Deux Mil Seize 2016

2016 has been a biiiiig year for many, many reasons.  Also, December has been a busy month for me and therefore has been no shortage of things to write about.  Inversely, there was a definite shortage of time to write about those things.

And so, beginning in 2017, I have a great line up of new and better content.  There's a lot of YUGE things to look forward to in the coming year on the Bithiyan.

Things to anticipate:

New Book Reviews
Movie Reviews
Interviews
Possible Short Documentaries
New episodes and Season 1 Finale of Zytroft
Season 2 of Zytroft
New York City
And much, much more!

Merry Belated Christmas and Happy New Year Folks!

Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco

Midnight Test Drive: S1:E17

Here we have it.  Season 1: Episode 17 of Zytroft

This, you could consider, to be my first Christmas special.  It's made so, mainly, if not completely, by the end caps.  

My cousin is a clever lad and made a makeshift go pro out of his iPhone and ductape.  Also, he's a natural in front of the camera and improviser. 

The night makes things non-visible but I don't mind since it adds an air of obscurity and mystery to the vid. And it's just hard to see. 

Anyway, enjoy this episode of Zytroft.

Do You Know Lindybeige?

I discovered this wonderful youtube channel a little over a year ago.  This is one of my favorite channels and have seen about every video on it.  Lindybeige has got around 350,000 subscribers (relatively small) and hundreds of videos.

Nikolas Lloyd presents his unique and quirky expertise on all things warfare, history, weapons, swing dancing, poetry, tabletop gaming, and much more.  He has a degree in archaeology and has taught swing dancing for years.  He's well read in history and gaming manuals, and has a graphic novel releasing next year.

Lloyd's youtube name reflects his fondness of the color beige and the Lindy Hop dance.  I could talk for a while about what makes this channel special, but I think it'd be better to let you explore that yourself.  Lloyd does that job the best.

Here we have 1) the video that got me started watching Lindybeige and also 2) his most popular video.

1)

2)

Also!  Very important!

If you like his work, you can support Lindybeige on his Patreon.

He has a website, too.

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Shop Bith Store!

Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco

How to Write Correspondence

The Christmas season is a wonderful time of year to take up writing letters.  Once the gold standard of personal communication, keeping correspondence with friends and family is now a lost art.  In the world of the internet, we still send messages to people but it has become informal.  The instantaneous delivery and reception of email, text, and messaging has taken away the necessity to really think out and compose well what you want to communicate.  Hand writing a letter makes you think harder about what you really want to say.  It also makes what you say more meaningful.

Text messaging is the worst thing ever to happen to dating.  It has caused many many many communication misunderstandings and miscommunications.  It can kill relationships.  But, from personal experience I have found that introducing correspondence by mail can make being long distance so much more...survivable.  A well written love letter is far more romantic than a text message could ever be.  Letters build anticipation.  Albeit texts can still be romantic, much like an O'douls still technically has alcohol in it.

Writing letters can be fun for your inner artist.  There are endless designs and types of personal stationery you can use.  You can write in cursive, another lost art.  You can draw pictures, spray the letter with cologne or perfume, kiss it with lipstick, and send small gifts and photos.  An email can be saved in your computer or phones memory but a letter is a tangible keepsake for life.

Around Christmas time and other holidays throughout the year, it is still very common for folks to send cards, but let us not forget their origins.  The holiday greeting card is a devolution of written letters.  So yes, you can absolutely still send out your seasons greeting cards and I encourage it, but why not take the next step, rise to the next level, and write your own card.  Make it mean something to the person your writing.  Instead of letting Hallmark write a message for you, actually write it and then you'll never have the problem of not finding the right card at the store.  Also, it's okay be a procrastinator and wait until the day before Christmas, since you have the entire store at your pen tip.  Just don't forget that mailing a letter takes a couple days, so don't wait until the last minute.

Anyway, make this Yuletide more memorable for all go buy some personal stationery!

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Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco

Six

The rings on my hands,
the ring on yours,
they turned my intentions
into a difficult question.
The isle is long,
not as long
as the years are wide.
A wide gap lies
between Nassau and the cape.

The Bith Store is Here!

The time has now arrived, just before Christmas too!  The Bith Store is here!  When you click on the store page tab, you will be able to see all the Bithiyan related items for sale, and be able to purchase them via Redbubble.

Your support as readers is important to us here and we want to give you as many opportunities to support the Festival of Ideas as we can.

The first thing in the store is the "Bithiyan Poster Campaign" poster, as a sticker.  Stickers are great because they can be stuck anywhere... Its easy to stick them on binders, notebooks, cars (with permission from the owner, don't be an idiot.  So your own car pretty much), city poles, iPhones, doors, anywhere.  Stickers get the Bithiyan name out there and gets it seen.  The more we shout it from the rooftops, the bigger the Festival of Ideas grows.

I don't know if I ever put it this way in any other post.  Remember, the Festival of Ideas is not only the Bithiyan itself, but a community and a movement to grow what is essential to western free societies: The Marketplace of Ideas.

More ideas, more voices, more free speech> less of it.  In the marketplace of ideas, may the best ideas win.

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Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco

Poem d'Amour

My first love is love.
Of all my endeavors,
off all my systems,
love I love the most.

Garius' Stool

           “Can we come to grips with this over-hyped plight.  We feel that our noses cannot be raised any higher at their egregious solitude.  For once, would the baskers emerge from their magnification domes?  For once, would they bring the wisdom they’ve absorbed out to the civil landscape.  I can’t express enough how much these sentiments would mean great joy for our people if they were realized by those ignorant in their wisdom.”

            Garius completed his diatribe and planted himself back upon the wood and canvas stool.  Much like the stool he had carried under his right arm to the assembly, Garius carried from his humble dwelling of thinking, to the public forum, his ready protest against the ruling wisemen and unfolded it.  He placed it where all men of reason were gathered.  Once his deeply considered sentiments were established, he sat upon them.  Garius rested upon the great logical analyses he so worked out for numerous years.

            His great folly was his failure to feel the soil beneath his placement, prior to setting his stool.  Garius was so convinced by his self-apparent cleverness that his arrogance was a disgruntled confidence. 

Treachery.  The ground beneath his argument gave way to the weight of his arrogance.  Upon his back, Garius laid.  His white tunic and silver grey locks were muddied by reality.  Garius perhaps had not estimated reality’s pull, but gravity cares not for one’s will and assured convictions. 

            When Garius arose from his tumble, the assembled assemblymen laughed at his folly and jested at his sincere foolishness.  He began scolding them, but he made the dissenter’s own arguments for them.  They beat him over the head with his own stool, laying him back within the mud. 

            Another assemblyman, Jonus, one who stood in the back, and with a voice no less deep, spoke. “This man we mock and ridicule in his folly, he built and tested his stool.  He sat it upon his domestic surface, by the comforting warmth of the hearth.  It supported him and he became confident.  Garius then came to the assembly and placed his seat.  Though a well-made stool, he did not have care enough to place it upon a solid rock, many which are scattered throughout this plain.  He made careless haste to set it in the mud, and now Garius lies battered in the mud.  Unable to argue what he holds true.”

            Jonus sat down upon a stool which did not lean or wobble.  It sat on a flat stone surface. 

*I wrote this a few months ago and never posted it.  After a second review, here it is.  I'm calling  a rhetorical allegory.  Maybe it's a metaphor.  I think it's actually a really long simile, with some allegorical and metaphorical elements.  Anyway, I hope y'all get a moral out of it, and enjoy!  If anyone has a better name for what this is feel free to put it in the comments!  

Peace out.  Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco

How to Save Something

Many financial, money, success, entrepreneur experts will tell you that the key to being wealthy, as demonstrated by those with wealth, is multiple streams of income.

Well this post isn't about income, but what you do with it.  The multiple streams principle can be applied to saving as well.

It's important for everyone to put money aside for rainy days/future plans/etc.  Everyone, no matter what you bring in and what you spend and pay in expenses, can save SOMETHING.  If you can even save only five dollars a week, great!  It's putting SOMETHING away and doing it periodically.  You must stick with it.

THEN FORGET ABOUT IT.  Your savings should not tempt you, because you don't have it ;)
Pretend you don't have it.

If you can afford it, having multiple spots to stick cash is a great way to diversify your savings.  Whether in a lockbox under your bed or in a separate bank account, you can set different rules for each spot on to how you contribute to it.

My method:
I probably go a little overboard but saving money becomes fun once you find a good way to do it.  With online banking nowadays, its even easier.

1.  Immediately after getting paid, I move 5% of each check to a growth account.
2.  I withdrawal a certain set percentage of one check and put it in a personal lockbox.
3.  Any other checks get 50% withdrawn and put into the lockbox.
4.  The remaining fifty percent gets split, putting half in a reserve account.
5.  Periodically, at the end of a set time period I put a set percentage of the lockbox savings into a safe.
6.  All pocket change goes into the lockbox.
7.  Before a pocketful of change goes into the lockbox, the biggest coin and smallest coin from the pocketful go into a jar.

This is fun for me, but I'm not saying anyone has to go this nuts.  What's important is that you ARE saving SOMETHING.

A few years ago I saw a image on reddit about a guy who saved every five dollar bill he got over a period and it added up quickly.  I thought it was a great idea and started doing it.  Over time, my savings method changed and evolved to what I have now.

That is what I wanted to hopefully spark with this post.  I had no savings method until I came across one guys method and got the idea from him.  Hopefully, I've inspired you to try out one these methods and it leads to your own effective method and BIG savings!

As always, please comment, share, put in a lockbox, safe, whatevs!

Shema Humata: Tass Sheshco