This is a story about shoes, 300 pairs give or take, and my 30-year relationship with a significant other named Amy, who lived in Kansas with her parakeet, and whom I never got a chance to meet. Amy and I were introduced to each other in the early 1970s through N.O.S.E., or the National Odd […]
In John Dunning’s Booked to Die, men abuse and murder women and each other, brothers and sisters cordially loathe each other; Cliff Janeway, book-loving cop protagonist, beats his antagonist nearly to death – justifiably, of course, for the antagonist is a bully who likes to beat up women. Just another few days in America, full
The Haunted Bookshop I: Innocents at the Bookshop Read More »
Christopher Morley’s The Haunted Bookshop begins with the mysterious disappearance from the Bookshop’s shelves of Thomas Carlyle’s biography of Oliver Cromwell, that bringer of the reign of Christian righteousness and short hair to a people who, after a taste of perfection and a lot of death, decided they preferred neither. The book disappears, reappears, disappears,
The Haunted Bookshop II: “Christianity Fails Again” Read More »
In the not too distant future, a young Hispanic woman will graduate from college. She may have a degree in Anthropology, Economics, or Chemical Engineering. At this point, she’ll be too young to run for a House seat, but having a desire to serve her country, she’ll get a job as a Congressional Aide. Over the
Reclaiming the Republic in Two Simple Steps Read More »
I saw the danger, yet I walked Along the enchanted way. . . . “On Raglan Road” More than three months now and I just can’t get the music of Van Morrison out of my heart and feet. After five full decades his voice, his songs, his high-art approach to backstreet blue ballads and stonegood
Van Morrison: The Little Giant of Blue-Eyed Soul Read More »
A harmonica? The thing’s only four inches long! All kinds of notes are missing! Harp players have to show up with a briefcase full of different keys, just to play! They’re so tinny and shrill! So why would a serious musician ever choose the harmonica to play music on? Admittedly, this is good question. But
A Full-Tilt Tribute to the 1896 Harmonica Read More »