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Showing posts from August, 2021

MOVING TO FRANCE: OVERVIEW AFTER SEVEN YEARS #1

We arrived in France on 16 April, 2014. I had retired just two weeks before. Our house in Pennsylvania had been put on the market but was as yet unsold. But we made it here and we have been here for just over seven years. I posted about our experiences after three years. It's time for an update. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY We have not regretted the decision to move to France for one second. Not one single second. BUREAUCRACY It's been an unforgettable couple of years for French bureaucrats. Brexit and COVID have generated the need to design, distribute, amend, interpret, and enforce all manner of forms and procedures.   There are tens of thousands of Brits who spend from a few weeks to many months in holiday houses or primary residences throughout much of France, although the major concentrations are on the French side of the Channel and down along the Med. No longer citizens of an EU country, Brits will have to live by different rules. They will be limited to the number of days they can

INTERSTELLAR TRAVEL, GUNS, AND D.C. STATEHOOD

Some stuff to get off my chest... INTERSTELLAR TRAVEL Check out a guy named Cameron Smith on YouTube.  Here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CprziVZHqBk  Settle in. It's over an hour long and he's not the most dynamic speaker. But if you want to think seriously about how the human race might colonize planets in solar systems other than our own, this guy has done the initial serious thinking for you.   Some of my favorite science fiction stories have been concerned with generation ships, interstellar conveyances that recognize that sub-light travel between solar systems requires planning for, at the very least, hundreds of years of travel. These works of fiction vary widely thematically. Many end badly or, if they end well, are initially presented to the reader as being a failed project that required saving. Regardless, I think that one of the reasons that I enjoy these stories is that, in order to be serious, they have to take the time to create scenarios

DOES THE NEW BLOG NOTIFICATION SYSTEM WORK FOR YOU?

  Greetings, Google has forced me to change the app that I use to notify subscribers of new posts. It's not as easy as they make it out to be, kind of like putting together IKEA furniture - even if you find a YouTube video, it's still a pain to get right. But I've tried. Now I need to know if it works for you. The first notification should go out on Monday, 23 August. Obviously, you can't tell me if you DIDN'T get the email. But if you did, let me know if you have any problems with it. Did you understand what it was about? Did it link properly to my blog. And PLEASE. Let me know if you want to unsubscribe. I don't want to clutter up your Inbox if you would prefer that I leave you alone. Stay safe. Be well. Peace Out! Ira