Saturday, January 05, 2013
Grief Takes Many Forms
Man shoots collection of Dale Earnhardt memorabilia after death of pet snake
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Blindness & Beyond: José Saramago's Literary Legacy
Blindness & Beyond: José Saramago's Literary Legacyon AbeBooks: Nobel Prize-winning writer José Saramago came from very humble origins. He was born into a poor rural family in central Portugal in 1922 but was being hailed as one of the world’s best novelists by the end of the 1990s.
Friday, January 04, 2013
Forgotten Books: The Last Man on Earth -- Isaac Asimov, Martin Harry Greenberg, & Charles G. Waugh, Editors
I read several of the stories last week, atarting with Clifford Simak's "The Coming of the Ants." It's set in the world of City, one of my favorite SF novels, and the subject of one of my very first FFB posts, maybe the very first. Naturally I liked the story a lot. The man appears only very briefly, as by the time of the story men have long left this particular earth.
"The Underdweller" by William F. Nolan has the last guy hiding out in the sewers of L. A., which made it irresistible for me even if not much time is spent there.
And of course Fredrick Brown's "Knock" is here. It's probably more famous for the short-short story that begins and ends this tale. Reading the whole thing is as much fun as ever.
I'll be reading some of the other stories eventually. There are two by Edmond Hamilton, whose City at World's End I loved as a kid. And a Zelazny I don't think I've read, and . . . .
Cheap copies abound on the 'Net if you're inclined to read this stuff.
Thursday, January 03, 2013
Elvis: Still Shakin'
Elvis Song Too Sexy For School Play, Utah Officials: A parent in the American state of Utah has got All Shook Up about a school musical featuring Elvis Presley songs, so the production has been cancelled.
Update: The Show Will Go On.
Update: The Show Will Go On.
Fossil Update
Fossil Older Than Oxygen on Earth Found in Australia: Researchers have found fossils of bacteria that are nearly 3.5 billion years old, believed to be the oldest visible fossils ever uncovered.
Wednesday, January 02, 2013
PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest
Android: Mimic (The Identity Trilogy): Mel Odom: Amazon.com: Books: In a dystopian future, a bioroid detective struggles with his own artificial identity during his search for a killer. New Angeles Detective Drake 3GI2RC is not your average Bioroid. First, he’s one of the New Angeles Police Department’s few android cops, and second, he’s haunted by another man’s memories. But even as Drake investigates a very public crime, he must look inward for answers. After all, where does his programming end, and his own personality begin? Mimic is the second exciting novel in The Identity Trilogy, a series written by Mel Odom and set in the Android universe!
Patti Page, R. I. P.
NYTimes.com: Patti Page, the apple-cheeked, honey-voiced alto whose sentimental, soothing, sometimes silly hits like “Tennessee Waltz,” “Old Cape Cod” and “How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?” made her one of the most successful pop singers of the 1950s, died on Tuesday in Encinitas, Calif. She was 85.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
PWA TAKES A STEP FORWARD from Robert J. Randisi
Ed Gorman's blog: PWA TAKES A STEP FORWARD from Robert J. Randisi: PWA has instituted a new Shamus Award for works published in 2012. It is the Best Indie P.I. Novel. This is for novels that have been published by the authors themselves. Entries must bear a 2012 copyright.
Arms and the Man
Arms and the boy, really. It's not that I have anything to add to the national debate about guns. It's just that sometimes I get nostalgic and want to set down some of the things I remember. And I remember guns. For example, the first thing I remember Santa bringing me was a toy M-1 rifle. I don't remember how old I was, but it was before we moved to town, so I must have been three or four. It's one of my earliest memories of my mother. She came into my room very early, before daylight, I think, and carried me into the little living room where we had the Christmas tree. She had long hair then and was wearing a long white cotton gown. It was like being carried by an angel, and there under the tree was the M-1. I thought that rifle was great, and I played with it for years afterward. So did my brother, later on, and some of the neighborhood kids. We played with it so much, in fact, that the barrel eventually fell off. We might have played with it even after that. It was all a long, long time ago.
We loved to play with toy guns. We all had them, my sister included, as you can see in the photo. I'm on the left, with my brother between me and my sister. The kid from across the street is on the right. His name was John Roy Truelove, and he had guns, too. We could play for hours, shooting each other with cap pistols. What the photo doesn't show is my very favorite gun, which was a cast aluminum Luger. It had no moving parts, but I thought it was swell. I must have gotten it about the time I got the M-1. Long gone, however, with all the rest of the arsenal. It looked just like this one.
Later on, when we moved from the first house in town to the one I associate most with my life in Mexia, Texas, my brother and I shared a room. There was no closet in the room, and our clothes and shoes were all in a little armoire. Together we probably had four pairs of jeans and six or eight shirts. Well, we had some underwear and socks, too. That was it.
Besides the armoire, two twin beds, and a desk, the room had an open gun cabinet that held a couple of .22 rifles, maybe three. Two shotguns, and automatic and a double-barrel. Later on a couple of deer rifles. Ammo was right there in the cabinet behind a couple of little doors in the bottom. Shotgun shells and .22 cartridges: shorts, longs, and long rifles.
We never thought a thing about any of that. That's just the way things were. Our parents told us never to play with the guns, so we didn't. We were allowed to handle them, but we were cautioned never to point them at anyone. "There's no such thing as an unloaded gun," we were told.
Comic books and movies with guns? Oh, yeah. Hardly a Saturday afternoon passed that I wasn't at the double-feature cowboy show at the Palace Theater. Some kids even brought their cap pistols to the show. And a lot of the stars had comic books that I read: Monte Hale, Roy Rogers, Rocky Lane. Add to that the Lone Ranger and Kid Colt. Probably others. Lots of gunplay in all of them, though I remember that the Lone Ranger never killed anybody. Maybe the others didn't, either.
When I was a teenager, I stopped going to the matinees, but nobody thought anything of it if I said I'd like to take the .22 on Saturday and hunt armadillos or that I'd like to take the shotgun and go dove hunting. If we didn't have enough shells, I could go down to Western Auto, walk in, and buy a box. I could drive by and pick up a couple of friends with their shotguns, and off we'd go.
That's really all there was to it. I never developed a lasting affection for guns, and I haven't owned one since I was a kid. One of the .22s was mine, and I gave it to my brother when our parents died. He's the family gun collector, and he always liked hunting more than I did. I never cared for it, myself, and my dove hunting expeditions were few. Never went deer hunting at all, though my brother and father did for a lot of years.
That's my history with guns.
Later on, when we moved from the first house in town to the one I associate most with my life in Mexia, Texas, my brother and I shared a room. There was no closet in the room, and our clothes and shoes were all in a little armoire. Together we probably had four pairs of jeans and six or eight shirts. Well, we had some underwear and socks, too. That was it.
Besides the armoire, two twin beds, and a desk, the room had an open gun cabinet that held a couple of .22 rifles, maybe three. Two shotguns, and automatic and a double-barrel. Later on a couple of deer rifles. Ammo was right there in the cabinet behind a couple of little doors in the bottom. Shotgun shells and .22 cartridges: shorts, longs, and long rifles.
We never thought a thing about any of that. That's just the way things were. Our parents told us never to play with the guns, so we didn't. We were allowed to handle them, but we were cautioned never to point them at anyone. "There's no such thing as an unloaded gun," we were told.
Comic books and movies with guns? Oh, yeah. Hardly a Saturday afternoon passed that I wasn't at the double-feature cowboy show at the Palace Theater. Some kids even brought their cap pistols to the show. And a lot of the stars had comic books that I read: Monte Hale, Roy Rogers, Rocky Lane. Add to that the Lone Ranger and Kid Colt. Probably others. Lots of gunplay in all of them, though I remember that the Lone Ranger never killed anybody. Maybe the others didn't, either.
When I was a teenager, I stopped going to the matinees, but nobody thought anything of it if I said I'd like to take the .22 on Saturday and hunt armadillos or that I'd like to take the shotgun and go dove hunting. If we didn't have enough shells, I could go down to Western Auto, walk in, and buy a box. I could drive by and pick up a couple of friends with their shotguns, and off we'd go.
That's really all there was to it. I never developed a lasting affection for guns, and I haven't owned one since I was a kid. One of the .22s was mine, and I gave it to my brother when our parents died. He's the family gun collector, and he always liked hunting more than I did. I never cared for it, myself, and my dove hunting expeditions were few. Never went deer hunting at all, though my brother and father did for a lot of years.
That's my history with guns.
Once Again Texas Leads the Way
Angry Cowboys Fan Fills Washing Machine With Explosives, Fires Rifle At It Just To Blow Up Tony Romo Jersey
NSFW language in the video.
Hat tip to Art Scott.
NSFW language in the video.
Hat tip to Art Scott.
Once Again Texas Leads the Way
BBC News - Texas rangers on the rise of modern day cattle rustling: Texas is America's biggest ranching state. In recent years, it's seen a sharp rise in the number of cattle being stolen.
Hat tip to Richard Prosch.
Hat tip to Richard Prosch.
Time Is Running Out!
Top Suspense Group: New e-reader for Christmas? Or just weary of the hunt for writing of genuine quality in the ever-growing eBook marketplace?
For two days only, January 1st and 2nd 2013, selected titles from the twelve authors of the Top Suspense Group will be selling for 99c each. That's a dozen proven thriller and suspense titles for less than the cost of... I don't know, something that sells for twelve dollars. But you get the idea.
Click here to see and order any or all of the books you can see below. Favorite Kills is a collection of award-winning and nominated short stories by Top Suspense Group members and includes Number 19 by Naomi Hirahara.
For two days only, January 1st and 2nd 2013, selected titles from the twelve authors of the Top Suspense Group will be selling for 99c each. That's a dozen proven thriller and suspense titles for less than the cost of... I don't know, something that sells for twelve dollars. But you get the idea. Click here to see and order any or all of the books you can see below. Favorite Kills is a collection of award-winning and nominated short stories by Top Suspense Group members and includes Number 19 by Naomi Hirahara.
First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .
Note to grammar cops: I didn't write this headline.
Man punched female driver, got naked, laid down in road, deputies say -
Man punched female driver, got naked, laid down in road, deputies say -
Only 99 Cents for One More Day!
The Blacklin County Files: Bill Crider, Judy Crider: Amazon.com: Kindle Store: Sheriff Dan Rhodes tackles five tough cases with compassion and humor. Killers, crooks, cats, cattle, cranks, and ice cream. Plus recipes!
Tuesday, January 01, 2013
Happy Birthday to the Internet!
Internet quietly celebrates its 30th birthday: The internet, a revolutionary and cheap communications system that has transformed the lives of billions of people across the world, turned 30 today.
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My Favorite 2013 Prediction
Earth’s twin will be discovered in 2013, astronomers predict
I don't really think it will happen, especially considering this.
I don't really think it will happen, especially considering this.
Overlooked Movies: The Big Country
The story is complicated, so I won't go into all of it. Gregory Peck, playing it noble, is a former sea captain who comes to live on a ranch owned by Charles Bickford. Peck is engaged to Bickford's daugher, played by Carroll Baker. Charlton Heston is the ranch foreman who doesn't like Peck because he thinks Peck is a coward. That's far from the case, but Peck keeps doing things that turn people against him, including Bickford and Baker, because of his meekness. The town's schoolmarm is Jean Simmons, and she owns a ranch with water being used by both Bickford and Burl Ives, a rancher with a crude following. Chuck Connors has a great turn as his villainous son.
There are duels, gun battles, and an epic fistfight between Heston and Peck, one of the best on film. The title gets repeated a lot in the dialogue. I never seem to include this film in any list of the Ten Best Westerns, but it's still a favorite.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
As part of his reform, Caesar instituted January 1 as the first day of the year, partly to honor the month’s namesake: Janus, the Roman god of beginnings, whose two faces allowed him to look back into the past and forward into the future.
Monday, December 31, 2012
Richard Rodney Bennett, R. I. P.
NYTimes.com: Richard Rodney Bennett, the British composer who in a long, distinguished career moved with ease among classical concert music, jazz and film, died on Dec. 24 in New York, where he had lived since 1979. He was 76.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Viking Update
The Raw Story: When the sleek, beautiful silhouette of Roskilde 6 appeared on the horizon, 1,000 years ago, it was very bad news. The ship was part of a fleet carrying an army of hungry, thirsty warriors, muscles toned by rowing and sailing across the North Sea; a war machine like nothing else in 11th-century Europe, its arrival meant disaster was imminent.
Now the ship’s timbers are slowly drying out in giant steel tanks at the Danish national museum’s conservation centre at Brede outside Copenhagen, and will soon again head across the North Sea – to be a star attraction at an exhibition in the British Museum.
Now the ship’s timbers are slowly drying out in giant steel tanks at the Danish national museum’s conservation centre at Brede outside Copenhagen, and will soon again head across the North Sea – to be a star attraction at an exhibition in the British Museum.
Worth It For the Crocodiles Alone
Mail Online: It's a real animal house! The $15million Texas mansion filled with dozens of stuffed polar bears, crocodiles and lions
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
The Strange Story of William Faulkner’s Only Children’s Book
Brain Pickings: The Strange Story of William Faulkner’s Only Children’s Book
Sunday, December 30, 2012
PimPage: An Occasional Feature in Which I Call Attention to Books of Interest
Another great comic strip collection from Titan Books. Not to be missed by Modesty fans. The large format makes this one especially enticing.
This volume includes the classic stories The Girl from the Future, The Big Mole and Lady in the Dark!
With story introductions that take the reader behind the scenes of Modesty's world, this outstanding collection is not to be missed.
First It Was the Thin Mints Melee . . .
OrlandoSentinel.com: Woman stabbed drunken joker 9 times during holiday party for teasing, cops say
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
Hat tip to Jeff Meyerson.
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