LLNL/Sandia-Livermore Thousand Cranes Project

The question has been raised about support for anonymous posting of blog articles. New threads created by me lack a by-line, though comments do mention my name. I recall there are some controls buried somewhere in the Google toolkit for the blogger software, it's not the easiest piece of kit to configure. That given, I did not enable anonymous support in the initial configuration on purpose. In my personal experience, anonymous is all to often used as a place to hide behind while acting badly. People abused anonymity by posting articles full of hate toward individuals or groups. Basic respect for others went out the window, resulting in some of the most uncivil language. Anonymous support had been enabled at the "other blog" ostentatiously in order to allow for people to report abuse at work without fear of reprisal. There has not been any kind of report like that in a very long time.  I would prefer my blog to be more a family atmosphere. If a situation arose where anony...

Everyone has their own criteria for best and worst locations to spend their retirement years. What were your reasons and the best/worst places according to those criteria? 

Being one of those "deplorables" that stuck to their religion and guns, I enjoy making holes in paper, better know as benchrest shooting. Back in the days working at LLNL I would  on the weekends  take an occasional jaunt with one of my friends over to the Livermore Rod and Gun Club. Lugging my high-end .22 bolt-action rifle; a tacklebox for my tools, targets, vernier sight, ammo, as well as a few other miscellaneous items; and my rifle rest to one of my favorite tables there for an afternoon of measuring wind in hopes of making tiny groups of holes. Over the years Livermore Rod and Gun evolved from a fairly basic target range to one with shaded compartmented stations that offered lit targets during night-time. Castro Valley was the nearest alternative, but that has closed down. Is Livermore Rod and Gun still operating?

A jump in fuel prices, followed by almost everything else, is not welcome by those living on fixed incomes.  advisorperspectives.com How are you doing these days? Did economics effect your choices in the recent election?

 For many years there has been a blog for LLNL folks. For a long time it was a good site, full of useful postings about conditions at LLNL, retirement issues, major news stories in Science and Technology, as well as news from DoE that was relevant to LLNL or Sandia Livermore. At some point that blog also took over for a similar blog at LANL which had foundered after it's moderator quit. Suddenly the nature of postings changed in character. Postings covering Livermore became more and more rare. These days it's almost completely LANL-dominated topics. Civility went out the window too. Trolls often posted rude comments or personal attacks on other posts. I tried helping the moderator to get rid of the trolls with some success. But there were other problems, accusations of  censorship. It took a while but eventually I was able to find supporting evidence. The blog moderator was throwing out posts from conservative thinkers, even those posts that were quite mellow in nature. The so...