iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

Splitting red oak logs today. Largest 300+lbs. I'm a traditionalist, not masochist. 13 years ago i did this with saw and maul. Took 3 months. Love technology. This'll take about 4 days to split the entire tree.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Good morning. Try to be strong today, my friends. Just do your best and it'll all be good. Peace

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 30/12/2024

Mediterranean Chicken with all 4 kids and grandkids. Joy last night before FiL funeral this morning. Cooked with son. It was great. Cabernet paired well.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 28/12/2024

Good night from Persimmon Knob

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 28/12/2024

Radial followed by dendritic

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 28/12/2024

After FiL's passing on Christmas Day, family is gathering for Monday funeral. First kids and grands arrived today. 2 more and families Sunday along with 4 nieces and nephews and families. Joy and love amidst sorrow. As is right and just.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

Seems to be a game of chicken, doesn't it?

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

Granada is a great city to visit. Mountainside neighborhoods. The Alhambra. Breathtaking churches. Vibrant and safe walk appeal. Really excellent food.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

You ought to be Advent maxing. You know it. Do it tastefully and in muted tones. It's not yet Christmas. It's Advent. Prepare.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

Good story and good moral. It seems few want to deal with anything. Esp those who say screw your feelings.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

Mom and daughter 1 made Serbian Pita (spinach cheese eggs in phyllo) and a phyllo cranberry brie custard pie. What a combo

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

@jfallows.bsky.social I love the little Rams uniform. A little Roman Gabriel

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

if you're not carcass-maxing, you're putting food in the trash. I boiled the carcass for 7 hours. Then in fridge for a day. Total gelatin. Pulled all bones. Shocking how much meat is there. Now aromatics & veggies boil all day. Then feast. It is *so* delicious. It'll feed us for 4 days.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

I put my wild apple brew in the windows specifically to have sunlight help the alcohol.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

Yes, specifically bred for blight resistance

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 27/11/2024

Late season liqueurs cooking in window. 2 jars wild Persimmon. One jar Satsuma orange and one jar Georgia Pecans. You can do this.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 27/11/2024

Man, every tear you find huge sycamore leaves. The ones who held on the longest and grew biggest.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 27/11/2024

Yes, Sir, ACF. Thanks for the kind words

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 22/11/2024

Thank you so much! Lots of time and effort but the grace we receive is worth it.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

Fact check: plausible, but unlikely

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

You can do this. Really. Yes, you.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

And a well-managed forest ensures we have wood to heat the home every winter no matter the future of the grid.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Also, there's free maple syrup.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

There are a lot of people who be moan where the world is. Finding a place like ours and reforesting it is both simple and relatively inexpensive compared to most of life's activities. And it leaves something for our successors. Nothing like feeding grandkids the fruits of their future land

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Reforestation also increases wildlife. Deer eat from the orchard and from increased nut production. The Meadow is now prime spot for does to birth fawns. We have quail now. More turkeys than we can count. So that also provides us with meat for the year. A real bounty.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Our small orchard produces more fruit than we can eat. So we preserve like crazy, give fruit t an neighbor who wants it in any amount. Apples, pears, plums, peaches, cherries.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

What were dry creek beds for 11 months of the year now run year round or nearly so. Pond creek dries occasionally. Spring Creek is always wet and sports fish and snapping turtles after only 12 years. Reforestation makes land a water sink and retains it vice running off.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Now, The Meadow (as it's will always be called) sports wild orchids not known in this region, wild passion fruit, and a crap ton of pollinators.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Thread on reforesting land. In 2012 we moved to new house on 15.5 acres. ~6 acres old growth forest. Rest hayed pasture. Started transplanting saplings first year and every year for 6 years. Now The Meadow is a forest. 3 species Chestnuts including 25 15/16ths American. 70 species of trees

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Before. As likely by R as by D. Maybe multiples independent of each other.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Sunset from the creek stand at Angel Hill Farm this evening.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Boccadasse, Genoa, Italy

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Inside the bato of this dead Sycamore to the left of the stand I'm sitting in rn is a healthy clump of Chanterelles. They're about 15 ft up the tree. Too bad. They look so good.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Thank you, Tom. I think it is easy to say something once. Writing it down and putting it out there for everyone to see if you're wrong ought to make you slow down and think it through. I encourage people to make predictions. Great exercises in thinking and humility.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Annecy and Lyon are delightful, off the beaten path places to visit in France. Here are pictures of Château Menthon and the island castle in Annecy. Also some doors of Lyon and the interior of Notre Dame de Fouvriere. I'm leading an intimate small group (6 guests) Excursion in May. Hope you'll come.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Here is a piece i wrote back in Jan 2020 with some modest predictions of what we can expect in 2030. I think i hit some nails on the head and I missed perhaps the biggest issue, the TFR collapse. What do you think? bgcts.com/what-to-expe...

bgcts.com

What to Expect in 2030

Its always easy to look back and say, "Yeah, we should have seen that one coming..." Stunning how few people who were professionally studying the Soviet Union for a living saw its collapse. Yet all th...

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

I love corals. They taste good, too

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

You're doing it right. It should take that long. You're gonna have the healthiest land in WI

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Truth isn't good or bad. It just is. Truth doesn't change based on the rank of the recipient. If you can't state the evidence that would change your mind, you don't care about truth. Love your neighbor; no caveats. Goodness breeds goodness. Travel is fatal to bigotry & prejudice.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

If you don't already, I recommend following @jfallows.bsky.social and reading his Breaking the News substack. Here is a podcast discussion we had back earlier this year as the first of two discussions. I'm thankful for our long friendship. fallows.substack.com/p/america-is...

fallows.substack.com

‘America is Very Purple’: Personality and Place Across the American Landscape.

The country is complicated. In an era of simplistic "Red State / Blue State" polarization, three different approaches to this central, murky, but inescapable truth.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

The entire world and all activities are an interconnected venn diagram

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

This is so true. Any bit and any non practitioner can tell you what to do. But you have to actually do it and most that tel you what to do aren't practicing. Follow those who show you how to do something for yourself. Keep it up Sim.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Forests mimic cathedrals. Cathedrals mimic forests. God created one. God inspired the other. We should ponder the similarities. We should give thanks for both. We should regenerate our great woods. We should build great churches anew like our forebears did. Together.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

Serbian village life 100 years ago. Children tended livestock. They were poor relative to today. It was like this in Italy, Lebanon, Japan, and Argentina. Could we relearn to live this way if circumstances necessitated it? bgcts.com/restored-film-…

bgcts.com

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 16/11/2024

Made Mugolio this fall. Fermented pine/spruce syrup. Packed green cones in sugar and let sit for 2 months. Makes intense syrup. Used a few tablespoons in chicken goulash tonight was delightful. 10/10 simple. Free cones everywhere in spring/summer. Win win.

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Tom Ruby @tomruby.bsky.social · 03/07/2024

See more at www.culturaldebrisexcursions.com

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