Hello, everyone.  The holiday season is finally winding down.  All that is left of it are the continuing Christmas themed ads on TV and the usual year end retrospectives of what happened last year.  We aren't getting as much of either as we used to because we turn off the TV for most of the day.  We check in for a couple of hours in the morning and evening for the (s)news otherwise we keep Pandora or Netflix on.  Recaps of last year don't interest me much because I don't see much worth remembering and I don't expect this year to be significantly different--let's not even talk about better.  Evidently that conclusion--that things will continue on their current trajectory--is shared by two of my favorite bloggers:  John Michael Greer and David Kaiser.

I love the title of this article:  "Must-Have Gadgets You Don't Need".  That neatly describes my assessment of most technology out there.  And, since I don't need it, I don't want it.

And another article the title of which I love:  "Are some diets 'mass murder'?"  We have become increasingly skeptical and critical of dietary advice.  A couple of years ago Mom's GP suggested a diet to help lower her cholesterol which provided us several good laughs.  We have totally ignored it.  What we have done is shift to whole milk, butter and almost totally cut out commercially prepared foods.  We also read the labels carefully choosing items with the fewest additives.  We also prepare most of our food from scratch.  I don't bother with any advice that talks about "nutrients" like fats, saturated fats, carbohydrates.  Food and nutrients are not necessarily the same thing.  And trying to link "nutrients" to diseases takes a leap of faith I no longer am willing to make.