Archive for November, 2006

Forever hold your penguin dear

“Death ends a life, not a relationship.” – Jack Lemmon Emma and I watched “March of the Penguins” for the first time on Saturday night. I know the whole world has seen it by now, but we hadn’t. Mr. Brilliant had to leave the room; even though he is a man wont to explore the joys of forensic pathology in…
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Be conscious of your treasures

“The only people with whom you should try to get even are those who have helped you.” – John E. Southard In the U.S., this week marks our Thanksgiving holiday. A vegetarian, there will be no turkey on my table, but plenty of that congealed cranberry sauce from a can, the kind that retains the can imprint, those rippled rings…
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Listen to writers

Turns out, it really is true. We all get 15 minutes of fame. Unless we are in a writing group that has to split that 15 minutes by the twelve of us, in which case our fifteen minutes is down to around 2.5 minutes per person. [I know the math is all wrong, but bear with me.] And that’s exactly…
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Rest your stems

"All man’s troubles come from not knowing how to sit still in one room." – Blaise Pascal My good and wise friend in New Zealand, Richard, evidently determined recently that I needed instruction in how to be idle. Imagine my delight when a book arrived by that title, a gift from Richard. The author, Mr. Hodgkinson, leads his reader through…
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Sit very, very still with Slumpy

"He moves nice. It’s his stillness that’s not right.” – Marilyn Whirlwind Years ago, I was on I-40, driving from Greensboro, North Carolina, to a small town several hours west of there, when I heard a loud bang, an explosion, then a deafening sharp scary ongoing thump, thump, bang, thump. I started to lose control of the car. And as…
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