Category Archives: Books and reading

The Snowy Day

Is it just me, or does this Lands’ End catalog cover remind you of that beautiful childhood picture book classic by Ezra Jack Keats? Something about the bright red coat and stark, crisp, clean blocks of color contrast, I don’t … Continue reading

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The Charles Manson – Dennis (“Beach Boys”) Wilson Connection

Well. Here is something I’d never heard about before, never once in all the years since I first read the grisly details of Sharon Tate’s murder in the Sunday newspaper’s Parade magazine when I was just a kid under ten … Continue reading

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Remembering “The Day of Ahmed’s Secret”

I’m watching documentaries on PBS tonight about the Great Pyramid of Giza (aka the Pyramid of Khufu, Wikipedia article HERE), and seeing bird’s-eye views of the pyramids situated right next to Cairo reminded me of this heartbreakingly sweet children’s picture … Continue reading

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Must We Bare a Burden of Guilt for the Sins of Our Fathers?

Must We Bare a Burden of Guilt for the Sins of Our Fathers? http://paulrwaibel.com/2021/05/20/must-we-bare-a-burden-of-guilt-for-the-sins-of-our-fathers/ — Read on paulrwaibel.com/2021/05/20/must-we-bare-a-burden-of-guilt-for-the-sins-of-our-fathers/ I just read this very thoughtful reflection essay/review about how descendants of evil people, especially WWII Nazi war criminals, have personally dealt … Continue reading

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Writing Exercise – “Protest Night”

Here’s an exercise from late October or early November. I can’t remember which member of our writing group assigned this exercise, but it’s another taken from Ursula K. Le Guin’s Steering the Craft: A Twenty-First-Century Guide to Sailing the Sea … Continue reading

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How to write a bestseller #@#%$!!!!!

Who the BLEEP knew?!?!?!? While buying paper towels and other staples at Target last night, I decided to swing past the books and maybe treat myself if anything caught my eye. Well, these did catch my eye, LOL. But they … Continue reading

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And the sun came out . . .

Very windy rain showers hit Milwaukee around mid-day today. I took this series of photos from my office window after returning from a couple of meetings around three o’clock. For some reason the title of a favorite picture book of … Continue reading

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LIttle Free Library – There’s a book!

Actually there are THREE books! The Little Free Library Book (2015) tells the official story of the Little Free Library movement and contains a forward by Todd Bol, the founder of Little Free Libraries, who built the first one in … Continue reading

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The individual vs. society – Joseph Campbell, Gandhi, and JFK weigh in

I’m cleaning out my office today, throwing out old student papers and old lecture notes from courses I no longer teach. One of the files I came across was from a one-off course on mythology that I taught in the … Continue reading

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A nice midweek break

Last night after work I met my friend, Karen, for dinner on the East Side (which is how we Milwaukeeans refer to the area bounded by the lake on the east, the river on the west, Capitol Drive on the … Continue reading

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