Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is pleased to report that he can now see clearly again. As he reported earlier in the week his glasses got screwed up. We think that they got exposed to some heat somehow and got tempered. This tempering caused very small “waves” to form on the lens. When your Maximum Leader put the glasses on, he got the feeling like he was looking constantly through those heat waves you see coming up off asphalt during the summer. It made him sick to his stomach after a few minutes.

So your Maximum Leader tried to trot out his old prescription and get a new set of glasses. Sadly, since the prescription was three years old no one wanted to fill it. So, your Maximum Leader went over to his eye doctor and got a check up. He was clear. No signs of bad deseases of the eye. No deterioration of his vision either. In fact his eyes were unchanged in 3 years. That is a good thing.

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader has new glasses and can see just fine now.

Your Maximum Leader hasn’t blogged much this week because of the glasses issue (which really wasn’t resolved until Wednesday) and a desire to get some of the books off his nightstand. You see your Maximum Leader can read without his glasses. In fact his vision at book-reading distance is quite good. So he read a lot. He is nearly done with two baseball books he recently received as gifts. The books are George Will’s “Men at Work” and Jason Turbow’s “Baseball Codes”. Your Maximum Leader highly recommends Will’s book to any baseball fan. It is certainly one of the best baseball books out there. Turbow’s book is a fun read. Your Maximum Leader can’t say that he learned much from the Turbow book, but it is filled with so many entertaining baseball yarns that it was a quick read.

Now your Maximum Leader is going to try and knock out Lord Norwich’s “Travellers Companion to Venice” and Christopher Moore’s “Lamb” before too long.

Your Maximum Leader is also going to try and get rid of all the old programming on his DVR and free up some space on that hard drive. Last night your Maximum Leader and Villainette #1 finished the last two episodes of Joss Whedon’s ill-fated series “Dollhouse.” The penultimate episode was okay, but would have been better if it had been the last episode. The final episode was disappointing from the perspective of the story. It seemed rushed, badly edited (in fact it felt like it was 3 hrs long when shot and only 1 hr long when it aired), and just thrown together. The best thing about the final episode was the Whedon was able to throw in a few of his favorite actors from previous outings (like Felicia Day from “Dr Horrible” and many members of the “Firefly” series).

For your intellectual curiosity, you should go and read one of the latest installments of FLG’s posts on time-horizons and their connections to politics/economics/world-view. FLG is probably on to something with this line of thinking.

That is all for now.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that Ellison & Joan has moved their respective blogs. Your Maximum Leader is a big fan of both and suggest you change your bookmarks - if you have them…

Ellison is here.

Joan is here.

That is all.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader will share some disjointed thoughts with you today.

As this blog approaches its 7th anniversary, your Maximum Leader wonders if he should drop the 3rd person schitck. Perhaps only for a little while. He might need a break from it.

Your Maximum Leader was speaking with someone here in town about goings-on. The person mentioned some vice busts in the area and pointed out some photos of the alleged “Johns” and the prostitutes. One of the prostitutes wasn’t a bad looking woman. But every one of the “Johns” was pretty damned ugly. Your Maximum Leader mused for a moment on how prostitution might be a good example of equal treatment in the marketplace. He also found himself wondering if the prostitute felt sorry for herself for having to have sex with some really ugly men…

Your Maximum Leader is excited about the 4th of July holiday. As he’s mentioned in this space many times, the Fourth is the best holiday on the calendar. (Let him explain why in a base way: Bikini-clad hotties, cook-outs and fireworks!) He will go out to the Chesapeake Bay to his In-law’s house and enjoy the water, fishing, some crabs, a little bourbon, and the aforementioned hotties, cookouts and fireworks.

Your Maximum Leader sees that according to some bogus poll of 238 “scholars” produced by Siena College, FDR was America’s greatest President. Theodore Roosevelt was number 2. Abraham Lincoln was #3. George Washington was #4. Thomas Jefferson was #5. Obviously these “presidential scholars” are idiots and deserving of only scorn. Any “greatest presidents” list that does not begin with either George Washington or Abraham Lincoln is pretty much crap. Your Maximum Leader is content with Lincoln and Washington and then all other comers. A very strong case can be made for FDR and TR as 3 & 4. But this crap being peddled by Siena College is just wrong. In case you want a real list of great presidents you can read your Maximum Leader’s greatest list from this past February. Let him close this matter with a plug for JAMES KNOX POLK as the greatest overlooked president in our history.

For now that is all.

Carry on.

UPDATED: Your Maximum Leader looked up the press release from Siena College in the hopes that he’d get their whole list and methodology. Well, here is what they are releasing out to the public. (NB to Polymath: Apparently the presidents worse than G.W. Bush are: F. Pierce, W. Harding, J. Buchanan and A. Johnson.) Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure of the first to categories in which the presidents are rated. They are “Background” and “Imagination.” Without some guidelines as to what those actually mean it is hard to judge what the hell someone means by saying that (for example) Thomas Jefferson had a better background than John Quincy Adams. Frankly, in terms of having the right “background” to be president (assuming - as your Maximum Leader does - that background means past experiences before becoming president) he can’t think of a reason why Thomas Jefferson would be ranked number one? Over John Qunicy Adams?! Okay, Jefferson was Ambassador to France and Secretary of State. But he was a crappy Governor of Virginia. (And he shouldn’t get credit for writing the Declaration.) In your Maximum Leader’s opinion the two men most qualified to be president by virtue of their background are John Quincy Adams and George Herbert Walker Bush.

Anyhoo… Siena College’s criteria (and hence their results) are suspect (and worthy of derision). Stick with your Maximum Leader’s assesments and you’ll go places.

Carry on again.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is sorry for silence here. He’s been quite busy of late. Kids getting out of school. Birthdays. Anniversaries. It has been a little crazy.

Your Maximum Leader celebrated over the past few days both his birthday and his wedding anniversary. He’d hoped to get away with Mrs Villain for a nice dinner in town to celebrate the “contract renewal” as he jokes about his wedding vows.

What is the joke you might ask?

Allow your Maximum Leader to explain… He has a friend who, in college, speculated that one of the reasons for rampant divorces in the world was that people were living longer. In olden tymes, when a couple got married it was until death did you part. But death came to people fairly soon. So being married 20-30 years was a pretty good run in this friend’s mind. This friend posited that since we (modern people) live so much longer we ought to change the way we view marriage. In the opinion of your Maximum Leader’s friend, marriage vows should expire after 7 years unless both parties agree to renew for another 7 years.

This year your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain were married 14 years. In case you were wondering, your Maximum Leader and his lovely bride agreed to another 7 years of wedded bliss.

How did we celebrate this milestone? Did he get away for a nice dinner? Well… Since you ask… We went and got burgers from Five Guys. Because nothing says Happy Anniversary quite like bacon cheeseburgers.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has to out of his way to get news about goings-on in Canada in the US news. Call him crazy, but he likes to know what is going on with our great neighbour to the north (and largest trading partner). Your Maximum Leader likes Canada. He’s liked pretty much every Canadian he’s ever met. It is a good place.

But imagine how sad he is to know that the only news he can get (without going out of his way) about Canada is about a fake lake being made for the G-20 conference.

So your Maximum Leader feels he must call out his good friend Skippy and ask “So is this “fakelakegate” really the biggest news in Canada right now?”

And a good follow-up might be… “Really… Nearly a billion dollars to protect the G-20 summit? Couldn’t you just not protect some of the leaders attending and hope for the best? How about you skimp on protecting all the ones from a parliamentary democracy in that the PMs are likely just glorified party leaders and can be easily replaced?”

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader remembers when he first thought about getting a web site. It was probably 1997 or so. He wasn’t sure what he’d do with a web site, but it seemed like the thing to have. He didn’t get off his lazy duff and register a cool name while the registering was good. Back in 1999 he remembers reading an article on CNet or something that stated that almost every single word in the Webster’s American Dictionary had been registered as a .com domain. The article provided a short list of some of the available single words still out there. One leapt to your Maximum Leader’s eye: perfidy. Your Maximum Leader read that word and immediately set off to Register.com and tried to register perfidy.com. Sadly, it was taken by the time he got there. But he saw that perfidy.net and perfidy.org were still available. Your Maximum Leader decided that the “gold standard” of domains were the .com domains and he passed on those two.

Then he went and got nakedvillainy.com which is cool and all, but he’d not thought through some of the porn-y implications of the domain. (NB to porn people: if you would like to buy this domain - reasonable offers will be accepted.)

So… Imagine your Maximum Leader’s glee when he discovered that perfidy.org was a cool blog. Guess what else? The writers over at the Ministry of Minor Perfidy are pretty cool. He’s met a number of them. They are good guys.

Well… Buckethead over at the Ministry of Minor Perfidy informed your Maximum Leader that he’d (Buckethead that is) written some “crazy shit” over on the blog. So your Maximum Leader had to check it out. Your Maximum Leader figured out that neither this post nor this post were the “crazy shit” he’d been expecting.

It must be this post that is the crazy shit post.

Now… Your Maximum Leader hasn’t poured through the archives of Unqualified Reservations as has Buckethead; but what he’s read is very thought provoking. Of course, your Maximum Leader styles himself a pseudo-benevolent autocrat; so let’s say he might have some anti-democratic tendencies. There are definately times when all this democracy stuff isn’t what its cracked up to be. As Thomas Friedman noted recently on Meet the Press, there are times you wish the US were run like Communist China so that authority could just dictate something that was in the greater interest of the nation and be done with it. Your Maximum Leader would never throw a statement like that out. Of course your Maximum Leader isn’t interested in a Communist Autocracy either. He is more for the Roman Principate model himself.

Anyhoo… Check out Buckethead’s post and then go on over to Unqualified Reservations and see what you think.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has had a heck of a few days. The biggest event was Thursday when Villainette #2 sustained a rather nasty toe injury during Karate class. The injury required 9 stitches to her left big toe and nearly 5 hrs in the local ER. She’s been hobbling along now on crutches since then, but will likely be walking with a boot on the left foot for another 10 days or so.

So what happened you might ask? Well, your Maximum Leader’s version of the story involves the brave Villainette #2 taking on a room full of Ninja coming at her. She faught them off but as they retreated and dragged off their dead one was able to stab at her toe slicing the skin open and causing a nasty bleeding wound.

The truth of the matter is that while doing lunging exercises she got her toe caught in a gap between the mats on the floor and fell forward. The stuck toe combined with the falling body caused the skin to tear around her toe.

Your Maximum Leader prefers his version of the story…

Friday your Maximum Leader went to Richmond to visit for a bit with Smallholder who was there chaperoning some students from the school where he teaches. It was good to see him and to chat about all manner of things. A sample of topics included Tea Parties, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell and the flap about Confederate History month, farming, King Lear, parenting, charcuterie, volcanoes, and how young girls seem to be dressing more slutty with every passing year…

The Saturday and Sunday were spent at your Maximum Leader’s in-laws on the Chesapeake Bay. Sadly there was no fishing involved - as the boat was out of the water and in need of a little scraping and painting of the hull. But your Maximum Leader was able to nap and relax and get some stuff straightened out with his in-law’s computer. He normally doesn’t attempt to blog (or use the internet) at his in-laws. This is because their house is for fun and relaxation. And until about a week ago they didn’t have high speed internet (but a 48k dial-up connection). They now have high-speed internet and that is what was the cause of some of the PC issues your Maximum Leader helped fix.

Your Maximum Leader has been watching a lot of hockey of late. As some of you may know the hockey playoffs are underway. Your Maximum Leader, out of some silly supertitition he supposes, is not going to comment on his team, the Capitals. But if you are a hockey fan you know what is going on…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader was so distraught over the loss of the US Olympic Men’s Hockey team at the hands of our noble brethern to the north that he forgot to wish you all “rabbit” yesterday.

Anyhoo…

Your Maximum Leader would like to take a moment to with our friend, minion, and go-to Canadian Skippy. Your Maximum Leader wishes Skippy a very happy day. One hopes he finds a female companion (or two) to help him relieve the “pressures” of being a year older today. Many (happy?) returns Skippy.

Your Maximum Leader would also like to give a huge (HUGE) shout out to reader “BigFred” who provided a Latin rendering of the little expression that gives your Maximum Leader so much joy. Thanks to BigFred we have:

in vicis of mestitia a magnus penis est vacuus

So, we may have a winner on how to render, in Latin, the expression “When your luck has run out, a big dick is useless.” This has made my day.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader commends to you Big Stupid Tommy’s latest. Clicky here to read it. The open: I met Sir Anthony Hopkins the other day. I was putting gas in the truck, and wondering at the “Jesus will return, repent your sins” post-it note somebody had stuck on the gas pump at the BP station, when a man wandered around the rear end of my truck.

Read it…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is going to have to buy a another computer or something. It is getting ridiculous at the Villainschloss. Mrs Villain is using her laptop most nights for school. The Villainettes are using your Maximum Leader’s computer for school. So your Maximum Leader who has pithiness to share with you all, is found watching TV and not sharing his pearls of pithiness.

Ah well…

Your Maximum Leader hopes Scott Brown can pull out a win in the Massachusetts Senate special election today. He doesn’t feel quite as confident as many of his political fellow-travellers. But he does feel it will be a very close outcome. Your Maximum Leader has always said that he is a great fan of divided government. And he is. Getting Scott Brown in the Senate will truly divide our government in a way it has not been divided over the past year. And yes, our government has been divided over the past year. It has been divided between the House and the Senate with the President standing by trying to “influence” things. That is not enough division for your Maximum Leader. He’d like to have a Senate with enough Republicans to sustain a fillibuster.

You know… All this talk of how the President has done over his first year seems to be the first stages of setting up for the rash of stories on how the administration hasn’t done much and is likely looking more likely to fail over the long-term. Your Maximum Leader is well aware that there are three years more in the term and that things can change very dramatically and very quickly. So, while your Maximum Leader is willing to say that so far the President and his team hasn’t done anything noteworthy yet (and adding Scott Brown to the Senate soon would not help him at all); he isn’t willing to declare the Obama Presidency over and failed. That is just stupid.

Your Maximum Leader, while not blogging last night, watched the speech by his Excellency Robert Francis McDonnell, the Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia to the Joint Session of the Virginia General Assembly. It was a good speech. The person operating the teleprompter should be flogged as there were at least three short delivery issues that your Maximum Leader things were all teleprompter related. All in all your Maximum Leader was pleased with the speech and the initiatives laid out therein. (Your Maximum Leader especially hopes that Virginia can lead East Coast states in expanding domestic energy production. He hopes we can auction exploration rights for oil drilling soon. He also hopes we can do more with coal gassification and nuclear power in the state. He’d like to see Virginia be the great energy exporter on the East Coast of the US.) Your Maximum Leader knows that there will be lots of compromises and changes to what the Governor wants. He does have a friendly House of Delegates, but the Democrats have a majority in the State Senate. There will be lots of compromising and wheeling-and-dealing. We’ll see how the 60 day session goes. Your Maximum Leader spoke briefly with the Smallholder last night. Smallholder was pretty critical of the Governor’s plans on changing the teacher pension system in the state. Your Maximum Leader is not unsympathetic towards Smallholder’s position, especially as it will impact Mrs Villain. But, at this stage changes to the pension system are all proposed and there is a lot of negotiating to be done. We’ll see how it goes.

Your Maximum Leader and Smallholder also mentioned Jennifer Love Hewitt. Ms Hewitt has been in the news recently because apparently she has been decorating her “hoo-ha.” Apparently she “be-dazzels” her “va-jay-jay.” Your Maximum Leader is a bit scandalized by this. On the one hand it seems like the dreamy JLH could be a bit more kinky than he suspected. On the other hand she might just be bat-shit crazy. She is likely a bit of both.

Your Maximum Leader should probably start looking around for a new platonic object of his affections. Kristen Bell? Mila Kunis? Who knows…

Be-dazzeled bits… Ewwww…

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader lives. He was cut as planned on Wednesday. His doctor did remove a small piece of your Maximum Leader. Biopsy results will likely be a few more days. He is not worried. His side is feeling much better today than it did yesterday. Indeed, yesterday he was a little uncomfortable. He was also cranky yesterday. Funny. Those two might be related. Anyhoo… With each passing day he feels a little better. So that is good.

Your Maximum Leader feels sorry for the people of Haiti. They certainly don’t need nature piling on all of the problems they already have. But pile on nature did. He hopes the aid will help. If it is not too uncharitable to say, he fears that Haiti’s problems are so deep that no amount of aid will really help over the very long term. Aid given now can help end immediate suffering, but that country needs education, infrastructure and political change to make lasting change.

You should donate to help Haiti. It is the right thing to do, regardless of your Maximum Leader’s previous comments.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is (again) stealing a page from FLG’s book. He’s now listening to:

and

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader has been out there. By “out there” he means “on the interwebs.” Lurking. He’s been reading and ruminating. Occasionally he’ll comment.

All in all he’s not had much that he feels warrants a comment. That is one of the problems of blogging isn’t it. One might read a post (or a tweet or a newspaper/journal article) and say to oneself, “My self, that perfectly encapusates my thoughts on this subject.” But if you don’t actually write a post of your own linking the article/piece in question who the hell knows? Frankly, even if you did write a post and provide a link, who the hell cares?

Meh.

So hows about a post about nothing? Indeed… Lets…

Your Maximum Leader has been spending his free time watching hockey and football. He’s tried reading a few different books to see if something grabs him. He’s been sorely disappointed in his choices. What makes his disappointment more… disappointing is that all the books he’s chosen are recent additions to his library that he’s not gotten around to reading yet. Sadly, your Maximum Leader figures that he’s suffering from some sort of short-attention-span disorder.

Speaking of hockey… This Washington Post piece about the NHL “war room” in Toronto was interesting. The room is much smaller than he imagined. Although he does like the little detail of how the room smells of pepperoni pizza. That makes it all so real. So real. In a way knowing that the room is as small as it is makes your Maximum Leader sort of sad. He was hoping for a “mission control at NASA” feel. Or even better… Dr Strangelove… Alas, it looks like a production room at a secondary studio at a big city TV station…

Anyhooo…

Your Maximum Leader got word from his good friend, Smallholder, to let him know that the hog and steer raised for his consumption have been slaughtered and are going to be butchered this week. Today in fact. Your Maximum Leader has made three calls to the butcher to adjust his cutting instructions. Your Maximum Leader has decided that he needs to get the bacon and one ham fresh from the butcher. (Normally, the cut pieces are frozen for him.) Your Maximum Leader is going to try and make his own bacon and cure a ham this year. He’s got his pink salt in hand and will have to get to curing this weekend if he is going try his hand at ham and bacon. The bacon should be pretty easy to cure. It can be done in a large bag in the fridge. The ham is going to be more of a challenge. He needs more space and time. Your Maximum Leader isn’t sure how he’s going to manage the ham, but he’s working on it.

Actually, your Maximum Leader trying to figure out the curing of the ham at the Villainschloss has been a mentally taxing exercise.

Moving along…

Your Maximum Leader is disturbed by his use of the DVR. He feels that he is watching more tv as a result of having more control over his viewing choices and times. He records a fair number of programs. By his count he has three shows recorded daily (Pardon the Interruption, The Late Late Show and his guilty pleasure Chelsea Lately). In addition to the dailies, he records only new episodes of 8 other shows. Then there are movies as he finds them on HBO. In his defence, if he doesn’t watch one of the dailies within a day or two of broadcast he deletes them. As they are topical there is nothing like watching old news… But he has a few movies that have been on the DVR for months… Almost half of the last season of Curb Your Enthusiasm remains on the DVR. (NB - Your Maximum Leader loves Curb Your Enthusiasm; but finds he can’t watch more than one episode at a time. The humor is uncomfortable at times and has to be doled out in measured doses.)

It would likely do him well to cut down (or out) a significant portion of tv time. Your Maximum Leader supposes that compared to “regular” Americans he might watch less tv than most. But it is starting to feel like too much.

Sooo…

What the hell is up with Tiger Woods? Your Maximum Leader doesn’t get it. If you are going to be a world famous personality and you know that you like to mix it up when it comes to female company; then why do you even consider marriage? Your Maximum Leader has a certain amount of regard for George Clooney in this regard. Clooney gives off the vibe that he knows he is going to have trouble in a long-term relationship; so he doesn’t enter into one. That is a good thing in your Maximum Leader’s opinion. Know yourself and save yourself (and others) lots of heartache. Your Maximum Leader is at one level shocked and at another amazed by the scope of Tiger’s affairs. Shocked by the numbers and amazed by the efforts that went into meeting/maintaining/hiding the affairs in his schedule. One wonders if he has an assistant helping him in this… Then again, if he had an assistant to help him with these things he might not be in the mess he’s in now.

Concerning Mrs Woods. She is a very attractive woman. That said… Your Maximum Leader finds something disturbing and off-putting about her eyes in most photos he’s seen of her. He’s not saying she has “crazy eyes” or “googly eyes” or anything. There is just something wrong about her eyes to him.

In real news…

Your Maximum Leader reads that the Senate seems to be stripping the “public option” out of the Heath Care Bill. He hopes that soon the “Health Care” part will also be stripped from the bill…

This bill is a mess and just continues to linger on getting worse. One would hope that at some point the Senate would just throw up their hands and say collectively “Fuck this… Let’s pass some stimulus bills, an anti-flag-burning amendment, and declare it National Cocktail Party Month.” After putting the health care measures out of our national misery they could go home for “Winter” holidays and raise money for their re-election. That’s a good plan right? Of course it is.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is one tired guy. He hasn’t stopped since Friday. He wishes he could have a day just to relax. Let us recap shall we…

On Friday night the formal ball your Maximum Leader and Mrs Villain attended was great. Everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves. Your Maximum Leader worries a little that Mrs Villain didn’t have the best time. He feels this way because this year (and last) your Maximum Leader was responsible (with another gentleman) for planning and execution of the dance. Your Maximum Leader took this duty really seriously and spent a significant amount of time attending to the smooth operation of the dance. This left his lovely wife alone for some stretches of the night. He feels miserable about this. He will not be planning the dance again for quite a while. He hopes to make next year’s dance more enjoyable for her…

Sadly there will be no picture of your Maximum Leader bedecked in his tux. Alas, Villainette #2’s attempt at taking a photo failed because she had the camera set to some wierd setting that made us all out-of-focus… It is probably better anyway. Your Maximum Leader needs to take the tux to the tailor. He needs it taken in about a half-an-inch around the waist. His pants were drooping all night. Not a good scene.

Then on Saturday there was much yard work done in the morning. Your Maximum Leader’s hands have a blister to show how hard it was to get the leaf mulcher started. Eventually your Maixmum Leader excused himself from yard work and got to putting the finishing touches on his speech to be delivered on Sunday.

Saturday night was fun. Villainette #2 and your Maximum Leader went to Tony Cheng’s for dinner and then the Capitals game. We had shrimp toast and Peking duck for dinner. Your Maximum Leader loves Tony Cheng’s, but he should remember that their Peking duck isn’t the best in town. They put something on the skin that changes the taste. The skin is very crispy and has a sweet taste with an undercurrent of citrus. It is a flavor that is different from the ususal taste of Peking duck with which your Maximum Leader is familiar. In his opinion the best Peking duck in town is to be found at the Peking Gourmet on Route 7 near Bailey’s Crossroads (and across from St. Anthony’s Catholic Church).

The Capitals game was great. The Caps played soft during the first and second periods. They were outshot by the Florida Panthers. The Caps looked tired. Very tired. Then they turned it up in the third period and scored 5 goals in the last frame. They won 7-4. It was lots of fun.

Then yesterday your Maximum Leader went down to Longwood University to deliver a speech to members of the Freshman class who were being recognized for their early contributions to the school. The recognition dinner was being sponsored by a secret society that your Maximum Leader helped to establish 20-odd years ago. He made the 2.5 hr drive down to the school in about 2 hours. Then he had the pleasure of meeting a few of the current members of the society before the speech and dinner. They were gracious hosts who indulged him as he blabbed on about how things were long ago… Your Maximum Leader thinks the speech went off well. The students seated at this table were full of questions. He had to deflect the questions about the secret society; but he was happy to indulge them in reminescences about life at Longwood before they were born…

NB to Robbo: Your Maximum Leader is not your hero for ever. Sadly, he couldn’t figure out how to work in the material from the Market Snodgrass speech. He did try to tell an Irish joke to the students at his table and ramble a little bit. But it didn’t come off as well as it could have.

Then on the drive home he missed a turn that he has been making for decades and wound up in Goochland (rather than Richmond) before he knew it. So that added about 25 mins to his return trip that he’d not bargained for…

All in all, it was a good weekend. A bit on the tiring side… But very good.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is a great fan of Eric’s blog. It is pretty durned awesome.

Did you read one of Eric’s recent stories about the fruits of theivery? If you did not you should.

Your Maximum Leader sees that a few commenters are disagreeing with each other on the nature of the story. For what it is worth your Maximum Leader thinks that Eric was likely an agent of fate in this case. Yes we know that stealing is wrong. But in this case there is redemption in an attempt to right a wrong. No one would be happy with Eric stealing (indeed Eric himself was not), but in this case something was saved that would have been lost.

Regardless… The story itself is great. Read it and think about it some your own self.

Carry on.