from Bruce
Anecdotes
Books
• When Gary Paulsen was 14 years old, he felt cold on the street and so he went into a public library to warm up. The librarian gave him a library card and checked out a book for him. It took him a month to read that book, but soon each week he was reading two or three books. Mr. Paulsen says, “She saved me, she really did, by giving me that book. She turned me into a reader, made me love reading and books and stories.” As an adult, Mr. Paulsen has written over 100 books, including the very popular book Hatchet, starring a boy named Brian who has to survive alone in the Canadian wilderness with only a hatchet and the clothing he is wearing.
• Like so many of us, Brazilian author Paulo Coelho owned too many books. He put them on shelves, and when he returned home one day, he discovered that the shelves had collapsed. Reflecting that if he had been home he might have crushed to death by the books and shelves, he decided to greatly reduce the number of books he owned — to 400, which he says is still a high number if he intends to reread all those books.
• When she died, Agatha Christie left behind two gifts for the fans of her detective characters Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple — two mystery books. Curtain told about M. Poirot’s final case, and Sleeping Murder told about Miss Marple’s final case. Ms. Christie dedicated the mysteries to her daughter and her husband. After writing the mysteries in 1940, she left them in a vault to which only her husband had access. As Ms. Christie wished, the two mysteries were not published until after her death.
Children
• In 2008, author Barbara Kingsolver’s younger daughter, Lily, was 11 years old. According to Ms. Kingsolver, “The wisdom of each generation is necessarily new. This tends to dawn on us in revelatory moments, brought to us by our children.” As an example, she brings up her daughter, whom she walks to the school bus stop and talks to until the bus arrives. This is a good time, but a few weeks previously, Lily looked her over and then told her, “Mom, just so you know, the only reason I’m letting you wear that outfit is because of your age.” When the bus arrived, Ms. Kingsolver hid behind a building. That is an example of new knowledge. In Ms. Kingsolver’s words, “It’s okay […] to deck out and turn up as the village idiot” when you are old enough. What about the old knowledge? Ms. Kingsolver says, “Honestly, it is harrowing for me to try to teach 20-year-old students, who earnestly want to improve their writing. The best I can think to tell them is this: Quit smoking, and observe posted speed limits. This will improve your odds of getting old enough to be wise.” According to Ms. Kingsolver, the books that are good are the books that are wise.
• Kathy Lette is an Australian author who says, “All I do in my books is write down the way women talk when there are no men around.” She lives with a human-rights lawyer with whom she has had children. Unfortunately, this means that she changes lots of diapers. According to Ms. Lette, this has an effect on her writing, just as having children has an effect on every female author: “For every baby she has, a female author loses out on writing about three books.” She has asked Geoffrey, the human-rights lawyer she lives with, to change diapers (nappies), but the first time she asked, he replied, “But I’ve got 250 people on death row in Trinidad.” She jokes that she did not say anything then, but “after another 4,000 nappies, I replied, ‘Oh let them die.’ After the second baby, I was like, ‘I’m going to go there and kill them myself. Human rights begin at home!’”
• George Orwell (the author of Animal Farm and 1984) and his wife, Eileen, adopted a three-week-old boy in June of 1944. Mr. Orwell’s real name was Eric Blair, so they named the boy Richard Horatio Blair. After his wife died, Mr. Orwell raised the boy on the island of Jura so he would be away from the city. There, Mr. Orwell let the boy learn from his mistakes. For example, young Richard found a tobacco pipe in the garden and filled it with cigarette butts that he took from the fireplace. Mr. Orwell saw him do this, and he handed young Richard his lighter. In a letter, Mr. Orwell reported on the result of young Richard’s attempt at smoking: “I’m sorry to say that Richard took to smoking recently, but he made himself horribly sick and that has put him off it.”
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© Copyright Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
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Presenting
Michael Egan
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION
BANDCAMP MUSIC
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION OF BANDCAMP MUSIC
Music: "The Loneliest Snowman"
One-Sided Single: “The Loneliest Snowman”
Artist: Jeni Hankins
Artist Location: London, UK
Info:
“Jeni Hankins grew up in the coalfields of Appalachian in Southwest Virginia among a family of miners, moonshiners, and journalists. Her writing pulls the grit, gumption, and keen sense of observation out of that heritage like drawing water from her grandmother’s well.”
“Jeni Hankins is a singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist from the Appalachian coalfields of Southwest Virginia. Based in London, England, she tours internationally and is known particularly for her storytelling and her authentic southern American singing style. American author Lee Smith writes, ‘Jeni is a true poet and born storyteller – many of her songs contain whole novels.’ And SING OUT MAGAZINE says that with her ‘born-in-the-bone twang’ Jeni is an ‘Heiress to the Mountain Crown’ — the legacy of Hazel Dickens and Sarah Ogan Gunning.”
Jeni Hankins – Lead Vocals and Rhythm Guitar
Alfred Hickling – Harmony Vocals and all other instruments
© Jeni Hankins, Lulu Wall Music, BMI,
and Alfred Hickling, Sweet Pea Music.
Price: $1 (USD) for track; this track is a one-sided single
Genre: Country
Links:
“The Loneliest Snowman”
Jeni Hankins on Bandcamp
Jeni Hankins on YouTube
Jeni Hankins Official Site
Other Links:
Bruce’s Music Recommendations: FREE pdfs
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
David Bruce's Smashwords Page
David Bruce's Blog #1
David Bruce's Blog #2
David Bruce's Blog #3
David Bruce's Apple iBookstore
David Bruce has over 140 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Stephen Suggests
Winter
People from the South are very different from people from the Midwest when it comes to winter.
New Venture
Michael Egan
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Current Events
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Enjoying the Batman binge on Decades a bit more than I should.
Slams RFK Jr.
Graham Nash
Graham Nash has slammed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for using his song “Chicago” in a promotional video for the anti-vax rally set for Washington, D.C. on Sunday.
The CSNY legend took to Instagram Saturday to inform fans that RFK Jr.’s use of the 1971 song — also known as “We Can Change the World” — was “not authorized” and that Nash has begun “taking steps to cause the cessation of its use.” Nash’s manager Mark Spector told Rolling Stone Saturday, “A cease-and-desist letter is in the works.”
Noted anti-vaxxer, “Disinformation Dozen” member and Eric Clapton pal Robert Kennedy Jr. — through his Children’s Health Defense — will stage a D.C. march Sunday from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial; RFK Jr. is also expected to speak at the rally, where attendees will “stand united to protest all government mandates.”
On Instagram, Nash reiterated that his own beliefs in no way intersect with that of the anti-vaxx community. “I believe in science and facts, and do not support such blatant disregard for either, nor for my rights as a musician,” he wrote.
Graham Nash
Recalls Cartoonist Al Capp
Goldie Hawn
Goldie Hawn's early career was marked by a terrifying encounter with one of America's most prominent cartoonists.
Hawn appeared on SiriusXM's The Megyn Kelly Show on Friday where she recalled meeting famed Lil Abner cartoonist Al Capp for an audition when she was 19.
"I had a script and I was reading for this script. I go to Park Avenue at the time I'm supposed to meet with him," Hawn said. "Next thing I know I'm in this rich guy's apartment, and he's famous and his name is Al Capp."
"In he walks with his – I didn't know he had a wooden leg, but he did – well, he walked like he had a wooden leg. He had this insidious grin. It was really ugly," Hawn said. "And he said, 'I'll be back in a minute, I'm just going to slip into something.' And he came back in a robe. So now I am freaking out because I am recognizing that something is going on."
"He said, 'Come on over here and give me a kiss.' I was shocked, but I expected something like that," she continued. "And so I went over to the couch because I wanted him to know that I wasn't going to run out of the room, I was going to stay calm, and whatever. And he pulled over his…whatever that robe was…and his whole apparatus, his whole wiener, was literally lying there.
Goldie Hawn
Pay TV Operators
Cable
Before One America News Network host Dan Ball finished an interview with guest Jim Gym Jordan this past week, he asked the Ohio Republican congressman for a favor.
“Please put some pressure on AT&T and DirecTV for us,” said Ball, whose nightly program "Real America" airs nightly on the right-wing cable channel. “OAN would love to continue broadcasting on that platform and we know for a fact it is all political behind the scenes on why they’re doing that to us.”
The desperate calls for help — which would be considered unseemly on a traditional cable news outlet — follow DirecTV’s Jan. 15 announcement that it will drop the San Diego-based OAN from its service in April. DirecTV, which AT&T spun off last summer, accounts for nearly half of the 35 million homes that can receive OAN on cable or satellite TV. The channel is not broadly distributed enough to be measured by Nielsen.
OAN is not be the only conservative outlet losing distribution. Newsmax, the Boca Raton, Fla.-based channel that is the TV home of former President Trump’s first press secretary, Sean Spicer, was dropped from four cable systems in January after it failed to reach new carriage agreements with those companies.
Cable
Ill-Timed Email
Weber Grills
Weber picked the wrong day to suggest grilling meatloaf.
The outdoor grill maker apologized on Friday for sending a recipe-of-the-week email earlier that day featuring instructions on how to prepare “BBQ Meat Loaf.”
The email coincided with news of the death of Marvin Lee Aday, best known as rock superstar Meat Loaf.
Not long after sending out its recipe, Weber Grills followed up, offering its “sincerest apologies” to recipients.
“At the time we shared this recipe with you, we were not aware of the unfortunate passing of American singer and actor Mr. Marvin Lee Aday, also known as Meat Loaf,” Weber said. “We want to express our deepest apologies for this oversight and for any offense this email may have caused.”
Weber Grills
‘House Is Crumbling’
Legal Net
When Donald Trump the unindicted conspirator announced plans in 2006 to build a golf complex on ancient sand dunes on the Aberdeenshire coast in Scotland he told reporters it was love at first sight. “As soon as I saw it there was no question about it,” he said. It would be the world’s “greatest golf course”.
This week Trump International Scotland became a central element of a case that looks poised to dominate his post-presidential life, and could even put him behind bars.
Fifteen years on, the property has done wonders for its owner. That is, if you measure success according to the idiosyncratic accounting style of Donald Trump a known grifter.
He bought the 2,000 acres (809 hectares) site at Menie in 2006 for $12.6m. Within five short years it was valued by the Trump Organization in its financial statements at $161m, an increase of almost 13 times.
The hike caught the attention of Letitia James, New York state’s progressive attorney general known for her relentless pursuit of the rich and powerful. How the Scottish property came to rise meteorically in value is one of the matters she is exploring in her continuing investigation into Trump Organization finances.
Legal Net
Wharton Business School
Six Figures
A professor says her students think the average American makes , and one thought $800,000 was an average salary
A simple question from a university professor caused a social media firestorm and led to a major discussion about the U.S. wealth gap this week.
Nina Strohminger, a legal studies and business law professor at Wharton, the number two ranked business school in the U.S., wrote on Twitter that one quarter of her students thought the average American salary was over six figures, and one even thought it was $800,000 a year.
“I asked Wharton students what they thought the average American worker makes per year and 25% of them thought it was over six figures,” Strohminger tweeted on Wednesday. “One of them thought it was $800k. Really not sure what to make of this (The real number is $45k).”
The average annual wage in the U.S. 2021 was $53,383, according to the Social Security Administration. That’s nearly $30,000 less than the annual tuition at Wharton which is $80,432 per year.
Six Figures
Monkey 'Queen'
Yakei
In southern Japan, a young female macaque has upended societal norms by seizing control of her 677-member troop through a violent primate coup. Now, her hard-won empire could come crumbling down around her due to one unstoppable force: mating season.
Meet Yakei, a 9-year-old female living in a Japanese macaque reserve called the Takasakiyama Natural Zoological Garden, where she has spent the last year reigning as the first female troop leader in the park's 70-year history.
A New York Times article published Jan. 21 chronicles the monkey matriarch's incredible rise to power: After assaulting her own mother and assuming the role of top female in the troop, Yakei embarked on a violent vendetta against her troop's four highest-ranking males, finally assuming the troop's coveted alpha position after beating up Nanchu — an elderly, 31-year-old male who had ruled the troop for five years.
Hostile takeovers by aggressive females are exceptionally rare in Japanese macaque society, with only a handful of recorded cases preceding Yakei's coup, Yu Kaigaishi, a research fellow at the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, told The New York Times.
However, after nearly a year in the top spot, Yakei's position may be in jeopardy during the chaos that is mating season — which typically runs from November to March. According to reserve researchers, an 18-year-old male named Luffy has been making unwanted courtship advances on Yakei since this year's breeding season began. Queen Yakei, meanwhile, seems to regard Luffy with fear.
Yakei
2 Giant Sphinxes Discovered
King Amenhotep III
Archeologists discovered two colossal sphinx statues while restoring the ancient Egyptian funerary temple of King Amenhotep III, according to the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities.
King Amenhotep III was a pharaoh who ruled Egypt around 3,300 years ago when it was rich in gold and oversaw a peaceful period of prosperity and growing international power.
The limestone statues measure around 26 feet in length and depict King Amenhotep III in the form of a sphinx – a mythological creature with a lion's body and a human head – wearing a mongoose headdress, a royal beard, and a wide necklace, the ministry said.
An Egyptian-German archeological mission found the statues half-submerged in water inside the Luxor temple, known as the "Temple of Millions of Years."
The team also found three black granite busts of the goddess Sekhmet, a goddess of war also associated with healing which is often depicted as a part lion.
King Amenhotep III
Solid, Liquid, and Vapor
Leidenfrost Effect
Dash a few drops of water onto a very hot, sizzling skillet and they'll levitate, sliding around the pan with wild abandon. Physicists at Virginia Tech have discovered that this can also be achieved by placing a thin, flat disk of ice on a heated aluminum surface, according to a new paper published in the journal Physical Review Fluids. The catch: there's a much higher critical temperature that must be achieved before the ice disk will levitate.
As we've reported previously, in 1756, a German scientist named Johann Gottlob Leidenfrost reported his observation of the unusual phenomenon. Normally, he noted, water splashed onto a very hot pan sizzles and evaporates very quickly. But if the pan's temperature is well above water's boiling point, "gleaming drops resembling quicksilver" will form and will skitter across the surface. It's called the "Leidenfrost effect" in his honor.
In the ensuing 250 years, physicists came up with a viable explanation for why this occurs. If the surface is at least 400 degrees Fahrenheit (well above the boiling point of water), cushions of water vapor, or steam, form underneath them, keeping them levitated. The Leidenfrost effect also works with other liquids, including oils and alcohol, but the temperature at which it manifests will be different.
The phenomenon continues to fascinate physicists. For instance, in 2018, French physicists discovered that the drops aren't just riding along on a cushion of steam; as long as they are not too big, they also propel themselves. That's because of an imbalance in the fluid flow inside the Leidenfrost drops, acting like a small internal motor. Large drops showed a balanced flow, but as the drops evaporated, becoming smaller (about half a millimeter in diameter) and more spherical, an imbalance of forces developed. This caused the drops to roll like a wheel, helped along by a kind of "ratchet" effect from a downward tilt in the same direction the fluid in the droplet flowed. The French physicists dubbed their discovery a "Leidenfrost wheel."
Leidenfrost Effect
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