alleged to be the founder of Islam, saying something in French that I understand to translate something that's rude enough in English to get a person arrested for saying it on the street. I don't think that sort of thing is funny. I think it's the sort of cartoon that might "belong" on the wall of an outhouse at a summer camp for ten-year-olds, but not in a printed magazine or newspaper. Nor even in the kind of "alternative newspaper" or web site that appeals to "sophisticated urban adults," which I do sometimes read, but which have a standard that the rude jokes are supposed at least to be funny.

But even when cartoons are tacky enough to justify distributors saying "I won't print or sell this; if you want to sell it, haul it around and promote it yourself," that does not justify murder. Duh.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/09/journalism-professor-confronts-new-york-times-editor-about-decision-not-to-publish-charlie-hebdo-cartoons/?

Virginia takes too many handouts from the federal government, sacrifices too much local control in exchange for handouts from the federal government...yet Virginia rates 48th out of 50, taking fewer handouts from the federal government than almost any of the other United States. I'm glad to read this! Thank you for sharing, Oliver Darcy!

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/10/which-states-rely-the-most-on-federal-aid-new-map-has-the-answer/?

Well...for the moment I'm steaming mad about this one. Let's just say: My home relies primarily on wood heat. Within my lifetime, 100% of the wood burned in my home has been either dead wood, or wood lovingly hand-pruned off living trees. I reclaimed a lot of it from construction sites where it would otherwise have been destroyed in bonfires, which construction workers are inflicting on the environment because they're finding it hard to give away scrap wood. My stove is pretty much airtight, burns garbage--including dung and carrion--as well as wood, and saves my local environment from a lot of pollution. My father put a good filter cap on the chimney in the 1980s, and I personally added a metal liner sleeve in the 1990s. I don't add nearly as much carbon waste to the atmosphere as the electric company from which the EPA wants to force me to buy all my home heat, nor do I burn fossil fuels--the company burns coal. This is what's known as cap-and-trade, Gentle Readers. It's immoral and unethical and abusive and cruel. I am not going to give up my Granola Green home and lifestyle in order to be trapped in some sort of all-electric-heated housing project. Let'em sue me--and if pried away from my home and my Granola Green wood-and-garbage-burning stove, I'll stop eating. (I know I have what it takes to do an Ultimate Hunger Strike, thanks to the past year of Poison Green GMO-food-induced anguish.) This EPA policy needs to be struck down, and those who made it need to be permanently removed from the U.S. government, if not from the entire U.S.

http://ntlconsulting.blogspot.com/2015/01/epas-version-of-frozen.html

And here's another example of federal bloat at "work" wasting your tax dollars:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-09/u-s-justice-department-intervenes-in-redskins-trademark-fight.html?cmpid=yhoo

Whew...I needed something to warm my American heart after those two links. Here is such a thing.

http://www.dogs4warriors.org/posters/

The Guardian prompted Twitterers: "What does your dream job look like?" MIPhoto at Morguefile had the right cat image, even the right color...

Marsha Cooper's table runner is just what laptop users need...

https://www.zibbet.com/marsha32/tablerunner-in-bright-colors-with-matching-hot-pads

You need to see the cartoon here:

http://higherperspective.com/2015/01/jesus.html

At Bubblews, Julito turned it into a chortle-worthy post:

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9784472-i-blame-the-universe-for-all-the-bad-things-happening-on-earth

Susanzeitler shares the latest phishing scam...

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9788906-a-warrant-for-my-arrest-you-might-have-one-too

If anything, Theresa Wiza is being too charitable, actually posting on Bubblews these days...

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9777834-what-might-be-bubblews-biggest-mistakes

...On further consideration, I'm sure she's being too charitable.

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9760765-redemption-update

This is about non-payments for updates about a second amputation, which this Bubbler has been posting from a hospital.

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9780700-trust-is-a-two-way-street

So this will probably be my last full-length Bubblews post...for a long time, unless the site makes some radical changes. Hello, Morgan Griffith, Mark Warner, Tim Kaine, and Robert Hurt for that matter. This is a National Problem of particular concern to Virginians, because, to our shame and sorrow, Bubblews is based in Fairfax.

http://www.bubblews.com/news/9791306-farewell-to-bubblews

Finally, a cute animal photo from Florida. (I don't expect to see lizards in my part of the world for several weeks.)

http://personapaper.com/article/19181-temperatures-drop-lizards-in