*headdesk*

on the other hand...

I was like, okay. That's interesting. And it turns out that if someone dies while constructing your building, you have to pay out from the insurance their funeral expenses. Now, most people who look at balance sheets and see the insurance thing pop up would instantly know that someone died there and that's bad for business. Bad feng shui and bad for your reputation.

However, no one really looks at the miscellaneous expense line and therefore, a lot of things get hidden there that no one really thinks about. Including insurance payouts.

When I applied for work, I continually think to myself. "Don't be another line in the miscellaneous expense."

Totally indifferent to them! We live on a busy road, and we get some pretty extreme thunderstorms, so they're pretty used to loud noises.

Even on their very first fourth of July, spent at a lake house, Mal and Vice were just fine watching the fireworks.

Let’s play the biggest game of kick the can on the internet.

Remember everyone that making the Constitution was infinitely more interesting and relevant to America than Thomas Jefferson’s callout post to King George, and that it marks a real 250th anniversary in terms of continuous governance. Also governance is building, not destroying!

Potatoes, while obviously the single most lifegiving crop in human history, have gotten a bit of an unfair rap in the media. Be it because of carbohydrates, not enough greenery, or the fact that everyone only eats them fried to a crisp in oil and heavily salted, it seems like there is always a chance for our so-called "truth tellers" to deliver a slam to the noble spud.

Of course, improving your mood will require cooking a potato. Eating them raw does not seem to make me feel any better. And that can be difficult, if you are already feeling pretty terrible. That's why I think we should replace the police with people who hand out a baked potato. They could have like a little oven or something with them and when you want one, you get one.

Now, now, I hear a lot of you saying: oh, but then who will arrest the criminals? That's scarcity thinking. There'll be no criminals anymore. If you're feeling like you might want to rob a bank, it's possible that you just need a baked potato. With chives, little sour cream, bacon bits? Any nearby Potato Officer will provide, and then you can go right back to having a productive life, doing some kind of weird hobby instead of threatening to shoot a bunch of people unless they give you money that you would just use to buy potatoes anyway.

Sometimes using a wheelchair means you can no longer get to the places that used to be important to you, and not because of man-made inaccessibility. I have sat with someone as they cried because they could no longer visit the place they had scattered a loved one’s ashes because not even the most expensive wheelchair in the world could handle the terrain. As much as I wanted to, my wheelchair meant that I couldn’t position myself in a way that would allow me to give them a proper hug. In that moment, our wheelchairs felt more like heavy weights than freedom.

And sometimes wheelchairs are like the legs of someone who can walk but would maybe benefit from a wheelchair themselves. Sometimes wheelchairs are exhausting and painful and you’re counting down the time before you’re able to be lifted into bed. Sure, like painful legs, you can do more with them than without, but constantly performing gratitude for something that hurts you is exhausting. And again, not because you need a better wheelchair, but because those are the limits of your body and the technology that exists.

It also has a lot of different kinds of stitches you can do that make different densities of fabric.

I was surprised that I’d never heard of it though. It’s older than knitting and crocheting and even though it’s been done all over the world it’s super relevant to Nordic culture and my grandmother and I are both into keeping in touch with our roots a bit so I’m surprised I’ve never heard of it.

It’s also a lot easier to freehand and adjust as you go than crochet or knitting and you mostly go by inches instead of rows and number of stitches so a large number of accessories like stitch markers or whatever isn’t really necessary.

We have nalebound early medieval socks for our reenactment kit. You can make the needle out of any old bit of wood with a knife. Popsicle sticks work! (when running classes, I make up a whole lot of quick and easy needles out of popsicle sticks. If I'm been arty-reenactory, I make them from antler, bone, boxwood or hard fruit tree wood). You can do hats, scarves, mittens, or just any old stuff that you can make by going round and round and round, and build up elements by then sewing the different pieces together. The most basic stitch is just an overhand knot.

Hats by my partner in stuff, J.

Or, given J. is somewhat prone to mathematical things, nalebind yourself some hyperbolic plane brain corals and then a sea slug to go on them, just because:

However it is very understandable that it isn’t as popular.

1. You drag the yarn through the loop. This means you have to use short pieces of yarn, not a large skein. You splice the yarn peices.

2. It is binding. You are tying knots. That makes it very hard to unravel. Harder than crochet.

The reason why knitting was revolutionary and kept as a trade secret for a long time, is that you keep the one sided loops. And that you can unravel the whole thing easily.

No matter It is beautiful. And the people who are masters, can do almost anything.

The neckwarmer below had needlbound braids.

Btw there's Needlbinding Festival every 3rd weekend in August, in my local Iron Age village. You should visit.