Another common conversation: "I want to lose more weight but my bench press will suffer." Well bud, no one cares how much you can bench and it's not going to help you once you leave. What I care about is longevity. How can I continue...
Madhouse at the End of the Earthby Julian Sancton Madhouse at the End of the Earth arrived in Yankton a couple of months back, and I have no idea who sent it to me, but my best guess is with Paul - he's always one to...
I recently picked up on the technical meaning of the numbers following the acronym SPF - Sun Protective Factor. An SPF of 15 would imply that the sunscreen provides protection for 15 times longer than going without. If your skin could last ten minutes in...
Mackerel as a Means of Currency Among the Incarcerated: A Retrospective Analysis Inmates are never short on creative ideas and they've created many solutions to the lack of cash in prison. Most compounds use stamps as a form of currency. Universally accepted, inflation protected, and easy...
Spare the last month, the softball field has been closed for the entire time I've been here due to Covid imposed restrictions. Even with the closure, I heard the lore from other inmates - softball in Federal Prison is a huge deal. One guy half-joking/half-serious...
Seneca phrased it best when he eloquently wrote "work nourishes noble minds." If everyone sat around every day, in prison or outside of it, not only would nothing get done, a lethargy would take over our souls. We're meant to put our minds and bodies...
Fact of Prison: all inmates count down the weeks and months. Many more count down the years. Some I'm here with have been counting down the decades. Without fail, on the eighth day of every month, I hear my favorite snippet of prison optimism. "Only...
As the temperatures in South Dakota begin to break 90 degrees, fresh on the menu is cold nachos. At first, the idea sounds wildly unappealing. "Hi, I'd like a plate of nachos but please don't heat any of it up, room temp will suffice" said...
Corruptibleby Brian Klaas I cannot seem to get enough of hunter-gatherer references when analyzing our modern world and writing on the variance and evolution of our lives between that time period and now. This continues to appear in many aspects of my reading and it is...
A couple months ago I was in the legal library and a friend passed this book to me. He mentioned that he enjoyed it to the point he read it twice. Books can find their way into your life in fairly random ways and this...