Nashville's WSM radio premiered the WSM Barn Dance which became the Grand Ole Opry.
It was a Saturday.
Last edition:
Friday, November 28, 2025
Saturday, November 28, 1925. Grand Old Opry premiers.
Thursday, November 27, 2025
A Blog Mirror Post: Do it yourself, was "How to Grocery Shop on the Cheap Humility, thy name is Aldi."
Rockwell's World War Two era illustration of one of Roosevelt's Four Freedoms, this one being Freedom from want. This came from a March 6, 1943 Saturday Evening Post illustration although it was completed in November, 1943. Rockwell was inspired by a Thanksgiving dinner in which he photographed his cook serving the same in November, 1942. The painting has come to symbolize Thanksgiving dinners. Interesting, compared to the vast fare that is typically associated with the feast, this table is actually fairly spartan.
This is a really good article on grocery shopping.
How to Grocery Shop on the Cheap
Humility, thy name is Aldi.
I'm going to take this in a slightly different direction, but this blog post is, I'll note, really good.
And I love the kitties featured in the article.
Anyhow, it ought to be obvious to anyone living in the US right now that groceries, that odd word discovered by Donald Trump in his dotage, are pretty expensive. Less obvious, it seems, is why that is true. Again, not to overly politicize it, but the common Trump Interregnum explanations are largely complete crap. It's not the case, as seemingly suggested, that Joe Biden runs around raising prices in a wicked plan to destroy the American lifestyle for "hard working Americans". Rather, a bunch of things have contributed to that.
To start with, the COVID 19 pandemic really screwed up the economy, and we're still living with the impact of that. One of the impacts of that is that certain supply chains somewhat broke and have never been repaired. Added to that, global climatic conditions are impacting crops in what is now a global food distribution system. Weather has additionally impacted meat prices by impacting the Beef Cattle Heard in the last decade, which has been followed up upon by the visitation of cattle diseases, and poultry diseases, that have reduced head counts. That definitely impacts prices. The Administration, however, believing that the country exists in the economic 1820s, rather than the 2020s, fiddles with inflation causing tariffs on a weekly basis, which raises prices on everything. And finally the ineptly waged Russian war against Ukraine has impacted grain supplies world wide. It reminds me of, well. . . :
Then I watched while the Lamb broke open the first of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures cry out in a voice like thunder, “Come forward.”
I looked, and there was a white horse, and its rider had a bow. He was given a crown, and he rode forth victorious to further his victories.
When he broke open the second seal, I heard the second living creature cry out, “Come forward.”
Another horse came out, a red one. Its rider was given power to take peace away from the earth, so that people would slaughter one another. And he was given a huge sword.
When he broke open the third seal, I heard the third living creature cry out, “Come forward.” I looked, and there was a black horse, and its rider held a scale in his hand.
I heard what seemed to be a voice in the midst of the four living creatures. It said, “A ration of wheat costs a day’s pay, and three rations of barley cost a day’s pay. But do not damage the olive oil or the wine.”
When he broke open the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature cry out, “Come forward.”
I looked, and there was a pale green horse. Its rider was named Death, and Hades accompanied him. They were given authority over a quarter of the earth, to kill with sword, famine, and plague, and by means of the beasts of the earth.
Not that dire, of course. . .
Anyhow, this reminded me of an agrarian topic. How can you, dear agrarian reader, reduce your grocery bill?
Well, do it yourself, of course.
What do I mean?
Well, grow it and kill it yourself.
Assuming, of course, you can. But most people can.
Now, let me be the first to admit that this is more than a little hypocritical on my part now days. The pressures of work and life caused me to give up my very extensive garden some years ago. I'd frankly cash in my chips and retire life now, but my spouse insists that this cannot be so. So, in my rapidly increasing dotage, I'm working as hard as ever at my town job.
An Agrarian's Lament indeed.
Anyhow, however, let's consider this. Many people have the means of putting in a garden, and many have the means to take at least part of their meat consumption in by fishing and hunting. Beyond that, if you have freezer space, or even if a friend has freezer space, you can buy much, maybe all depending upon where you live, of your meat locally sourced.
Given as this is Thanksgiving, let's take a look at how that would look.
I'll start off with first noting that there's actually more variety in Thanksgiving meals than supposed, as well as less. This time of year in fact, you'll tend to find all sort of weird articles by various people eschewing the traditional turkey dinner in favor of something else, mostly just in an effort to be self serving different. And then you have the weirdness of something like this:
I suppose that's an effort by our Vice President to be amusing, something he genuinely is not, but frankly, I do like turkey. I like it a lot. A lot of people do. Vance, of course, lives in a house where his wife is a vegetarian for religious reasons, so turkey may not appear there.
Anyhow, what is the traditional Thanksgiving meal? Most of us have to look back on our own families in order to really determine that.
When I was growing up, we always had Thanksgiving Dinner at one of my uncle's houses. My father and his only brother were very close, and we went there for Thanksgiving, and they came to our house for Christmas evening dinner. Both dinners were evening dinners. We probably went over to my aunt and uncle's house about 4:00 p.m. and came home after 9:00 p.m., but I'll also note that this is now a long time ago and my memory may be off. This tradition lasted until the year after my father passed away, but even at that, that's now over 30 years ago.
Dinner at my aunt and uncles generally went like this.
Before dinner it was likely that football was turned on the television, which is a big unfortunate American tradition. My father and uncle would likely have a couple of beers. My father hardly drank at all, so this was relatively unusual. My mother would generally not drink beer and interestingly it was largely a male drink.1 I don't think I saw women really drink beer until I was in college.2 Anyhow, at dinner there's be some sort of white wine, although I can barely recall it. Nobody in the family was a wine connoisseur, so there's no way I could remotely give an indication on what it was, except that one of my cousins, when he was old enough to drink, really liked Asti Spumante, which I bet I haven't had in over a decade.3 Dinner itself would be a large roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, bread, salad, and a marshmallow yam dish. Dinner rolls would also be present.
Desert was pumpkin pie.
Pretty common fare, and frankly, very good fare, for Thanksgiving.
After my father died, Thanksgiving dinner was briefly up to me for a time, as my mother was too ill by that stage in her life to deal with cooking much.4 In light of tradition, I'd probably cook a smaller turkey, although if I had wild waterfowl I'd shot, I'd go with that. Otherwise, mashed potatoes and yams. To drink, for me, probably beer.
After I started dating my wife, Thanksgiving was at her folk's place. My mother in law is an excellent cook, and my wife is as well. Unlike J. D. Vance, I'm not afflicted with vegetarian relatives, and indeed, as my wife is from a ranch family, all dinners very much show that.
On the ranch, Thanksgiving is a noon meal. So is Christmas dinner. Noon meals are generally odd for me, as I don't usually eat lunch, but that reflects a pretty strong agricultural tradition. Big meals are often at noon. Meals associated with big events, such as brandings, always are. So it makes sense.
Thanksgiving there shares a common feature with the ones that were at my aunts and uncles, in that usually somebody offers everyone a drink before dinner, while people are chatting. Unlike my aunts and uncles, however, somebody will usually offer people some sort of whiskey.
Their Thanksgiving Dinner has a very broad fare. There's a large roasted turkey, but there's also a brisket. Both are excellent and everyone has some of both. There's salad, mashed potatoes and two different types of stuffing, as some of us likey oyster stuffing, and others do not. Cranberry sauce is handmade by one of my brothers in law, who is an excellent cook. There are other dishes as well, and there's a variety of desserts. Homemade dinner rolls are served as well.
So, that leads to this. If I were cooking a Thanksgiving Day dinner, what would it be.
It's be simple compared to what I've noted for the simple reason that I'm simplistic in my approach to dinner in general. I had a long period as a bachelor before being married, and I know how to cook, but my cooking reflects that bachelorhood in some ways.
The main entre would be a turkey, or perhaps a goose, which I'll explain below.
Two types of stuffing, for the reasons explained above.
Salad.
Mashed potatoes (but with no gravy, for reasons I'll explain below).
Bread.
Yams.
Pumpkin pie and mincemeat pie.
To drink, I'd probably have beer and some sort of wine. I'd have whiskey available before dinner.
Okay, if that doesn't meet the Walmart definition of a Thanksgiving dinner, that's because nobody should buy things at Walmart. . . ever.
So, in applying my localist/killetarian suggestions, how much of this could I acquire while avoiding a store entirely?
Almost all of it.
Starting with the meat, I always hunt turkeys each year, but I don't always get one. If I was going to cook Thanksgiving dinner, however, I'd put a more dedicated effort into it. Turkey hunting for me is sort of opportunistic, and given that I do it in the spring its mostly a chance to try to get a turkey while getting out, usually with the dog (although poor dog died in an automobile accident earlier this year, he only every got to go out for turkeys). If I put in more hours, which I should, I'd get one.
If I can't get one, however, by this time of year I definitely can get a goose.
Which, by way of a diversion, brings up J. D. Vance's stupid ass comment above. If your turkey is dry, that's because you cooked it wrong. And if wild turkey is dry, that's because the cook tried to cook it like some massive obese Butterball.
Tastewise and texture wise, there's no difference whatsoever between a wild and domestic turkey. People who say there are say that because one of them, if not both of them, were cooked incorrectly.
Which is true of goose as well. Goose tastes very much like roast beef, unless the cook was afraid of the goose and cooked it like it was something else and ruined it.
Anyhow. . . I can provide the bird myself
So too with the vegetables, mostly. When I grew a garden, I produced lettuce onions and potatoes. One year I grew brussels sprouts. Of these, only the lettuce either doesn't keep on its own or can't be frozen in some fashion. I could grow yams, I'm quite confident, even though I never did.
Now, on bread, I can bake my own bread and have, but I can't source the ingredients. So those I'd have to buy. I could likely figure out how to make my own stuffing, but I probably wouldn't bother to do so, unless I wanted to have oyster stuffing. I would have to buy the oysters.
I'll note here that I wouldn't make gravy, as I really don't like it. My mother in laws gravy is the only gravy that I like. Otherwise, there's no excuse for gravy. I put butter on mashed potatoes, and I always have.
But I buy the butter.
I'd have to buy marshmallows for the yams too.
That leaves something to drink. I know that some people will distill their own whiskey as a hobby, but I'm not about to try that, and I"ve never brewed beer. If I ever lived solely on what I produce myself, mostly, I'd take it up. I clearly don't have the time to do that now.
Dessert?
I'm fairly good at making pies. I like pumpkin pie, but I've never grown pumpkins. I could give that a shot, but I'd still have to buy most of the constituents. My grandmother (father's mother) used to make mincemeat pies, but I've never attempted that. The real ingredients for mincemeat pies freak people out, I"d note, those being, according to one granola website I hit and may link in, the following:
Old-Fashioned Mincemeat Pie Recipe:
1 lb beef (I used ground beef from grass-fed cows) *
¾ teaspoon salt (I like using Real Salt)
1 ½ lbs apple, peeled and chopped (about 3 cups)
⅓ cup suet or tallow or coconut oil, or butter or coconut oil *
1 Tbs ground mace (or ½ Tbs nutmeg if you don't have mace)
8 Tbs (½ cup) dried currants (or substitute raisins if you choose)
Which brings up a lot of stuff I'd have to buy. Everything but for the beef, as I too have beef from grass fed cows that I knew personally.
All in all, pretty doable.
Cheaper?
Well, if you are an efficient agrarian/killetarian, yes.
Footnotes:
1. My father normally only bought beer during the middle of the summer, and sometimes to take on a fishing expedition if somebody was going along. Otherwise, it just didn't appear in your house. The only whiskey ever bought was Canadian Whiskey, and a bottle of it would last forever. We often didn't have it at all. . . indeed, normally we did not. He only bought it when I was very young, if we were having guests.
This is interesting as in this era offering a drink to guests was very common. A different aunt and uncle liked Scotch and would offer it to guests, but my father hated Scotch.
When I was young, my parents would occasionally buy wine, but it was almost always Mogan David. Clearly were were not wine connoisseurs.
2. This probably seems odd, but it's true. I saw women drink beer so rarely that it was a shock when I was a kid to see a woman drinking a beer. They just normally didn't.
Indeed, by the time I was a teenager a girl drinking a beer sort of made her a "bad girl", but not in the Good Girls Don't sense. Rather, that was in the rowdy party girl sense. Or so we thought. We knew this, but we really didn't know any beer drinking girls as teenagers.
In college things were different, but the reputation that college students have for partying didn't really match the reality, at least for geology students. As an undergraduate in community college we might very occasionally go out for a beer, and that was almost always the collection of us who had graduated from high school together when everyone was home. For part of the last year of community college I had a girlfriend and I can remember being in a bar with her exactly once, when she was trying to introduce another National Guardsman to her sister. Otherwise, that relationship was unconsciously completely dry.
At UW as an undergrad most of my friends were geology students, like me, and the discipline was so hard there really wasn't any partying. Sometimes a group of guys would go out for a beer, but that was about it. Early on I recall there being a party of geology students who had all gone to community college together in the freezing apartment that one of us had. There were some beers, but generally, we just froze. A girlfriend who was also in the department and I went to a Christmas party the year I graduated, which was a big department affair and there was beer there, but that's about it.
In law school the story wasn't much different, frankly. Indeed, it wasn't until I got out of law school, and started practicing law, that I encountered people who really drank heavily.
3. To be honest, as a person always should be, when my mother's illness began to advance dramatically, she began to drink heavily. It was a problem that my father and I had to deal with. The oddity of it was that she had never done that when she was well.
As an added element of that, when she was well she took a wine making class. The wine she made was absolutely awful and she was the only one who would drink it, but because it was so bad, she'd fortify it with vodka to make it tolerable. That acclimated her to drinking. She gave it up completely as she began to recover just before my father died.
4. While she recovered a great deal, she never fully recovered. She was also an absolutely awful cook. As my father's health declined in the last year of his life, I took over cooking from him.
Tuesday, November 27, 1945. Slinky first sold.
The legendary toy The Slinky went on sale for the first time. Gimbels in Philadelphia offered it.
Patrick J. Hurley, attorney and career civil servant, resigned as Ambassador of China having submitted a blistering letter of resignation the day prior.
Born in Oklahoma to Irish immigrant parents, he's started off in life as a cowboy and mule driver before becoming a lawyer. His work as a mule driver started when he was only 11 years old, and he attempted to join the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry at age 15. He graduated with a law degree from National University School of Law in 1908 and went to work in Tulsa. He received a second law degree from George Washington University in 1913, by which time he was already a successful businessman and rising in Republican politics. He served in the Oklahoma National Guard during the Punitive Expedition and was a Judge Advocate during World War One, as well as serving as an artillery officer, for which he received a Silver Star. He was the Assistant Secretary of War under Hoover. He started of World War Two as a General before going on to be a diplomat. He'd retire to New Mexico where he'd die in 1963.
Most assessments of his role in China are not favorable.
As the Sheridan paper makes plain, the US was busy beating itself up over Pearl Harbor, even as the early rumblings of the Cold War were beginning.
He was replaced in his role by George Marshall, a role that Marshall is generally not recalled for.
Norway adopted the UN Charter.
Last edition:
Monday, November 26, 1945. Now's the Time, Wolves and War Brides, Questionable claim about Goering, Test tube babies in Virgin hospitals, Japanese social insurance, ties for Christmas.
Friday, November 27, 1925. Hill Packing.
The Casper Tribune reported on major events of the day, but what drew my attention was the horse packing plant. I was completely unaware that Casper had every had one.
A little digging shows the company was still in business in February 1928, and doing well enough to have a full page ad.
By that time it was then packing everything, including poultry. Horses were still noted, however, with the reference to wild horses, "outlaws of the range". The company advertised into the 1930s, and there were newspaper reports of it taking in huge numbers of horses.
What happened to it?
Of interest on this story, the plant was owned by Hill Milling Company, which still exists. It's Hill's Pet Nutrition today. Apparently in the 1930s it was a major supplier of horse meat to Europe.
The Soviet Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars.established Gostrudsberkassy, the savings bank for workers in the Soviet Union.
On the same day, the USSR and the Emirate of Afghanistan went to war over control of the island of Urta Tagay.
The small war over the island resulted from Imperial Russian troops having to abandon the island in 1920 in order to aid the White cause, with the island, long claimed by Afghanistan, then occupied. The fight drew the attention of western nations, and amazingly Afghanistan won.
The Reichstag approved the Locarno Treaties.
Last edition:
Thursday, November 26, 1925. Thanksgiving Day.
Blog Mirror and Pondering: Cassie Craven: Welfare Was Supposed To Be Our Job
Let me start off by noting that as a rule, I can't stand Cassie' Craven's op eds. They tend to be in your face unthinking populist, and I also resent (I'm not kidding) the co-opting of a cowboy hat that obviously doesn't fit.
And frankly I don't much like people spouting off about protecting Wyoming or what Wyoming is or was, when they aren't from here. She's from Nebraska, so that's not far off, but Nebraska is not Wyoming.
Well, like some other populist things, or NatCon things, I'll confess that as a real conservative, and for htat matter a distributist agrarian, I find myself occasionally disturbed by a one of their members saying something that taps into something I've said myself. This article by Craven does that:
Cassie Craven: Welfare Was Supposed To Be Our Job
As much as I hate to admit it, and I do hate to admit it, she has a point, although in the typical populist manner, she starts off by saying something cruel to get to the point. Indeed, it basically takes her 40% of her article to quit being an asshole before she gets to the point that 's worth considering, with this paragraph:
Welfare, in the 14th century meant one’s good fortune, health and exemption from evil. This changed in the 19th and early 20th centuries as public assistance became a role the government took over from the private charities, which had historically helped to ensure that people fared well. Welfare was holistic, community-driven and just as much emotional and spiritual as it was physical.
The shift of society away from the church-based and community associations and toward the government was no good for our fellow man. Adding fuel to the fire were the rapid technological advances that made us distant, isolated, and serotonin-addicted.
This has addled people’s ability to engage in real conversation or romance.
Well, she's correct, sort of .
Craven seems to edge up on the point, actually and then wonder off again, being slightly mean spirited once again. She never gets to the bigger point which is that a welfare system that creates semi permanent benefits, run by a bureaucracy, creates dependency, and corrupts. Indeed, that was the huge difference, other than an inability to cover all who really needed help, from modern welfare and pre Great Depression charity.
Support form charitable organizations, and churches, and the like, was always very temporary. And it tended to come with some requirements. State funded welfare tends not to, although the GOP has attempted to insert some. There are work requirements, of course, but it is difficult to tell how much they're winked at as the principles of subsidiarity have not been applied, so there's no real control. In contrast, I know of a situation in which a Church collects directly for the poor and distributes directly to the poor. In doing so, they do ask "are you working?"
And there are more uncomfortable truths as well. Welfare has, ironically, been a major driver in the decline of Western morality, and more particularly, and arguably much more pronounced, American morality.
Prior to the current welfare regime, children were very much the responsibility of both parents, in every fashion. We've discussed this in the context of the Playboy Philosophy and what not, but what was the case, even into the early 1980s, was that people that had children were normally married, and to a large degree, women who became pregnant out of wedlock either married the father or gave the child up for adoption (or after 1973, aborted). Moral decay brought on by the Sexual Revolution, aided by pharmaceuticals, started to erode the two parent family however and in our current age that's pretty pronounced. An African American commentator got in trouble a year or two ago by claiming that some women "married the government", but there's more than a little truth to that. Kids raised in this environment are more subject to abuse by subsequent "boyfriends" of their mother, and are more likely to be raised in poverty and declining morality. It's simply the truth.
That in turn kicks back to society at large. The American lower middle class tends to wade at least knee deep in a sort of moral sewer even while being horrified by those swimming in it. This wasn't the case thirty year or more ago. The trend line isn't good.
So, Cravens has a point.
But how do you end this? She doesn't opine on that, which is the cowardly way out. Indeed nobody, except perhaps for those deep in the Heritage Society, is doing so. What Project 2025 did, apparently, is to suggest an increase in work requirements, which was attempted sort of sub silentio earlier this year. But then, the entire NatCon group in the government right isn't really willing, in general, to admit trying to bring into play any of their policies. They do them all silently while sometimes denying they're doing them at all.
Which is one of the things I really detest about the Trump Administration. It's dishonest. They should simply admit, if they think it, that "welfare is contributing to moral decay and we have to do something about it."
Of course, the problem here is that most Americans really don't want to do anything about the things they claim they do. Bloated Americans who spend Sundays watching the NFL and who are living with their second or third wives or girlfriends might think about going to the megachurch once a month where the pastor is not going to equate their lifestyle with adulterous mortal sin, or preach about the dangers of wealth to their souls, and might bitch about homosexuals and the like even while being just as morally adrift, but they don't really want the responsibility of responsibility.
Of course, save for some, which explains a movement towards cultural conservatism in the young, thereby being proactive in the culture, even if not attempting to be cultural revolutionaries.
Charlie Kirk and the hypocrisy of the Wyoming GOP
Charlie Kirk and the hypocrisy of the Wyoming GOP: A recently passed resolution to limit free speech demonstrates how little the state Republican Party believes in the First Amendment, writes columnist Rod Miller.
Ducking mystery solved; employee creates joy with tiny surprises > Defense Logistics Agency > News Article View
Ducking mystery solved; employee creates joy with tiny surprises > Defense Logistics Agency > News Article View: In the busy world of Defense Logistics Agency Aviation at Defense Supply Center Richmond, an unexpected yet delightful phenomenon has taken root: tiny duck trinkets, mysteriously appearing throughout the workplace, have become a symbol of joy and, Read news articles posted by the Defense Logistics Agency.
This has been going on in my office in a major way.
Wednesday, November 26, 2025
Monday, November 26, 1945. Now's the Time, Wolves and War Brides, Questionable claim about Goering, Test tube babies in Virgin hospitals, Japanese social insurance, ties for Christmas.
Recorded on this day in 1945:
The Sheridan Press reported on wolves and war brides.
The story on the big wolf is ironic in a contemporary context. Wolves were wiped out in Colorado, probably and in Wyoming, probably, until the major reintroduction effort of the 2000s began. It's been a huge success in Wyoming, for which I'm glad, in spite of my initial skepticism. An ongoing effort is occuring in Colorado, which is meeting a lot of opposition in the anti nature Freedom Caucus era.
The Rocky Mountain News, which I remember from the 70s, 80s and 90s, when it was the best, in my view, of the two Denver papers, was a bit sensationalist at the time, which I've only recently come to appreciate. It was always a "tabloid", with that sort of paper format for some reason having a reputation of that type. I've never heard of the story related by the headline here:
A little digging finds that this claim was flat out untrue.
The News also reported on, oddly enough, test tube babies, something that is way earlier than I'd have ever supposed.
The first "test tube" baby was born in 1978. That person Louise Brown, is still with us. The first example of IVF in a mammal did not occur until 1959. Apparently the proponent of this suggestion was well ahead of her time in terms of scientific knowledge.
It's notable that the suggestion had a strong eugenics characteristic. That drive is also now very much coming into fruition, with designer babies now becoming a thing.
On the underlying concern, the explosion in births and the drop in the average age for a woman to first give birth that commenced at this time shows the concern was misplaced. As a Catholic, of course, I regard IVF as both unnatural and immoral. The bizarrely pro natalist Trump administration is all in on it.
The News also reported on Japanese social insurance, something being brought in by the progressive and distributist MacArthur occupation.
The cartoons of the day.
A classic gift was suggested.
British troops swept the Sharon plain in reaction to a prior days terrorist attack.
Ezra Pound was indicted for a second time on 19 counts of treason.
Last edition:
Thursday, November 26, 1925. Thanksgiving Day.
Edgerton dodged a bullet.
Remembering what hte day is for, there were church services.
Some were attended by the famous.
As well as the not so famous.
Pan American Mass, New York City.
Georgetown played a Marine Corps football team:
Whatever It Is, I’m Against It: Today -100: November 26, 1925: I don’t give a damn...: France: Paul Doumer, like Briand, fails to form a cabinet, so Édouard Herriot, who was last prime minister in April, will try next. Texas G...
Last edition:
Wednesday, November 25, 1925. Hats.
Tuesday, November 25, 2025
Sunday, November 25, 1945. Taxing war profits.
MacArthur ordered the Japanese government to submit a plan to tax away all war profits.
The Austrian People's Party won the Austrian election. The Christian Democratic party still exists.
Zionist terrorists attacked coast guard stations near Tel Aviv.
Last edition:
Thursday, November 22, 1945. Thanksgiving Day.
Wednesday, November 25, 1925. Hats.
The Turkish Hat Law, banning non Western headgear, took effect.
Beijing's Forbidden City was opened to the public for the first time.
Last edition:
Tuesday, November 24, 1925. William F. Buckley born
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