Uncategorized – A Four Score Graybeard

Missive #411 Published20 December 2024

66. The Thief with a Wagon…

A friend wrote recently about a decrease in his Heart Rate Variability (HRV) which caused me to do some research. I didn't know much about it except that it was the 'pause' between heart beats. What I found out was that my Polar Pacer watch, through Polar Flow, provides that data for me. From what I have read the best time to measure HRV is when you first get up in the morning. Since I have been wearing my watch at night with the continuous heart rate option turned on I'm capturing that data.

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Missive #410 Published 19 December 2024

Dos Passos tried to write this book in the same style as his USA trilogy that has hailed by the liberal left when he was a liberal. Unfortunately, he moved right and this right leaning book, published after his death, has been virtually ignored. I didn't like the USA trilogy style very much. This book would have been better if published as two separate books; one a fiction and a second one as a series of essays.

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Missive #409 Published 16 December 2024

Sigwulf, a minor Saxon prince, is saved from execution after his family is slaughtered by the ruthless King Offa of Mercia. Thanks to his Devil's Mark - his eyes of different colors — Sigwulf is exiled to the Frankish court of King Carolus, the future Charlemagne. There Sigwulf survives on his wits while at the same time trying to come to terms with disturbingly prophetic dreams.

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Missive #408 Published 15 December 2024

Continuing The Federalist Papers.

Federalist No. 36
The Same Subject Continued: Concerning the General Power of Taxation
Author: Alexander Hamilton
To the People of the State of New York:

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Missive #407 Published 14 December 2024

A rumor campaign threatens to thwart London barrister Leo Davies's hope of election to that rarefied strata of the British legal hierarchy, the Queen's Counsel. The rumors are based on truth, for Leo's sex life is hardly conventional. In a typical mystery novel, such a scenario would lead to blackmail or murder…or both. But Caro Fraser's new novel is neither typical nor a mystery. All of the drama in this character study of a fascinating protagonist comes from Leo's interior struggle with issues of sex, love, class, and ambition. The real mystery is how erroneously this book has been cast as a legal thriller.

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Missive #406 Published 13 December 2024

65. Bags of Loot

Nasruddin’s wife woke him in the middle of the night. “I heard burglars!” she whispered. “I saw them leaving their bags of loot in the garden, and then I heard them come into our house. It sounds like they’re in the kitchen.”

Nasruddin leaped out of bed, pulled on his clothes, and began to climb out of the bedroom window into the garden.

“What are you doing?” his wife asked.

“I’m going to sneak outside,” Nasruddin whispered, “and steal the loot from other people’s houses while the thieves waste their time looking for something worth stealing here inside our house.”

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Missive #405 Published 11 December 2024

The Customer review that I have quoted got it right; it is hard to keep track and I was tempted to give up. The story progresses from character to character then returns to each one of them to pick up their part of the story; very hard to keep track. The author did this in his other alternative history books but this is even more difficult because it is fantasy.

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Missive #404 Published 9 December 2024

Not much of a book promo and very few customer reviews. I thought it was a decent history of the Rocky Mountain area and deserved more. This is the second book by this author that I have read and since I enjoy history I'll be reading more of his.

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Missive #403 Published 8 December 2024

Continuing The Anti-Federalist Papers

Brutus V (pt. 1)
by Robert Yates

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Missive #402 Published 6 December 2024

64. The Burglar in the Dark

Nasruddin awoke to the sound of a burglar in his house. He got up, crept downstairs, and found the burglar stuffing all kinds of household objects into his sack.

“Excuse me,” said Nasruddin, startling the burglar, who stared at Nasruddin in surprise.

“It’s dark now, of course,” continued Nasruddin, “so it’s entirely possible you don’t realize what you’re doing. You seem to think these objects have some kind of value. But the fact is that they don’t have any value at all. I’ve seen these objects in broad daylight, and I can assure you that everything here is completely worthless.”

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