Thanksgiving is a truly American holiday. Where Americans reflect and give thanks for the incredible fortune we have enjoyed. It is the dinner, the gathering of family around a meat which makes thanksgiving special, but it has given rise to a new tradition, the Friendsgiving.
1/ Like many of you, I spent many Thanksgivings far from my blood family, sometimes sharing an MRE in an 1151 off Tampa, eating off a paper plate at NTC, or spending it with other homesick expats all over the world.
2/ For me, “Friendsgiving” started before the trend, and for over a decade I spent more thanksgivings with friends and my adopted brothers than I did with my blood family.
3/ It is these Thanksgivings that in retrospect mean the most to me, because they weren’t the obligatory family gathering, they were people we chose to spend the evening with.
4/ Inviting non blood relations into our homes and feeding them from our tables is one of the most intimate and nurturing things we can do.
This attraction towards supping with our friends is rooted in our history.
5/ From the days of Pliny the Younger witnessing early Christian Agape Feasts to frontier trappers gathering around a strangers fire to get out from the cold, the tradition of dining with those we are not forced to was once strong in the West. Somehow along the way we lost it.
6/ As we shifted towards a life of consumerism we often preferred the ease of eating in restaurants and meeting in bars. Public places are a crutch of formality, and reduce the intimacy of dinner at home in a society increasingly shying away from close interpersonal contact.
7/ And while the food at a restaurant may taste better, it will never match home cooked meals, the sense of accomplishment they provide and collegial participation of accomplishing something together.
8/ The imagery of close, friends and neighbors gathered around a home table, talkin, bonding and getting to know one another is the very basis of our culture.
9/ Unique to the spaces of the American frontier, finding another Christian home was paramount in the vast and hostile distances one traveled.
10/ We talk a lot about forming bonds and creating networks, but one of the best ways to solidify those bonds are through shared meals and great evenings.
11/ As Sebastian Junger once said “humans are the only species in which a young male will sacrifice his own life for another male he is not related to.’ One of the best evenings of my life was spent getting to know a group of officers over dinner at Balhousie.
12/ Veterans all, we ate, drank and for nearly six hours discussed battles old and new and debated the merits of American bourbon versus highland scotch. Over dinner you learn about one another, you have nowhere to hide, and your honest self will always reveal itself.
13/ By focusing on quality and production over consumption, it is our little way of pushing back against the current zeitgeist of consumerism. This isn’t some Ancient tradition, it is the way our Parents and Grandparents lived. The hard generations found it helpful, so will we.
14/ It is our way of bringing back solid traditions of old in the hopes that with the traditions come some of the close bonds of community that we remember from our youth. They are social events and whether they are co-ed, or divided the goal is to have fun.
15/ So sometime between family Thanksgiving and family Christmas find a night to gather some friends together bring them over, feed them food drink some of whatever it is you drink and start putting our society back together. If you need help, I’ll help you put together a menu.
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The world is full of information: some bad, some good, some deceitful. Making up one's own mind is the only true freedom we have. Sometimes it is wise to go along with the group, sometimes it is best to blaze your own path to glory.
Like at the Battle of Tannhäuser Gate
1. Like many ancient battles, the truth of Tannhäuser Gate has been lost to time. The story has been changed by both 13th Century bards and Wagner alike.
But the legend remains and the story, despite the wear of intervening centuries, refuses to be lost like tears in the rain
2. The name Tannhäuser is an old one, and dates to the pre-bronze age of Germany. The old Germany of witchcraft and pagans that would come to terrify the mighty Romans.
This is where our story begins, the dark forests of southern Germany in 1260 BC
What wins wars? Certainly sometimes superior logistics, weapons, or generals, but when no side has those advantages? What leads one side to crush their enemy mercilessly? Discipline, faith, and leadership. Like how white mercenaries ruled the 1960's battlefields of the Congo.
1/It is no surprise that trained, equipped, and well-led European armies slaughtered African tribal armies wherever they went. A tiny nation, Belgium was able to conquer a giant one like the Congo with nothing more than a professional army. Even Italy managed a colony: barely
2/ This isn't limited to Europeans. Shaka, the founder of the great Zulu empire, forged his tribal warriors, more used to ceremonial dance offs than the brutality of battle behind a spear into professionals. He organized his men trained them, developed new weapons, and conquered
Alright youse. Grab a chair and make sure you don’t mix up your guns while we clean, and wash your hands before you eat that powder is filthy.
Let’s talk German politics.
German had an election. Nobody won. But this always happens in Germany. So you have to form a coalition
It helps not to think of German parties as opposites of one another like in a 2 party US system: for example, the new CDU (led by Friedrich Merz, no relation) is no leaning more anti immigrant like AfD, but they differ on Germany’s place in the EU and foreign policy.
Likewise AfD and BSW are polar opposites in many ways; except they are both anti immigration. So what happens now.
A coalition must be formed to reach 50%. There are two options 1. Form what’s known as a Kenya Coalition (red, black, green… learn something) in the establishment
The uniquely American desire for cold stuff… like drinks bordering on Titanic iceberg level cold or A/C temps set to Siberia always puzzled me
It took me a while to realize that Americans don’t particularly like these things, but they do them: because they fucking can
America
I grew up with AC, and ice on demand. But I never understood why my family would run the AC like it was the last lap at the Indy 500 and they were three spots behind.
But they did it because they were now Americans, and they just… could
Beer is better slightly chilled. But Americans want cans that show you how arctic cold it is on the inside. That’s insane.
Until you realize it is just showing off: the ability to keep large quantities beer cold across long distances on demand? That’s big league flex