TEOTWAWKI

 Another fine acronym that all planners will want to use.


TEOTWAWKI

The end of the world as we know it.


The end is nigh!  

            I hope not

Were all gonna Die!

            Well, yes, none of us gets out of this alive, but not soon, I hope.

Events in the Life of a 70 Year Old


YearsEventTotal DiedAnnualized
(to date)Rate
2020-presentCovid-19200,000300,000+-?*
1981-2020HIV Aids675,00017,308
2001-presentAfghanistan1,83396
2003-2011Iraq War3,836426
Sep 11, 20019112,9772,977
1955-1975Vietnam War58,2202,911
1950-1953Korean War33,6868,422
1952Polio3,0003,000
*guestimate
for 12 months200,000 firstseven months

The events above imacted the lives of people presently 70 years old. For some of Polio was among our first memories when we were very young.  Our wars have been sad events, with Vietnam our a major challenge when we turned 18.  HIV AIDS has been with us for 40 years. 911 was an enormous shock. And Covid-19 has made a very major impact in only seven months.






The Tyrrany of SSgt Fitbit

My friend suggested that I start using a fitness watch to better condition the old ticker. So my wife purchased a Fitbit Versa 2.

Her name is SSgt Fitbit. Like most men I am trained to listen to and instantly obey women. And she is a Marine Staff Sergeant - a Platoon Sergeant - trained to get people to perform. 

SSgt Fitbit’s mission was to gently prod me into better condition. She would track my pulse and count my steps, and relay this information to my phone and computer. She was very smart.

Initially she got me to walk 10,000 steps a day. This was easy. Although the science for walking 10,000 steps is nil. The magic number “10,000” dates back to a marketing campaign conducted shortly before the start of the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games. A company began selling a pedometer called the Manpo-kei: “man” meaning 10,000, “po” meaning steps and “kei” meaning meter. It was hugely successful and the number seems to have stuck. It has as much scientific validity as "an apple a day keeps the Doctor away."

Still, it was truly meet and right and salutary. I would happily and leisurely walk my steps.

Then SSgt Fitbit started cracking down.  She started making me track active minutes. That was ok. The magic watch on my wrist did its thing and put it on the phone.

But then, as so often happens, she became pushy and
demanding. She started requiring me to perform active zone minutes. You have to push your pulse up to at least 93 beats

per minutes and then push it up to 113 beats per minute for double zone minutes. And she really wants me to go at 127 beats per minute. No more leisurely pleasure walks - now I am stepping out like a crazed madman sweating in the Florida sun where no one goes except Mad Dogs and Englishmen.

She reminds me of Sgt Daniels, an excellent but demanding young Marine NCO. Sgt Daniels was leading a run of our Marine unit. One Marine stumbled and started to fall out. Sgt Daniels was having none of it. She shouted and yelled and made him complete the run. After that he went to sickbay where they found he had broken his leg.

SSgt Fitibt has taken to exhorting me to go faster in many different languages. It is all telepathic - she is in my head! I know some of the words - Korean - Nakaja, Hebingday! Balyway, Hwang!, and Russian поторапливаться!, but the rest of her exhortations are in a variety of unknown languages. But I understand - move faster and faster.

I could take her off my wrist, or quit charging her, or throw her in the lake. But she has taken over my mind and body!! Invasion of the Body Snatchers!

And she mocks me, laughing and goading me. Oh, the Humanity! Where will it all end?



US Department of State - Russian Disinformation

 


Click to View the report

US Department of State - Russian Disinformation





Social Media is a very important way to communicate. As the graphics below show, many people in the US use social media.
Younger people use technology at higher rates than older people.



There are many different Social Media Platforms. The table below shows them by popularity. Youtube and Facebook has the largest usage. Video has become increasingly important, with Youtube now outperforming Facebook, although both platforms use Video.



Click the link below to read the full article:

 https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/fact-sheet/social-media/



Homes Size - Then and Now

 


Home size - Then and Now

https://www.propertyshark.com/Real-Estate-Reports/2016/09/08/the-growth-of-urban-american-homes-in-the-last-100-years/



Tiny Houses - Then and Now

Back to the Future

The tiny home movement is interesting. I am in favor of it. Living with less and making less of an impact on the environment is a worthy goal.

It is also back the future.  For most of mankinds existence we lived in housing of moderate size. 





All four sets of my great grandparents homesteaded in western South Dakota in first decade of the 1900. The claim shacks were built on site, sometimes with sod or dugouts.  Tiny Houses.



https://history.sd.gov/museum/docs/HomesteadingDakota.pdf




Homestead Acts

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Norwegian settlers in North Dakota, 1898

The Homestead Acts were several laws in the United States by which an applicant could acquire ownership of government land or the public domain, typically called a homestead. In all, more than 160 million acres (650 thousand km2; 250 thousand sq mi) of public land, or nearly 10 percent of the total area of the United States, was given away free to 1.6 million homesteaders; most of the homesteads were west of the Mississippi River.

An extension of the homestead principle in law, the Homestead Acts were an expression of the Free Soil policy of Northerners who wanted individual farmers to own and operate their own farms, as opposed to Southern slave-owners who wanted to buy up large tracts of land and use slave labor, thereby shutting out free white farmers.

The first of the acts, the Homestead Act of 1862, opened up millions of acres. Any adult who had never taken up arms against the Federal government of the United States could apply. Women and immigrants who had applied for citizenship were eligible. The 1866 Act explicitly included black Americans and encouraged them to participate, but rampant discrimination, systemic barriers and bureaucratic inertia slowed black gains.[1] Historian Michael Lanza argues that while the 1866 law pack was not as beneficial as it might have been, it was part of the reason that by 1900 one quarter of all Southern black farmers owned their own farms.[2]

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