A reader recently ripped me a new orifice. “Building the room without insulation is ill advised. In fact, I explicitly advised the opposite. You have to listen to the experts and, in this case, I am the expert!” Then he took the glass of wine from my hand and settled into having a really nice Sal-prepared meal complete with chocolate cheesecake. Such hubris was warranted, however. He was leaving the next day for four months down south.
Still, as he claimed, he was right. I was wrong. Tomorrow I start insulating the little room.
One way in which he was especially right was that an insulated room requires so much less heat. As it was, I had an 8kw diesel heater ‘warming’ a space that could only accommodate two cords of wood. My heating apparatus was overkill. By adding insulation, a large candle will keep the space warm.
It is so good to have such considerate friends.
But that is not today’s blog. Todays blog is: trouble comes in threes. I discovered this weird phenomena sailing. If I failed to put something away properly such as a line or a fender, inevitably that fender would soon wrap around a sheet (rope to control the sail) when I needed to tack (change direction while under sail). Now I have the boat with a sail on the wrong side and no way of fixing it because I am not properly under power in such a situation (while under sail, the motor is off). So, that is two things wrong. Typically one has to tack when one has sailed close to a place one does not want to hit so proximity to being the main part of a shipwreck is imminent. Voila! Trouble comes in threes.
My point is that one mistake is often just an inconvenience. You stop, fix it and carry on. Two mistakes is an embarrassment. The first mistake caused or was aggravated by the second mistake which ended up causing a problem larger than the actual sum of the mistakes. Gobs of time are now required to fix the botch up. But, if like most people, we can ignore the first two for awhile, that is often the opportunity for mistake number three to come along and bring the whole house of procrastination down. I have learned the hard way to stop and fix error number 1.
The examples of the error-of-threes are everywhere. The election of Trump caused the creation of MAGA, and that caused division in the country and the list of triumvirate trouble like that is all too common throughout history. Hell, the examples of triumvirate trouble is rampant in families every day.
The point is: we all make errors. And we don’t always fix the first error (especially if no one notices it). And we all have histories of dealing with the second or next trouble exacerbated by the flaw that was the first. And making it ripe for catastrophe should a third one come along at just the right time. That is the way of things.
What bothers me right now is that more and more it is being revealed that we are at least two errors deep into one helluva lotta trouble from Climate change to the economy, from Hamas to Israel, from the US government to our relationship with China. In Canada, for God’s sake, we have managed to annoy Russia, China and India just for starters.
We are knee deep in two’s and threes.
I guess what I am saying is we have so many troubled twos and threes, we have a new phenomena. The Tsunamis of threes. We do not have just one catastrophe from three things going wrong, we do not just have three times the things going wrong to double the problem but we seem to have three times the problem applied to many, many areas. Our troubles are 3 carried to the 33rd power.
Confusion cubed.
Our Off the Grid Home 
Sooooo.
We’re gonna have a BIG earthquake?
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I told you that before. Complete societal breakdown and it is coming much sooner than predicted which was, is, entirely predictable.
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Strangely, complete societal breakdown (CSB) seems to already be here. RIGHT NOW. Admittedly, I did not see it coming this way but what I see now are definitely harbingers. Almost every town in North/South America PLUS Europe has the scourge of the homeless, drugged, outlaw population that is, every year, getting larger! That’s insane. So many places are getting MORE expensive. That, too, is insane. San Diego has been invaded by hundreds of street-level prostitutes (what!?) and lots of major retailers are vacating Portland and San Francisco due to looting, crime and lack of legitimate customers. The ‘Merican system is folding-in at the knees. And none of that even mentions the madness that is MAGA, that a soon-to-be-proven criminal grifter might ascend the White House. AGAIN!!! CSB isn’t coming, it’s actually here.
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And it just keeps coming.
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My hypothesis of why society is self destructing?
The appeasement policies of democratic govts everywhere.
EVERYONE has “rights”.
You can’t say anything about anyone without being accused of sexism, racism, colonialism, on and on and on.
And people are pushing back any way they can.
The Australian referendum was a massive slap in the face for the govt.
Why should one minority get a “voice” over everyone else in the country?
Less than 4% of the population gets to advise the sitting govt on policy and procedure?
And you call that a democracy?
Give me a break.
One wonders what would happen here in Canada if a similar referendum was held.
I’m thinking a lot of taxpayers here after seeing BILLIONS of tax dollars dumped in the laps of “First Nations” ( they were the first immigrants….Asian explorers to the new world.) because ” they were here first” would like a say in any more tax money handed out.
Especially if our epically unpopular appeasement Prime Minister Trudeau was pumping for it.
But back to why people are “losing it” everywhere.
The world wide “soap box” of the internet and every crazy conspiracy theory known to man is spewed out as gospel.
China’s manufacturing of fentanyl ingredients and shipping to “The West” is payback for their “opium wars” of 150 years ago and the “one hundred years of humiliation”.
The Chinese communists hate the West and all it stands for.
Inflation driving the cost of everything to ridiculous heights.
We need either a major change of govt because try to appease everyone has been an epic FAIL.
Or we will have a recession and or another world war.
Take your pick.
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Oooooh, I like it when someone unloads a rant. Shows yer human. Not RIGHT, necessarily, but definitely human. I’d go so far as to say ‘healthy’. No sense trying to make sense out of nonsense. But I’d also say a major change of government is just handing your life over to another batch of monkeys but, who knows, maybe the next batch are smarter than the last ones. Definitely a very stupid bunch of monkeys in charge right now. And, then we come to recessions….more and more people are turning to the ‘ground’ economy – not so much underground and with illegal goods (altho THAT, too) but rather more like cash and no paper trail. I, too, am a stupid monkey. So stupid, I cannot abide all the throwing of poop, screeching at one another and trying to steal stuff all day. So, I let go of the vines and left the jungle.
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Well the “Voice in Parliament” in Australia has been voted down.
One wonders if the voters in Australia watched the Billions of tax dollars being shovelled into the “bonfire of apologies” in Canada and decided they wanted no part of the costs of “reconciliation” to beleaguered taxpayers.
(Apparently reconciliation CAN be bought with money….in Canada. Who knew)
No.
Another “appeasement project of the vanities” where politicians get to spend spend spend other peoples money and get great photo ops .
And Australians were having none of it.
First it’s a “voice” in Parliament.
Then more demands, and more demands. “Special status” , “Reparations” ” Renaming buildings and bridges”. “Tearing down statues”.
Yep
Best to snip the billion dollar boondoggle in the bud right out of the gate.
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I’m still a Green, pinko bleeding heart but I agree. Makes no sense to give restitution to the ancestors. I was poor. My father was destroyed in WW2. And at least that was recent. Shouldn’t I at least get a bridge named after me? Sniveling over something unproven in a different era makes no sense at all. And why should appeasing snivelers be self appointed and we’ll paid politicians? Don’t they have better things to do with their time?
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Big rain headed your way tonight.
Big wind tomorrow.
Batten down the hatches.
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