![Avada Law]({"default":{"normal":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_120.jpg","id":"1405","height":"120","width":"91","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_120.jpg"},"retina":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_152.jpg","id":"1404","height":"152","width":"115","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_152-115x150.jpg"}},"sticky":{"normal":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_120.jpg","id":"1405","height":"120","width":"91","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_120.jpg"},"retina":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Half.jpg","id":"1408","height":"265","width":"200","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Half-150x150.jpg"}},"mobile":{"normal":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon.jpg","id":"1409","height":"66","width":"50","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon.jpg"},"retina":{"url":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_152.jpg","id":"1404","height":"152","width":"115","thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.idlfirm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/IDLFirm_Logo_Favicon_152-115x150.jpg"}}}){kind=logo}
Socks for Uganda: and other charitable mash
It’s 3 pm in Houston on a late summer day. Late summer in Houston means October. I am standing on a shadeless sidewalk near the spot where the yellow school bus usually drops off my kids. The ambient air temperature is approaching 100 degrees Fahrenheit. For those of the dear readers who live in Europe and use the Celsius scale, 100 F in American temperature means hot, very, very hot. I look down at my toes and wonder if the cheap polyurethane coating on my Chinese-made Nikes would finally show its true colors and melt. The bus arrives and interrupts [...]
Fuels and Fossil Thinking
Today is September 29, 2021. The European gas market has melted. It has melted up. Gas in the UK is trading at approximately $30 mBtu. Not to be left behind, the same story is unfolding in Asia. Converted to oil, this price of natural gas is something like $200 per barrel oil equivalent. Propane and heating oil prices are spiking. There is no end in sight. To say the least, changes are coming to the gas pump. And not of a pleasant variety. To add a few other random numbers, coal burning in the electricity mix in China has gone [...]
The Pursuit of Happiness : and few impairments thereof
There is a modern-day Greek proverb which roughly translates as “Happiness does not require hard effort but skill.” An effortless happiness of sorts, so long as you know how to do it. The kind of Greek happiness which one can obtain through skill is intuitively different from the American kind of happiness, the one famously codified in the Declaration of Independence by none other than Thomas Jefferson. The American happiness requires pursuit. The pursuit of happiness is listed as an inherent human right, right next to life and liberty. Why did Thomas Jefferson not simply say happiness plus life and [...]