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Sunday Morning Book Thread 12-01-2019

Library of mp4 500.jpg
Part of the Library of Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing
(click pic to embiggen)

Good morning to all you 'rons, 'ettes, lurkers, and lurkettes, wine moms, frat bros, crétins sans pantalon (who are technically breaking the rules), Indian agents, Mexican bandits, bounty-hunters, blurrg herders, and baby Yoda. Welcome once again to the stately, prestigious, internationally acclaimed and high-class Sunday Morning Book Thread, a weekly compendium of reviews, observations, snark, witty repartee, hilarious bon mots, and a continuing conversation on books, reading, spending way too much money on books, writing books, and publishing books by escaped oafs and oafettes who follow words with their fingers and whose lips move as they read. Unlike other AoSHQ comment threads, the Sunday Morning Book Thread is so hoity-toity, pants are required. Even if it's these pants, from which we learn that a good idea in one contex may not necessarily carry over to another.



Pic Note:

MP4 writes:

Whenever we mention WWII or the Third Reich, I always think that I need to send in a picture of my "Nazi section." I used to work in a bookstore, so most of the books in my house are arranged by subject, though NOT in alphabetic order. I'm not quite that anal.

To the left, you can see the shelves where I keep my Poe and Holmes books as well as cartoon collections. One of these days I'll do a panoramic shot of the whole floor. Upstairs in my writing room are all of my movie books, but that room is a disaster area; a bourne from which no man returns!


It Pays To Increase Your Word Power®





20191201 book pic 02.jpg



Books By Morons

'Ette author Elisabeth Wolfe has a new novel coming out, and she tells me "it’s a bit different from my usual stock-in-trade." After reading the blurb, I can tell you it looks like a lot of fun:

Cleveland, 1922: Crime-fighting Mayor Richard Leon has been missing for over a year, and under John Lackland's administration, corruption has gone from bad to worse. Now, newlyweds Robin Locksley and Marian Fitzwalter and a band of like-minded friends have established a detective agency in the suburb of Nottingham, intent on acting when the police won't. But when their first client, Eleanor Curtmantle, reveals that Leon has been kidnapped by bootleggers, the race is on to find and rescue him before Lackland and his goons can kill the mayor and the city in one blow.


So basically, it’s a Robin Hood reboot with a bit of Tommy and Tuppence thrown in for good measure. In addition, there's a Theda Bara reference thrown in just for MP4. Ebooks are available on Amazon and Smashwords. The paperback edition will release either on Dec. 1 or as soon thereafter as Ms. Wolfe gets the proofs to approve.

___________

Kerrie Noor has published the latest in her Planet Hy Man sci-fi comedy series, Rebel Without a Crew:

Planet Hyman is at a lost as Hilda takes a sabbatical, she has found her "pleasure dome" and while she learns there is more to life than a new manifesto, H2 and DBO plot a coup. With Mex hungover, and Beryl shamed, there is little to stand in their way apart from a hippy colony too chilled to care, a reporter with no scruples, and a missing set of batteries.

Will H2 and DBO take over the planet and run it the proletarian way? Or will Hilda rise from her wet dreams toss her dead batteries to the wind and take over from where Beryl left?

Rebel Without A Crew: Robots are here to stay but will they get paid? is the third in the Planet Hy Man series "where every hero is a woman old enough to know better and old enough not to care." It will be available on a variety of e-book platforms for about a week at the introductory sale price of 99 cents.

The series starts with Rebel Without a Clue and continues with Rebel Without a Bra.

___________

Insanity's Children, the sequel to The Stars Came Back, by Rolf Nelson, is now up on Amazon. As always, reviews posted to Amazon by readers are greatly appreciated.

Lighting up a planet and turning it into a star, even a very small one, tends to attract a lot of unwanted attention. Especially if you are flying the most wanted ship in existence, with an illegal crew, and first-hand knowledge of first alien contact. But life goes on. Plans are made. And then plans encounter reality, and with Helton Strom and his slightly demented AI warship Tajemnica involved, the results are predictably unpredictable.

The Kindle price is $4.99.

This page on Rolf's website has brief blurbs for each book he has written in this series.

___________



They Don't Publish Books Like This Any More:

20191201 book pic 01.jpg
(h/t Pulp Librarian)

Question: If you're going to set up a barricade, shouldn't you stand BEHIND it?



Moron Recommendations

Celia Hayes writes:

Hey, I was watching WWII in HD Color with my daughter this week, and the episode about the war in the deserts of North Africa moved me to get down and reread Ice Cold in Alex, which is basically a road trip through the desert by two British soldiers, an Army nurse and a South African ... who is likely a German spy using the first three as cover.

It's a darned good book, and they made a very good movie out of it, which for some bizarre reason is practically unavailable in a format which can be played in the US. Might be worth a plug for the book thread, as the descriptions of the desert and of conditions in 1942 are vivid.

The author of the book actually served in the medical service corps in that theater, and I have always thought that he put a lot of himself into one of the characters.

The novel tells the story of

...a small group of soldiers and nurses trying to escape from Tobruk through the German-occupied desert. For Captain George Anson, the taste of the ice-cold beer served in Alexandria, Egypt remains an indelible memory. When he's assigned to escort two nursing sisters there, he dreams of enjoying that simple pleasure again. But his routine mission turns epic as he and the nurses find themselves driving further and further south to escape the advancing German army.

E-editions of Ice Cold In Alex do not appear to be available. Only hardcover and paperback. First published in 1958, it may not be still in print, although some new copies of the paperback are available.


___________

Here's another road trip novel:

45 Having discovered Charles Portis recently I have fallen in love with him. I would recommend all morons to take a read on The Dog of the South. You will glad that you did.

Posted by: Puddin Head at November 24, 2019 09:24 AM (QZCjk)

I greatly enjoyed Portis' more well-known novel, True Grit, which the Coen Bros. film adaptation followed fairly closely. But The Dog of the South might be worth looking at, too:

His wife, Norma, has run off with her ex-husband, taking Ray's cards, shotgun and car. But from the receipts, Ray can track where they've gone. He takes off after them, as does an irritatingly tenacious bail bondsman, both following the romantic couple's spending as far as Mexico. There Ray meets Dr Reo Symes, the seemingly down-on-his-luck and rather eccentric owner of a beaten up and broken down bus, who needs a ride to Belize. The further they drive, in a car held together by coat-hangers and excesses of oil, the wilder their journey gets. But they're not going to give up easily.

___________

Let's see what longtime 'ette grammie winger has been reading lately.

32 The last couple of weeks I have read the 8 books in the "DC Smith" books by Peter Grainger. They feature a rather rumpled, old school British detective, a widower, somewhat adrift in a sea of modernizations. He's a wistful, compelling character, and I was sad when the series ended.

Posted by: grammie winger at November 24, 2019 09:15 AM (lwiT4)

The first book in this series is the Amazon blurb:

A desperate Kremlin takes advantage of a military crisis in Asia to simultaneously strike into Western Europe and invade east Africa in a bid to occupy three Rare Earth mineral mines that will give Russia unprecedented control for generations over the world's hi-tech sector.

Pitted against the Russians are a Marine lieutenant colonel pulled out of a cushy job at the Pentagon and thrown into the fray in Africa, a French Special Forces captain and his intelligence operative father, a young Polish female partisan fighter, an A-10 Warthog pilot, and the commander of an American tank platoon who, along with his German counterpart, fight from behind enemy lines in Germany all the way into Russia.

From a daring MiG attack on American satellites, through land and air battles in all theaters, naval battles in the Arabian sea, and small unit fighting down to the hand-to-hand level in the jungle, Russia's forces battle to either take the mines or detonate a nuclear device to prevent the West from exploiting them.

This one resembles Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising, which was also about a conventional war between us and the Rooskies that never goes nuclear. I heard a lot of people say it was boring, particularly after his thrill-a-minute Hunt For Red October, but I didn't think so, it kept me turning the pages, which was fine, since there are over 700 of them to turn.

I'm going to have to get this one and check it out for myself.

The Kindle edition of Red Metalweighs in high at $13.99.

___________



The Great Indie Black Friday Cyber Monday $0.99 Book Sale

Thanks to moron author Hans Schantz for putting this deal together. He also writes:

All the authors in the list are like-minded indie writers who share many of the same perspectives as the crowd here. I have read and can vouch for most of the books here as being worth your while, and a good fraction are amazingly good. The sale includes offerings from Prometheus, Conservative-Libertarian-Fiction-Alliance-Book-of-the-Year, and Dragon award-winning or nominated authors. The few books I haven’t read are from authors whose other work I have read and enjoyed. Not all the offerings may be to your taste, but at $0.99, it’s hard to go wrong on the value proposition, and you are helping out some wonderful, hard-working indie authors.

Some of these authors and books will be familiar, but many perhaps won't be. The full list of titles and blurbs is available here. There might be some good Christmas gifts for like-minded friends.

Update:

___________

So that's all for this week. As always, book thread tips, suggestions, bribes, insults, threats, ugly pants pics and moron library submissions may be sent to OregonMuse, Proprietor, AoSHQ Book Thread, at the book thread e-mail address: aoshqbookthread, followed by the 'at' sign, and then 'G' mail, and then dot cee oh emm.

What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.

___________

If you like, you can follow me on Twitter, where I make the occasional snarky comment.




20191201 book pic 03.jpg

Posted by: OregonMuse at 09:00 AM




Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Abre tus libros, Imbeciles!

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:00 AM (Dc2NZ)

2

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:01 AM (Dc2NZ)

3 Trifecta?

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:01 AM (Dc2NZ)

4 Quadfecta!

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:02 AM (Dc2NZ)

5 Good morning bibliophiliacs!

I spent yesterday afternoon with fellow Morons at John King Books in Detroit, a four-layer cake of used and rare books:

https://www.johnkingbooksdetroit.com/

I of course focused on cheezerific sci-fi pup, snagging such titles as “The Green Hills of Earth” (Heinlein), “Rogue Moon” (Budris), a short story anthology by Jerome Bixby, and these two classics: “Rogue Queen” by L. Sprague de Camp (She Learned About Sex From an Earth Man! “This oddly alluring creature wouldn’t have made a bad looking girl among human females – if your tastes ran to pink six-footers with cat’s eyes!”
http://ski-ffy.blogspot.com/2014/04/rogue-queen.html

And “The Robot Brains” by Sydney J. Bounds (“Decapitation at Cambridge! Someone, or something, was trying to reverse the tide of civilization”

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5178864-the-robot-brains

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:02 AM (Dc2NZ)

6 Tole Lege
Finisher Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe's Triumph last night, definitely would like to get the next in the series

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 09:02 AM (ZCEU2)

7 And wouldn't expect any more of a perfect library from Mary

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 09:03 AM (ZCEU2)

8 Good morning fellow Book Threadists. I hope everyone had a well fed week of reading.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:05 AM (bmdz3)

9 Nice book collection, MP4!

There were bound annual collections of Punch from the Victorian and Edwardian eras (I mean dating from those years) at that book store I was telling you guys about.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:07 AM (Dc2NZ)

10 The freedom fighters are standing around the barricade because they just overran it.

That's not a real obstacle, but a police line that they've captured.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:09 AM (cfSRQ)

11 So, four shelves of Nazi books and a dead teddy bear on the floor.

*scribbles in notebook*

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:09 AM (gd9RK)

12 Oh, and good morning.

Still reading Lord of the Rings. Taking my time, trying to tease out new elements. A lot of my re-reads of this book are basically nostalgia tours, sort of like listening to a favorite song. It's comforting and while you may get something extra out of it, mostly you're just enjoying the familiar pathways.

However, this time I'm looking a little more closely at Tolkien's writing style, mentally comparing it to other English contemporaries I've discovered since I started reading him. Also, though I've read the passage many times, I just realized that Lotho Sackville-Baggins was in fact a fair-haired kid. Can't think how I overlooked that before. Kind of amusing.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:12 AM (cfSRQ)

13 I've got all those Nancy books too.

Posted by: BeckoningChasm at December 01, 2019 09:13 AM (l9m7l)

14 Since Alexandria was, for all intents and purposes British in WWII, would you actually get ICE COLD beer?

BTW, a fun WWII book is Michael Gilbert's Enemy Within/Death in Captivity. Not his usual, but based on a murder in an Italian prison camp, and the subsequent escape. It's partly based on his own experience in a camp where all the Brit army prisoners got out in the hiatus between the fall of Mussolini and the German arrival to take it over. (Supposedly they actually watched from outside when the Germans showed up at the now empty camp.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:14 AM (ZbwAu)

15 I read a pretty good book, and wrote up a review of it, but Pixy says NO so, whatever.

Posted by: BeckoningChasm at December 01, 2019 09:14 AM (l9m7l)

16 Beckoning, there's a method for stripping out troublesome characters, but I personally do not remember what it is. I bet another moron does, though.

Posted by: Emmie at December 01, 2019 09:16 AM (87gB3)

17 I also read Douglas Murray's "The Strange Death of Europe".

It was brought up in another thread that only 44.9 percent of London residents now identify themselves as "white British".

“If the large-scale gang rape of children takes more than a decade to come to light, how long will less violent and horrific examples of untoward attitudes take to come to light, if they ever do?

In the meantime, the agreement seems to have been reached with the general public that it is not such a bad deal: if there is a bit more beheading and sexual assault than there used to be in Europe, then at least we also benefit from a much wider range of cuisines.”

Here is Murray discussing his book with Peter Robinson of “Uncommon Knowledge”:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQXHc-tJMXM

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (Dc2NZ)

18 Question, A H Lloyd: What was the name of the author of the Spanish Civil War book you recommended? I took down "Henry Payne", but that seems wrong. Since Christmas is coming, I want to be sure.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (ZbwAu)

19 Writing update: Last night I plowed ahead and wrapped up the main narrative for Vampires of Michigan. It's north of 43,000 words, but I expect that to fluctuate as I'm certain there will be some major edits.

Tonight I hope to finish the epilogue and then I'll take it from the top again, using the proverbial paper and blue pencil (actually not blue, but whatever).

With luck, maybe it's ready by Christmas, likely January.

Next up is the long-awaited sequel to Battle Officer Wolf. I'm trying not to think about it because I need to get this done first.

That will probably derail my Tolkien reading, but that's fine. I started this particular re-read largely be default. I can't usually sleep without turning a few pages and Tolkien is my go-to choice.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (cfSRQ)

20 BeckoningChasm, run it through this:

https://www.charset.org/html-special-characters

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (Dc2NZ)

21 I spent yesterday afternoon with fellow Morons at John King Books in Detroit, a four-layer cake of used and rare books:

https://www.johnkingbooksdetroit.com/
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:02 AM (Dc2NZ)


Pictures, in no particular order (read: they are out of order and I'm lazy):

https://stoatnet.org/johnking/

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (t+qrx)

22 Good Sunday morning, horde!

After Puddinhead recommended Dog of the South last week, I downloaded it on audio for my commute.

It's funny, in a dry way, and I've been enjoying it.

Posted by: April at December 01, 2019 09:18 AM (OX9vb)

23 Abre tus libros, Imbeciles!

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:00 AM (Dc2NZ)


Hmmmmm.

Well, I am an imbecile.

But, if I open a book, I shall have to close my laptop.

What to do?

What to do?

Posted by: naturalfake at December 01, 2019 09:18 AM (kauXV)

24 Beckoning, there's a method for stripping out troublesome characters, but I personally do not remember what it is. I bet another moron does, though.


Hogmartin has one, I think his site is stoatnet.org. I forget.

Or you can just go through and manually correct the curly quotes and the em dashes. It's not that hard. Also, why did you type it with non-Pixy-compliant characters in the first fucking place?

Or you could just whine about it.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:19 AM (gd9RK)

25 18
Question, A H Lloyd: What was the name of the author of the Spanish
Civil War book you recommended? I took down "Henry Payne", but that
seems wrong. Since Christmas is coming, I want to be sure.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (ZbwAu)

---
Stanley G. Payne.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:19 AM (cfSRQ)

26 Elisabeth's book sounds like fun. Just ordered the ebook version.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:20 AM (bmdz3)

27 Sitting by the fire, waiting for breakfast to finish baking, getting ready for the Snowmageddon the weather people are predicting.

What with Thanksgiving guests and cooking I haven't had much time to read this week, and the one book I did get through kind of sucked.

Posted by: Trimegistus at December 01, 2019 09:21 AM (NTel8)

28 On Black Friday Ken Matthews subbed for Rush. His guest was Star Parker, who was there to promote her book 'Necessary Noise'. I'd forgotten how much I loved that woman. The interview should be on Rush's site. Star showed up about an hour into the show. I intend to get the book.

Posted by: kallisto at December 01, 2019 09:21 AM (+OYy0)

29 Hogmartin has one, I think his site is stoatnet.org. I forget.
Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:19 AM (gd9RK)


https://stoatnet.org/ace/

Not as comprehensive as others, but easier to remember and Made For Morons™.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:22 AM (t+qrx)

30 ..I read a pretty good book, and wrote up a review of it, but Pixy says NO so, whatever.

Posted by: BeckoningChasm at December 01, 2019 09:14 AM (l9m7l)



"101 Ways to Fool a Moron".


*flips pages, sees no type, text or print*


HEY! I read that book too! Great review, bro!


/snrk


*hooks covfefe pot up to I.V. rig*



Jim
Sunk New Dawn
Galveston, TX

Posted by: Jim at December 01, 2019 09:22 AM (QzJWU)

31 "Pictures, in no particular order (read: they are out of order and I'm lazy):

https://stoatnet.org/johnking/"

Now, THAT"S a book store that I could get comfortable in.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 09:22 AM (cqNba)

32 I envy people who can talk about how their libraries are arranged. Mine is almost total chaos, and I often miss books for months, only for them to surface when the tides shift. E.g., just refound Scruton's big Modern Philosophy, arguably his best. I'm about to reread his final chapter in which he offers his answer to, well, the Devil embedded in modern philosophy since Descartes. IIRC, it was tremendous.

Now, I'm not all in for Scruton - too Kantian for me - but I know of no one else who seems able to put a foot in all camps. (Also, like Jordan Peterson, he tends to define God down. That trick never works.)

Modern Philosophy is about the best intro I've ever seen and includes every so often some witticisms, like "If someone argues for skepticism, he's telling you not to believe him. So don't."

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:23 AM (ZbwAu)

33 25
Stanley G. Payne.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:19 AM (cfSRQ)
_______

Thanks. Don't know why I typed "Henry".

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:24 AM (ZbwAu)

34 Good Sunday morning, horde!

After Puddinhead recommended Dog of the South last week, I downloaded it on audio for my commute.

It's funny, in a dry way, and I've been enjoying it.
Posted by: April at December 01, 2019 09:18 AM (OX9vb)


That's a good way to describe "DotS".

It's a fun book but not really laugh out loud funny.

"Masters of Atlantis" is a lot of fun too.

Posted by: naturalfake at December 01, 2019 09:24 AM (kauXV)

35 https://stoatnet.org/johnking/
Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:17 AM (t+qrx)
---
Nice photos!

Please to note the doorstop book with SMOD on the cover.

One could happily spend an entire afternoon in one tiny section of this store. The staff was friendly and knowledgeable. "Where are your cheesy sci-fi paperbacks with Bug-eyed Monsters and chicks in brass bras?" "Right this way, Madam."

Shibumi spent a good half hour reading naughty Victorian limericks aloud.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:27 AM (Dc2NZ)

36 Question: If you're going to set up a barricade, shouldn't you stand BEHIND it?


.............

Stupid men!

Morning!

Hey.. MP4 sure does love Hitler! just sayin'

Posted by: Chi-Town Jerry at December 01, 2019 09:27 AM (438dO)

37 20. Thanks Eris. When I get the Pixy Wall of Red Death, I just review it to locate the offending character. I'll try your link next time.

Posted by: kallisto at December 01, 2019 09:27 AM (+OYy0)

38 Now, THAT"S a book store that I could get comfortable in.
Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 09:22 AM (cqNba)


It's firmly towards the dark side of the "drafty book dungeon/cozy sunlit tea room" spectrum of bookstores.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:28 AM (t+qrx)

39 Just finished Grisham's "The Guardians" and am now twenty pages into Nelson De Mille's "The Deserter."

And news says the same thing has happened to Hunter Biden's financials as Obama's entire academic history. Sealed up so tight even the NYT and WaPo cannot get at anything.

Posted by: Les Kinetic at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (+fPHo)

40 MP4. I also liked the Punch magazine editions on the shelf. I wrote my thesis from them as the source material back during the 90s. WWI and Punch magazine.

From Fridays who dis the connection was literary as the acted in the tv mini series adaptation of Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott. Anthony Edwards and Lynette Anthony.

Take advantage of the author sale that Hans Schantz put together I have spotted many a gem this way.

Merry Christmas!

Posted by: Dread0 at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (thwGF)

41 From the pic, I'm thinking Bill the cat was upset about his portrayal in Volume 3.

Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (x8Q/V)

42 Shibumi spent a good half hour reading naughty Victorian limericks aloud.
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:27 AM (Dc2NZ)


True fact.

I think she ended up buying the book. That's one to leave on the coffee table when guests come over.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (t+qrx)

43 Those pants are fine. I would wear them to funk.

Posted by: Bootsy at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (Tnijr)

44 True fact.



I think she ended up buying the book. That's one to leave on the coffee table when guests come over.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (t+qrx)

---
What percentage involved Nantucket?

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:30 AM (cfSRQ)

45 I knew the morons would come through!

Now to get ready for church.

BBL

Posted by: Emmie at December 01, 2019 09:30 AM (87gB3)

46 Except they published 132 pages of records the times didnt care.

Posted by: Gaius martius at December 01, 2019 09:31 AM (hMlTh)

47 What percentage involved Nantucket?
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:30 AM (cfSRQ)


I didn't stick around for the reading, it was scandalous.

It was organized by subject, with indices and a glossary.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:32 AM (t+qrx)

48 Good morning, Horde! Thanks for the plug for Ice Cold in Alex, OM! And the Gilbert book is another eccentric WWII good read!
I've got a place next Saturday in the Author Corral at the Mustang Cantina in Goliad, which is part of their Christmas on the Square. We dearly love Goliad, which is where we started to collect many of the stories from local people which got worked into the Luna City series. And the two compendium collections of the series are about to be available in print. I'll send a message and post when they are up on Amazon.

Posted by: Sgt. Mom at December 01, 2019 09:33 AM (xnmPy)

49 The death of old bookstores is something I can't help regretting. Granted, the way things are now net-based does mean you can track down exactly what you want to find more easily than before. (E.g., it took me almost 20 years to find an affordable edition of the 2nd vol of Roskill's Naval Policy Between the Wars. I got vol I in High School; was married before I got vol II.)

But I miss the browsing. I remember in college finding a vol of letters between Marx and Engels on our Civil War. Way above my budget, but it was short and I read a lot over a few days. Guess what? They were just as good at making predictions as they were at economic and political theory. The thing which sticks most is that they expect the North to roll over the South, per their theories, and were nonplussed again and again to find that things like generalship mattered.

Finally one of them despaired, because "Thomas Jackson is the only first rate man in America." That was written just before Chancellorsville. So I guess it gets partial credit.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:33 AM (ZbwAu)

50 Hiya Bookies !

Posted by: JT at December 01, 2019 09:34 AM (arJlL)

51 That book store in MI looks too good. Used book stores like that are not for visiting, they are careers.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:34 AM (bmdz3)

52 Fans of Fenton Wood's Yankee Republic series will be pleased to learn that Book 4: City of Illusions is now available. A young radio engineer travels across a mythic landscape, in search of a metal from another universe. The first three books in this excellent YA techno-adventure series are on sale for $0.99.

Thanks for supporting indie authors.

Posted by: Hans G. Schantz at December 01, 2019 09:34 AM (FXjhj)

53 I noticed a disappointing lack of cats at John King Books, but their satellite store n Ferndale did have one:

"The one constant for about 10 or 12 years was Maggie, an overweight tabby cat, who adopted the store as her home after one of our customers dropped her off, saying that used bookstores needed cats. Maggie left the books and the customers alone – she was not in any shape to pounce from hiding spots or climb the shelves. She was healthy enough, though, and she provided a bit of distraction for the children of the serious book browsers. You could find her sunning herself in the west-facing front windows in the late afternoon, or curled up in empty boxes, fast asleep during her nap times."

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:36 AM (Dc2NZ)

54 Part of the Library of Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing

At some point, you've got enough books named "Hitler".

Posted by: Barack Hussein Obama at December 01, 2019 09:36 AM (Wd55D)

55 So, Hillary used to model for book covers.

The things I learn here.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (Z+IKu)

56 Shibumi spent a good half hour reading naughty Victorian limericks aloud.


Wait. Did you guys have a MiMoMe and go to a used bookstore?

That is so Moron.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (gd9RK)

57 I should look at my local used book store for the Sharpe series, could hit the one near the job going this week.

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (ZCEU2)

58 49
The death of old bookstores is something I can't help regretting.
Granted, the way things are now net-based does mean you can track down
exactly what you want to find more easily than before. (E.g., it took me
almost 20 years to find an affordable edition of the 2nd vol of
Roskill's Naval Policy Between the Wars. I got vol I in High School; was
married before I got vol II.)



Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:33 AM (ZbwAu)

---
When I discovered The Wipers Times in MSU's library, I knew I had to have my own copy.

I went to the local bookstore and asked if they could help - and they could. They gave me a card which I filled out.

A few weeks later, they notified me that they had found a copy and gave me the price, which I found reasonable. It was all very cool and mysterious.

Nowadays, I'd just go online.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:38 AM (cfSRQ)

59 Those pants are fine. I would wear them to funk.
Posted by: Bootsy at December 01, 2019 09:29 AM (Tnijr)


Those are the kind of pants that only a really cute young woman with great legs could wear.

And would probably look fine and make them her own.

Everyone else, stay far far away.

Posted by: naturalfake at December 01, 2019 09:39 AM (kauXV)

60 Nice book collection, MP4!

seconded

Posted by: JT at December 01, 2019 09:40 AM (arJlL)

61 Nice book collection, MP4!

There were bound annual collections of Punch from the Victorian and Edwardian eras (I mean dating from those years) at that book store I was telling you guys about.
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:07 AM (Dc2NZ)


Thank you, dear lady.

I actually have a few of those bound Punch collections from around 1917 - mid 1920s, which I have only for the cartoons. The truth is that Punch's "comic" articles simply never were very funny.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:40 AM (Ki5SV)

62 By the way, I should mention the store in question was Curious Books, a name well-known to Michigan Morons.

I wonder what will happen when Ray retires? They guy has to be 112.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:40 AM (cfSRQ)

63 And yes, there's a chew toy and fur on the floor. I have two doggehs who shed.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:40 AM (Ki5SV)

64
Come on, man!

Where's the latest issue of "Finger Biters Gazette"?



I've been waiting all week for it.

No malarkey!

Posted by: Joe Biden at December 01, 2019 09:41 AM (kauXV)

65 I would imagine old Adolph would be horrified to know he was sharing a bookcase with Pogo and Bloom County. Well done!

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes - the Housekeeper at December 01, 2019 09:42 AM (IttZ7)

66 Those are the kind of pants that only a really cute young woman with great legs could wear.



And would probably look fine and make them her own.



Everyone else, stay far far away.



Posted by: naturalfake at December 01, 2019 09:39 AM (kauXV)

---
Mayor Pete has a pair where the laces are on the reverse side.

NTTAWWT.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:42 AM (cfSRQ)

67 Wait. Did you guys have a MiMoMe and go to a used bookstore?

That is so Moron.
Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (gd9RK)
---
We had planned to also see a movie at the DIA, but it was suggested that we go straight to the bookstore instead and we all agreed. We ended up staying there until closing time!

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:42 AM (Dc2NZ)

68 I'm going to bitch now:

This was the worst Thanksgiving, ever. First of all, I've reached an age where one plate is my limit. But I could accept that. The trouble is that I seem to have caught something, and even that all came back up over the next 24 hours. Add in a pinched nerve and shingles, and it just sucked.

OTOH, I did get a laugh. One of the only 2 libs still befriending my wife put up an Assbook post whining that she was "deprived" of Thanksgiving, and had to spend it alone. Why? Because her sister and BIL had voted for Trump, so she obviously couldn't spend time with them.

I often argue that the left is not all THAT much worse than in my youth. But it is in that respect. In those days only a very few would be caught dead saying something like that. While their actions rarely matched their words, they at least gave lip service to hearing other points of view. And sometimes lived up to it. My HS girlfriend was an extreme leftist; didn't stop her from going out with me. Nowadays that's gone. A reminder that principles matter, even when you fail to live up to them. At least there's hope you'll remember them occasionally. (Not that I fault her on that - but some of her friends gave her shit because of me. And, incidentally, Mrs Eeyore was a lib when we met. I fixed that, with help from the far left.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:43 AM (ZbwAu)

69 By the way, I should mention the store in question was Curious Books, a name well-known to Michigan Morons.

I wonder what will happen when Ray retires? They guy has to be 112.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:40 AM (cfSRQ)


I like that one and The Archives just up the hill. They've been there for about eight hundred years.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 09:43 AM (t+qrx)

70 Finished Book 8 of Herodotus so the end is in sight, maybe a week away. Xerxes has scurried back to Asia (although looking at the maps it would've been a lot quicker going by water than land but maybe that the Persians got their invading asses kicked on the water while still sacking Athens on land, those guys were big on omens) but Mardonius has stuck around with a sizable army so Persian dreams of conquest haven't totally gone away. Alexander of Macedon has made an appearance so there's another famous person whose name I learned as a wee tyke that I can finally put in context rather than knowing he was famous for something or other, like I did for Atilla and Genghis Khan while reading Gibbon.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 09:44 AM (y7DUB)

71 Nice Five - fecta Eris !

Posted by: JT at December 01, 2019 09:44 AM (arJlL)

72 Read Kurt Schlichter's newest "The Collapse" and "Alas Babylon" on a Horde recommendation this week.

I enjoyed both books but really hoping neither ends up an accurate prediction on the near future.

Posted by: Big V at December 01, 2019 09:45 AM (B06Zw)

73 MP4's exhaustive collection of Hitlerania (is that a word?) puts to shame my shelves of Afrika Korps books.

Do you ever worry that you're on a "list" now?

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:45 AM (Dc2NZ)

74 Not so much a barricade as a sawhorse.

Posted by: Mr. Peebles at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (oVJmc)

75 So, Hillary used to model for book covers.

The things I learn here.
Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (Z+IKu)

I'm going to guess The Feminists is a rip-off of 1984]. Speaking of which, yesterday I read Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London, which is an easy read (I did it in a day). Very interesting, although in the "London" section of the book, you can see why some commenters say Orwell was "obsessed with the filth of the English working class."

I'm actually surprised, yet grateful, that no one has tried to film the "Paris" portion of the book. I would make a good tragi-comedy, but the idea of an Orwell character ending up happily every after doesn't quite work. . .

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (Ki5SV)

76 Yay book thread!

Thanks for the plug, OM! Paperbacks are working their way through the system, so they should be available within 72 hours (hopefully today sometime, but it's hard to predict how long the queue is). Maybe now that this project's done, I'll be able to make some headway on my ever-growing TBR list... after I get grades in. *strikes up "The End-of-Semester Blues"*

*waves to JTB and all and sundry*

Posted by: Elisabeth G. Wolfe at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (aFZYk)

77 Old bound magazines are great, if they're old enough. We have a full shelf of old St Nicholas, a magazine "for kids" from c. 1900. The superiority of pre-Dewey education is immediately obvious. I also have a single volume of "The Boy Mechanic", c WWI. There is literally no way anything so demanding could be sold today.

But then, I must confess those are examples which confirm my natural reactionary biases.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (ZbwAu)

78 Reading "Thirteenth Night: A Fool's Guild Medieval Mystery " by Alan Gordon, a clever mystery sequel to Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. The Fools Guild is an organization used to keep order in medieval Europe, under cover that Fools (entertainers in many ways) can go anywhere and not be noticed. That sounds overly simple but Gordon's writing is observant, sophisticated, and has just the right amount of humor. The take off on Shakespeare adds to the appeal for me.

If the stories keep up to this level, I'll end up reading the entire series. So far, it is very enjoyable.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:48 AM (bmdz3)

79 70
Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 09:44 AM (y7DUB)
_______

In your shoes, I'd follow it up with Arrian's Alexander. (And for explanation of some of the battles, I like Fuller. Makes sense of Jaxartes.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:48 AM (ZbwAu)

80 I'm envious of MPPP's national socialism collection. Must have.

Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 09:49 AM (EZebt)

81 Howdy Readers!

Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 09:49 AM (MVjcR)

82 I'm re-reading Grass' "Cat and Mouse". I read slowly because I do most of my reading in a bar and people have stopped thinking of me as that weirdo who reads in bars and have started talking to me, which is unfortunate because human contact is best effected through little grey boxes.

Anyway I'm taking my time with it because I'm just loving the language play. It's nearly poetry. And I'd forgotten that he does the same tricks of unreliable memory that are at the heart of his memoir "Peeling the Onion".

So I'm in no rush to get through it. I'll just roll around in it for a while.

The last book I read entirely at the bar was On the Road and I hated it so much that I couldn't put it down. I was just hate-reading in a hateful fury of hatred at the character, the narrator, the author, and all the filthy Beats who aggrandized it.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 09:50 AM (gd9RK)

83 @14:
"BTW, a fun WWII book is Michael Gilbert's Enemy Within/Death in Captivity. Not his usual, but based on a murder in an Italian prison camp, and the subsequent escape. It's partly based on his own experience in a camp where all the Brit army prisoners got out in the hiatus between the fall of Mussolini and the German arrival to take it over. (Supposedly they actually watched from outside when the Germans showed up at the now empty camp.)"

That sounds like the beginning of "Von Ryan's Express" - one of my favorite POW movies, and a pretty good novel. They changed the novel's ending for the movie, so no spoilers.

Currently reading "Kriegie", a true account of a B24 crewman shot down over Mainz and sent to Stalag Luft III. Pretty intense.

Posted by: That Deplorable SOB Van Owen at December 01, 2019 09:50 AM (HsTaO)

84 At some point I will have to show more shelves.

There's one more to the left, holding cookbooks and books on musicals and such. To the right, in the parlor, are my books on Roman history, English history, the Revolution and other things. I don't know that it's possible to fit the whole thing into one image, though.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:51 AM (Ki5SV)

85 Howdy JT!

Howdy Weasel! Do you have your fuzzy slippers on?

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:51 AM (Dc2NZ)

86 57 ... "I should look at my local used book store for the Sharpe series,"

Skip, That's how I got my copies. The used book store by us had almost all of them for a buck each. There was some luck involved but that store usually has a good supply of the series.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:52 AM (bmdz3)

87 Thanks for the book plug for Simple Service last week, OM. And, thanks to everyone who picked up a copy. It did wonders for the sales figures! Much appreciated.

As for my reading, I've just started the third of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. I started it because my sons love the series. The first book didn't blow me away, but I'm really liking them now.

Posted by: Laura Montgomery at December 01, 2019 09:52 AM (KFIdK)

88 I'm envious of MPPP's national socialism collection. Must have.
Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 09:49 AM (EZebt)


You and Eris can fight it out over my coffin.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:53 AM (Ki5SV)

89 75 So, Hillary used to model for book covers.

The things I learn here.
Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 09:37 AM (Z+IKu)

I'm going to guess The Feminists is a rip-off of 1984]. Speaking of which, yesterday I read Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London, which is an easy read (I did it in a day). Very interesting, although in the "London" section of the book, you can see why some commenters say Orwell was "obsessed with the filth of the English working class."

I'm actually surprised, yet grateful, that no one has tried to film the "Paris" portion of the book. I would make a good tragi-comedy, but the idea of an Orwell character ending up happily every after doesn't quite work. . .
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (Ki5SV)
_______

I love Down and Out. But then, that's true of most of Orwell. He's the one writer who can make me see how an intelligent man could be socialist. Not enough to convert me, of course, but I cannot help respecting Orwell (except on religion).

In contrast, Shaw for instance, while fun, doesn't sound real. It's as if he's posing.

One thing a friend pointed out is that the big difference between Paris and London is that the former, while life sucked, it was at least human. The London part is dystopian. (There's an earlier essay entitled "The Spike" on which it was based. Also a similar one on Hop-Picking, which is more like the Paris section. As my friend said, at least it was human.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:54 AM (ZbwAu)

90 I'm re-reading Grass' "Cat and Mouse".
---
I liked this one better than "The Tin Drum". More personal.

You know the part I mean.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:55 AM (Dc2NZ)

91 With all the sales brochures in the mail and email for fishing related stuff (which I don't need) (usually) I started reading some of my fly tying manuals. I forgot how relaxing that reading is.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:55 AM (bmdz3)

92 Yay! 2 new books to read from Hans G. Schantz list - Jon Mollison's OVERLOOK and Schantz's THE HIDDEN TRUTH.

Posted by: Oggi at December 01, 2019 09:56 AM (Bk5Q+)

93 On the question of which side of the barrier: Once the bitches break, you need to press on and keep them running!

Posted by: Armed and Larry at December 01, 2019 09:56 AM (rTqn/)

94 OK, just bought The Case of the Missing Mayor. Perhaps it will give me a mental kick in the pants to go back to writing my own book.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (Ki5SV)

95 88 I'm envious of MPPP's national socialism collection. Must have.
Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 09:49 AM (EZebt)

You and Eris can fight it out over my coffin.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:53 AM (Ki5SV)
---

How would you feel about a lingerie pillow fight over it right now? (San Fran, I may be ascribing ladyparts where there are none, if so, apologies)

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (Dc2NZ)

96 68- Jeez, what an entitlement mentality. She's 'deprived" because she doesn't like the beliefs of people she thinks owe her Thanksgiving.

How about giving it a rest for one friggin' meal, cupcake?

Posted by: vivi at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (11H2y)

97 74
Not so much a barricade as a sawhorse.

Posted by: Mr. Peebles at December 01, 2019 09:46 AM (oVJmc)

---
It's a police barricade, not an actual obstacle.

The freedom fighters have overrun it. It's showing them on the attack against The Woman (as opposed to The Man, who she replaced).

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (cfSRQ)

98 78 Reading "Thirteenth Night: A Fool's Guild Medieval Mystery " by Alan Gordon, a clever mystery sequel to Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. The Fools Guild is an organization used to keep order in medieval Europe, under cover that Fools (entertainers in many ways) can go anywhere and not be noticed. That sounds overly simple but Gordon's writing is observant, sophisticated, and has just the right amount of humor. The take off on Shakespeare adds to the appeal for me.

If the stories keep up to this level, I'll end up reading the entire series. So far, it is very enjoyable.
Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 09:48 AM (bmdz3)
______

I may have to give that a shot. I found Caedfel disappointing. The sensibility was too modern. (And I figured it out too early.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (ZbwAu)

99 You and Eris can fight it out over my coffin.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:53 AM (Ki5SV)

===

Any plans to go skydiving we should know about?

Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (EZebt)

100 A quick question for MP4:

If you're into WW2... I've been on-and-off listening to the audiobook of a book I read parts of about twenty years ago when I bought it for my late father; one of these days I'm going to have to do a complicated writeup for the Horde Book Thread.

But anyway:

Leo Marks' _Between Silk and Cyanide_ is his memoir of what-he-did-during-the-war as Head of Agents' Codes For the SOE (the Special Operations Executive) in Britain in WW2. It's a gripping work with many details the operatives and agents he got to know in the course of his duties, and also about the defeats the agents and SOE suffered along the way, such as the collapse of their efforts in the occupied Netherlands, as well as their more famous victories like the destruction of the heavy water plant in Vemork, Norway.

I recommend it highly.

Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain, Posing as Jimmy Hoffa Back From Vacation at December 01, 2019 09:58 AM (K3mZ6)

101 Hmm. Cooking With Der Fuehrer appears to be missing from MP3's otherwise impressive collection of Hitlerite literature.

Posted by: Cicero (@cicero) at December 01, 2019 09:59 AM (XVuno)

102 Wouldn't give that barricade any coverage in a miniatures game

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 09:59 AM (ZCEU2)

103 I read a short story by Lee Childs and an author new to me, Karin Slaughter about a dyslectic detective named Will Trent and was fascinated by the character. Picked up the first book in the series, Triptych, and couldn't wait to read the next books in he series. Will's dyslexia is what makes him a phenomenal detective. His brain makes connections that others miss so he can read a crime scene like no other. Even minor characters have depth but Will is so flawed, so human,you can't help but keep pulling for him to succeed. Slaughter's dry sense of humor pervades the dialogue and keeps gruesome crime details from taking away from the story. I'm now on book six, so highly recommended.

Posted by: Sharon at December 01, 2019 09:59 AM (QzF6i)

104 One thing a friend pointed out is that the big difference between Paris and London is that the former, while life sucked, it was at least human. The London part is dystopian. (There's an earlier essay entitled "The Spike" on which it was based. Also a similar one on Hop-Picking, which is more like the Paris section. As my friend said, at least it was human.)
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:54 AM (ZbwAu)


Very true. You want to see Orwell and Boris get on in the restaurant. In "London," you only meet Paddy and Bozo, and thogu Bozo is much the more appealing man, you get tired of the constant descriptions of the filth and the cheating in the doss houses. But it really is a depressing piece, and Orwell's hatred of the Salvation Army poisons the whole.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:59 AM (Ki5SV)

105 In your shoes, I'd follow it up with Arrian's Alexander. (And for explanation of some of the battles, I like Fuller. Makes sense of Jaxartes.)
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:48 AM (ZbwAu)


That's on my list but I already asked my wife for the Landmark Thucydides so that will be next unless you make a compelling case otherwise, like nothing will make any fucking sense in my planned sequence.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:00 AM (y7DUB)

106 MP4's shelf, oh my.

I'd love to see a debate between MP4 and some of the twats over on Unz re WW2. it would end up badly for them.

Posted by: boulder t'hobo at December 01, 2019 10:01 AM (ykYG2)

107 How would you feel about a lingerie pillow fight over it right now? (San Fran, I may be ascribing ladyparts where there are none, if so, apologies)
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (Dc2NZ)


**deep sigh**

Bunk.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:01 AM (Ki5SV)

108
Howdy Weasel! Do you have your fuzzy slippers on?
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:51 AM (Dc2NZ)
------
Hi Eris! I sure do!!

Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:01 AM (MVjcR)

109 What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.

***

Life is definitely too short to read lousy books.

What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?

Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

110 It is time for the annual re-reading of LOTR. I've done my prep work with "Bored of the Rings" and "The Silmarillion". Now for the real thing. But this year I'll be using the unabridged version of LOTR on CD. The little bit I've listened to, read by Rob Inglis, is excellent. Further reports to follow.

12 ... "Still reading Lord of the Rings. Taking my time, trying to tease out new elements. A lot of my re-reads of this book are basically nostalgia tours, sort of like listening to a favorite song. It's comforting and while you may get something extra out of it, mostly you're just enjoying the familiar pathways.

However, this time I'm looking a little more closely at Tolkien's writing style, mentally comparing it to other English contemporaries I've discovered since I started reading him. Also, though I've read the passage many times, I just realized that Lotho Sackville-Baggins was in fact a fair-haired kid. Can't think how I overlooked that before. Kind of amusing."

A.H. LLoyd is exactly right in this approach. There is so much in LOTR, so many aspects, it's easy to miss some of them. Between something coming to your notice that you have missed the first 20 times and new knowledge that lets you appreciate a part of the tale even more, the possibilities are endless.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (bmdz3)

111 Greetings, Book-based life forms. in my interminable research for my Grandfather Book Project, I have discovered that the Library of Congress has available online ALL the documentation from the Dachau War Crimes Trials! Yay! and being digital copies of microfiche....i get to scroll through 7,000 pages, because they aren't index'd or searchable! double yay!

good stuff though. fascinating to see how civilized people took down REAL Nazis.

Posted by: goatexchange at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (iUjXP)

112 How would you feel about a lingerie pillow fight over it right now? (San Fran, I may be ascribing ladyparts where there are none, if so, apologies)
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 09:57 AM (Dc2NZ)

===

No lady parts, But please, do go on...

Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (EZebt)

113 Thucydides is likely a long slog, donald kagan did a good review

Posted by: Gaius martius at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (hMlTh)

114 Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain, Posing as Jimmy Hoffa Back From Vacation at December 01, 2019 09:58 AM (K3mZ6)

Truthfully, the war doesn't interest me at all, though of course you can't help reading about it when you read a Hitler bio. My interest is the era of "Storming to Power," as per the title of one of the Time-Life The Third Reich books on the bottom shelf has it. Hitler's Vienna years, takeover of the German Workers' Party, the putsch, the rebuilding of the NSDAP, the scheming to become chancellor and daily life in Germany fascinates me.

Come September 1, 1939, and I don't care. I've never been any fan of military history.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:05 AM (Ki5SV)

115 The London part is dystopian. (There's an earlier essay entitled "The Spike" on which it was based. Also a similar one on Hop-Picking, which is more like the Paris section. As my friend said, at least it was human.)
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:54 AM (ZbwAu)

Yup....the part where Orwell writes that the Tramp is an English invention where they have to keep on the move or face jail time. He wrote that there was a whole army of tramps continually marching around England with nothing to look forward to except tea and 2 slices, the Spike or jail time and what a waste it was. Meanwhile, in Paris, Orwell did not see any tramps or street beggers.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 10:05 AM (Z+IKu)

116 109 Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl

Cut my losses, never look back.

Posted by: April at December 01, 2019 10:07 AM (OX9vb)

117 What I do want to read next is The Road to Wigan Pier. But I probably won't be able to search out a copy until Saturday.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:07 AM (Ki5SV)

118 The Case of the Missing Mayor should be a Perry Mason title. I found an unread stash, and am hitting them when I get tired of the bad mysteries I'm going through. I reported on a few, some months ago, but now I'm just discouraged. There are just so many rotten ones.

Wodehouse and Waugh both loved Gardner. The former wrote about that, but Waugh, so far as I can tell, says so only in letters. It surprised me, I'd gotten the impression that EW didn't care for mysteries. He dismisses them in his bio of Ronald Knox, for instance. (Though frankly, there's something missing in Knox's. As puzzles they are OK, but Miles Bredon just doesn't come alive. Nothing like the magnificent portraits in Let Dons Delight - which includes the best Boswell pastiche I've ever seen. If it were printed in an edition of the Life of Johnson, no one would ever know it was fake.)

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:09 AM (ZbwAu)

119 I will also, as part of the book group, finish Tom Jones by this time next week. I don't know how things will end well for Tom because he just found out that the person he's in jail for killing is gonna be just fine and they have witnesses that say he didn't do anything wrong; but Partridge just told him that as he was fucking everything that moved between Somerset and London that he stuck his crank in his own mother in Upton. Needless to say the ick factor is very strong with that and I'm not sure how Tom will get out from that.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:09 AM (y7DUB)

120 John King Books has a pocket Magna Carta from around 1330 on vellum! It can be had for a mere 45 large:

https://www.rarebooklink.com/pages/books/21-0609/magna-carta-in-manuscript

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:11 AM (Dc2NZ)

121 104
Very true. You want to see Orwell and Boris get on in the restaurant. In "London," you only meet Paddy and Bozo, and thogu Bozo is much the more appealing man, you get tired of the constant descriptions of the filth and the cheating in the doss houses. But it really is a depressing piece, and Orwell's hatred of the Salvation Army poisons the whole.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 09:59 AM (Ki5SV)
______

One light spot in the London section was the clergyman who handed out the meal tickets without giving a sermon, to the approval of all the recipients. "'E'll never make bishop." Was a good line.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:12 AM (ZbwAu)

122 but Partridge just told him that as he was fucking everything that moved between Somerset and London that he stuck his crank in his own mother in Upton. Needless to say the ick factor is very strong with that and I'm not sure how Tom will get out from that.
Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:09 AM (y7DUB)


I'm going to bet it really wasn't his mother. "Accidental incest that wasn't really incest" was a popular story trope in the 18th century, for some reason.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:14 AM (Ki5SV)

123 That's on my list but I already asked my wife for
the Landmark Thucydides so that will be next unless you make a
compelling case otherwise, like nothing will make any fucking sense in
my planned sequence.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:00 AM (y7DUB)

---
You are proceeding in the correct order.

The Peloponnesian War came before Alexander the Great. I found Thucydides very readable and he has excellent insight into human nature.

After that, you need to read the Anabasis and *then* Arrian, since Xenophon gives the game away that the Persian Empire is really a hollow shell.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:14 AM (cfSRQ)

124 Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats are going to the COP25 climate change conference in Madrid.

She plans to "reaffirm the commitment of the American people to combating the climate crisis".

Trump ought to "punk" her by having the FBI on hand when she returns to arrest her on suspicion of violating the Logan Act.

What goes around, comes around.

Posted by: MachiasPrivateer at December 01, 2019 10:16 AM (EMi53)

125 ... My interest is the era of "Storming to Power," as per the title of one of the Time-Life The Third Reich books on the bottom shelf has it. Hitler's Vienna years, takeover of the German Workers' Party, the putsch, the rebuilding of the NSDAP, the scheming to become chancellor and daily life in Germany fascinates me.
...

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:05 AM (Ki5SV)

===

I think the insight such study gives one into the current internal threats to our country are the foundation of my neurosis.

Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 10:16 AM (EZebt)

126 I read most of Orwell but years ago. Great prose stylist

While at Harvard, future novelist Michael Crichton took a writing course and was at odds with the teacher who told him he couldn't write for shit and he should stop pursuing an English major.

Crichton wound up in medical school, but not before submitting an Orwell essay as his own, for shits and giggles. He got a B minus

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 10:18 AM (C5DlE)

127 105 In your shoes, I'd follow it up with Arrian's Alexander. (And for explanation of some of the battles, I like Fuller. Makes sense of Jaxartes.)
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 09:48 AM (ZbwAu)

That's on my list but I already asked my wife for the Landmark Thucydides so that will be next unless you make a compelling case otherwise, like nothing will make any fucking sense in my planned sequence.
Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:00 AM (y7DUB)
_____

The arguments for Arrian next are (a) it is the natural sequel, in which Persia gets the axe, and (b) it's shorter. Still, can't criticize the choice of Thucydides.

Another book I just refound was my complete Plato. I may have to dip back in. He's the one philosopher who has a character of novelistic quality. Like Boswell's Johnson. One thing I discovered some years ago: compare the end of Plato's Phaedo (the hemlock episode) with the end of The Final Problem (Moriarty and Reichenbach Falls). Doyle pretty much "went and took", as Kipling puts it.

As you can tell, I'm in that state of slightly scatterbrained garrulousness which often comes on the first day getting over an illness.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:18 AM (ZbwAu)

128 Is this an episode of Bad Lip-Reading done on Joe Biden? It's pretty funny.

https://bit.ly/2srVfqP

Posted by: t-bird at December 01, 2019 10:20 AM (xSo9G)

129 based on a murder in an Italian prison camp

-
A college professor of mine was a POW in an Italian POW camp. He said that when they got particularly bored, they'd hold a fake funeral for one of the prisoners.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 10:20 AM (+y/Ru)

130
124 Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats are going to the COP25 climate change conference in Madrid.

She plans to "reaffirm the commitment of the American people to combating the climate crisis".

Trump ought to "punk" her by having the FBI on hand when she returns to arrest her on suspicion of violating the Logan Act.

What goes around, comes around.
Posted by: MachiasPrivateer at December 01, 2019 10:16 AM (EMi53)



If these asswipes are so concerned about the climate, don't they use teleconferencing?

To gauge the Climate Priests' concern about "climate change," you only need to observe how they live.

Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:21 AM (TdMsT)

131 What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

_______________________________

I never abandoned a book until J.K. Rowling's (writing as Robert Galbraith) P.I. Cormoran series. I couldn't stand the writing, stupid plot, and f and c bombs. I read 100 pages and gave up.

Posted by: Oggi at December 01, 2019 10:21 AM (Bk5Q+)

132 I'm going to bet it really wasn't his mother. "Accidental incest that wasn't really incest" was a popular story trope in the 18th century, for some reason.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:14 AM (Ki5SV)


Maybe that was the firewall between bawdy romps and porn. I'm sure you're correct on the resolution.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:22 AM (y7DUB)

133 On the off chance that there are gamers in the house, I'm going to give a plug for Conqueror: Fields of Victory.

This was my answer to the continual churn of Games Workshop miniatures rules. Company policy was (and still is, as far as I know) to re-release the rules every 3-4 years, and each new edition has pointless changes whose sole purpose is to require you to buy new figures, update old ones, etc.

Back in 2006, I started creating my own rules set, informed by GW but also my extensive board gaming experience. That became Conqueror: Fields of Victory, my first published title.

Subsequently I recognized a number of insidious errors had crept in and also that people wanted actual units to play with (as opposed with merely a system to make them). This became Conqueor: Fields of Victory Revised Edition, which is available in ebook or paperback on Amazon.

The rules were written for 25mm models, but I imagine 15mm would also work. It is a fantasy rules set and includes rules for magic but you can also use them for ancient/medieval/early modern period combat. The intended scale is one model for ten troopers and 3 yards per inch, but again, you can decide to scale it up if your game requires it.

The whole reason I got hooked on miniatures was DnD. Our campaign had progressed to the point where we had conquered domains of our own and wanted to raise armies, etc. Conqueror works well in this regard, as you can make up just about any unit you want.

Anyhow, any book nerds who are also gamer geeks will find it interesting.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:24 AM (cfSRQ)

134 119 I will also, as part of the book group, finish Tom Jones by this time next week. I don't know how things will end well for Tom because he just found out that the person he's in jail for killing is gonna be just fine and they have witnesses that say he didn't do anything wrong; but Partridge just told him that as he was fucking everything that moved between Somerset and London that he stuck his crank in his own mother in Upton. Needless to say the ick factor is very strong with that and I'm not sure how Tom will get out from that.
Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:09 AM (y7DUB)
_______

Haven't read it since the 70s, but it's one of the greatest clockwork plots ever. Everything just clicks into place. IIRC Coleridge thought it the best plot ever. Tom, of course, gets what he has always lacked, prudence. Sophia, remember, means "wisdom".

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:24 AM (ZbwAu)

135 The old bookstores are nostalgic, but the new way of dealers buying up large lots at (for example) estate sales, probably means more volumes are saved and effectively "redistributed" to the future generations.


The new way also supports the post office, since more than half the cost of many used books is in shipping. That part is less efficient, but then there is so much available digitally for free ... we really need to remake the education system so kids have a solid basis in real American and world history ... instead of public skool indoctrination and SJW brownshirts.

Romney said Russia was our greatest geo-political threat, but with Nixon/Kissinger getting played by China, that red scare became our great threat today. (thanks Mitch/Chao and other sellouts). But the immediate threat is DeepState and their Google/FB digital storm troopers. WW2 in color is fascinating on warfare, but the digital carpet bombing of the population via media and internet control is far more insidious.

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 10:26 AM (Cus5s)

136
Life is definitely too short to read lousy books.

What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

-----------------------

In my early reading life, I would finish the book.

However, as curmudgeonism set in, I now cut my losses.

Started a book recently that I thought had promise, but, within a matter of a 100 pages it had become unreadable. I even tossed it in the trash, it was so bad.

Can't remember the name, just that it was about a grizzled newspaperman versus a coverup by a political campaign.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:28 AM (WEBkv)

137 I never abandoned a book until J.K. Rowling's (writing as Robert Galbraith) P.I. Cormoran series. I couldn't stand the writing, stupid plot, and f and c bombs. I read 100 pages and gave up.

Posted by: Oggi at December 01, 2019 10:21 AM (Bk5Q+)


After The World According to Garp came out, publishers, looking for a quick buck, brought out some of Irving's earlier less successful tripe. Dear God they were bad; I didn't last beyond a couple chapters.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:28 AM (y7DUB)

138 109 What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.

***

Life is definitely too short to read lousy books.

What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)
______

Unless you are like my wife, who reads like lightening, life is too short to waste on something really bad. Two of the bad mysteries I recently was reading just went, unfinished, into the discard pile. And note, those where mysteries; even the desire to see if I'd "broken" it wasn't enough.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:29 AM (ZbwAu)

139 123
You are proceeding in the correct order.

The Peloponnesian War came before Alexander the Great. I found Thucydides very readable and he has excellent insight into human nature.

After that, you need to read the Anabasis and *then* Arrian, since Xenophon gives the game away that the Persian Empire is really a hollow shell.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:14 AM (cfSRQ)
_____

You are correct. Told you i'm feeling light-headed.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (ZbwAu)

140 Does reading the Book Thread count as reading?

Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (MVjcR)

141 I guess even Boomers deserve a wish for a happy advent season.

I also enjoyed Red Storm Rising. It was my introduction to that type of novel. Whoever is writing/producing "Clancy" novels/shows today, it sure aint Tom.

Posted by: Priscilla Hutchin's turkey baster at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (Fxgkp)

142 I think the insight such study gives one into the current internal threats to our country are the foundation of my neurosis.



Posted by: San Franpsycho at December 01, 2019 10:16 AM (EZebt)

---
One thing I find particularly irritating is the fact that few rises to power have been more meticulously documented than Adolf Hitler. Almost every move has been recorded and analyzed.

And yet, none of the people who draw analogies have any idea what actually happened. It's like relating things to the Hindenburg disaster without understanding that it was an airship rather than an ocean liner.

Hitler's rise to power wasn't gradual, it was sudden and complete. The erosion of the state was gradual, and that's what the left seems focused on doing above all else.

The real parallel isn't Hitler but Franco. I'll stop there because I brought that up regularly for the past three months. I'm over my Spanish Civil War fixation. Really.

I just wish the shakes would stop.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:33 AM (cfSRQ)

143 140: it is known. yes it does.

Posted by: chavez the hugo at December 01, 2019 10:33 AM (KP5rU)

144 Well, it was nice to hang with you folks, but The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of isn't going to write itself.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (Ki5SV)

145 Wallace is as big a dick as shep was. And fox is going down faster than a 5 dollar hooker

Posted by: Nevergiveup at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (85Gof)

146 109 ... "What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?"

Ladyl,
Definitely cut my losses, although it seldom takes hours to arrive at that point. My list of To Be Read books probably exceedes several times my lifetime and I plan to live a lot longer. That's why I no longer bother with books on current political or social matters or personalities. The same with fiction. If it doesn't include an element of humor and wit, I don't bother.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (bmdz3)

147 I have occasionally abandoned a book. or i just give up and flip through it to the end, more likely. some good authors, too. I have given up on McMurtry, Fraser, Ludlum.....

Posted by: goatexchange at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (UCGHn)

148 just removed 8" of gorebull warming from my driveway. thanks, nancy, by the way, fuck you.

Posted by: chavez the hugo at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (KP5rU)

149 140 Does reading the Book Thread count as reading?
Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (MVjcR)
---
Yes, especially if you give us a scathing review.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:35 AM (Dc2NZ)

150 What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)


What's his name, Dan Brown? The one who wrote the books about the movies starring Forrest Gump and Amélie? I ended up with one of those underway one time.

"Here's a concept which I will explain in excruciating detail as a service to you, the reader, who I assume is dumber than a bag of hair."
"Nah bro, I'm good, it's pretty straightforward, just go ahead and get on with the story."
"Not until I have wrought all the mystery and nuance out of the clever thing I wrote all by myself with my enormous pulsating brain and, having digested it thoroughly into a flavorless paste, convey it to you, dearest thickwit, as a mother bird feeds her chicks."
"*plonk*"

I think it's still en route to the bottom of the ocean.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 10:35 AM (t+qrx)

151 Just about done with a biography of Richard III.

Interesting person.

In some ways the book reads like a swashbuckling Errol Flynn movie.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:35 AM (WEBkv)

152 Just about done with a biography of Richard III.

-------

But did he order the murders of the Woodvillle princes? One of history's enduring conundrums.

Posted by: Cicero (@cicero) at December 01, 2019 10:38 AM (XVuno)

153 Romney said Russia was our greatest geo-political
threat, but with Nixon/Kissinger getting played by China, that red scare
became our great threat today.


Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 10:26 AM (Cus5s)

---
Point of order.

Nixon/Kissinger did not get played. They made a wise strategic move. China in 1972 was not the China of 2002.

Sorry, but a pet peeve of mine is over-determinism. There were a great many decision points between opening China and where we are today, just as there were many chances to stop the rise of Hitler's Germany and prevent World War II.

The fact that none of those chances were taken doesn't mean the initial impulse was flawed.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:39 AM (cfSRQ)

154 133
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:24 AM (cfSRQ)
_______

Never really got into land miniatures. But I can boast that, while Woodstock was going on, I was playing WWII naval miniatures. (Of course, the dark side of that was the lack of girls taking off their shirts. Or girls, period. Wargames may be the most male hobby possible.)

I do remember Chainmail, the non-magical precursor to DnD.

But I mostly played board games. I don't know Games Workshop. I was into Game Designers Workshop - Frank Chadwick was a genius, IMO. One of my friends and I - some years ago - decided to take his wonderful Beda Fomm and play it at games night at a local store. We were the only ones not playing fantasy RPG. So we got saying things like "I will attack you with my gun of armor piercing."

I actually played the Battleaxe scenario from Operation Crusader - the greatest of all board games. Never could get together enough people for the big scenario.

I also was quite active in Europa, back in the day.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:39 AM (ZbwAu)

155 Does reading the Book Thread count as reading?
Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (MVjcR)

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm........Yes.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 10:40 AM (Z+IKu)

156 148 just removed 8" of gorebull warming from my driveway. thanks, nancy, by the way, fuck you.
Posted by: chavez the hugo at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (KP5rU)
---------------

Heh.

We just had a pretty good winter storm roll through CA.

Where we live, the air is clear enough, hooray! to see the snow on the mountains.

Snow line looks to be down to about 3,000 feet, too, which is low, especially for this time of year.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:40 AM (WEBkv)

157 Since we're discussing what to do with bad books, I'll mention that someone (can't remember who) recommended A Feast of Snakes by Harry Crews very highly. I was looking for something a bit outside of my usual preferences, so I ordered a copy.

It was awful. Really, really bad. The writing was competent, but the plot, and particularly the whole 70s, things really suck, tenor is something I've always hated. In addition, there was an utterly gratuitous sex scene that sounded like something out of Penthouse Letters, but less profound.

This is not a slam on the person who recommended it, just that it wasn't my style at all. It was a short book, so I finished it, but had I known, I never would have started it.

In short, I suppose the answer to the question "finish or jettison?" comes down to book length and whether there's any hope that a book will improve. In this case, I should have gone immediately to jettison.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:40 AM (T6t7i)

158 "Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?"
---

Is it merely workmanlike but somewhat engaging, if only for the resolution of the story? If I make it halfway through I will usually slog through the end. It helps if I'm in bed and the heating blanket is on. I'm lazy.

If a book insults me a few pages in, I will throw it against a wall.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (Dc2NZ)

159 MP4: Well, in that case the only book I've read/listened to that seems relevant is Patrick Leigh Fermor's _A Time of Gifts_, concerning a walk the author took through 1930's Germany. It has interesting bits about Germany after Hitler took control, and interesting bits about Austria before the Anschloss or however it's spelled.

(Don't ask me to spell German. "The Germans are a barbaric people, they have operas that last for three days and no word in their language for 'fluffy.'")

Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain, Posing as Jimmy Hoffa Back From Vacation at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (K3mZ6)

160 I also enjoyed Red Storm Rising. It was my
introduction to that type of novel. Whoever is writing/producing
"Clancy" novels/shows today, it sure aint Tom.

Posted by: Priscilla Hutchin's turkey baster at December 01, 2019 10:31 AM (Fxgkp)

---
Red Storm Rising is hilarious once you realize that Clancy was kind of making it up as he went along. He didn't even come up with character names or description until it was absolutely necessary.

I think he set out to novelize a wargaming session and then realized that oh yeah, I need to give these people names besides SACEUR and CINCLANT.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (cfSRQ)

161 Started looking for baking recipes in Heidis grandmothers (bless her soul) Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook, circa 1954 2nd edition 1st print.
OMG. Little comments about the recipes authors and bakers who tried the recipes.. Hilarious.

Posted by: Cannibal Bob at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (VqhL9)

162 Explain the appeal of Grass. I hated The Tin Drum and liked The Flounder ok. Not that it matters but he's a thoroughly unlikeable person and I got a big kick when some of his lefty fans found out about his past.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:42 AM (y7DUB)

163 But did he order the murders of the Woodvillle princes? One of history's enduring conundrums.
Posted by: Cicero (@cicero) at December 01, 2019 10:38 AM (XVuno)
--------------------

I would have to say Richard III was involved, but, whether he gave the order or had plausible deniability, no idea.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:43 AM (WEBkv)

164 Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons" got flung about 1.5 chapters in. Or should I say, "cast down".

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:44 AM (Dc2NZ)

165 I suppose I did read a book or two last week. I read this one :
bloomsbury.com/au/abd-al-rahman-b-amr-al-awzai-9781786076854/

Steven C. Judd knows Umayyad law like no-one else (I just wish Religious Scholars and the Umayyads would go out in a cheap paperback) so is ideally placed to write about Umayyad jurists, in this case 'Abd al-Rahman b. 'Amr al-Awza'i as the title suggests.

This is a Sunni jurist who retired from Umayyad service to plot out ideal Islamic law as it should be practiced in 120s/740s Beirut. But then Syria got taken over by the 'Abbasids. Awza'i's jurisprudence, as a result, got trashed.

But he had an afterlife as his legal-theory (usul al-fiqh) got picked up to assist other legal theories, especially Malikism. It happened that his home Beirut was on the Byzantine frontier. So the Awza'ite law of jihad stayed current and became popular in North Africa and Umayyad Spain.

Highly recommended for anyone interested in how Umayyad Spain ended up as described in The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise.

Posted by: boulder t'hobo at December 01, 2019 10:44 AM (ykYG2)

166 I would have to say Richard III was involved, but, whether he gave the order or had plausible deniability, no idea.
Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:43 AM (WEBkv)

--------

Someone got the Thomas Becket-style "suggestion", probably.

Posted by: Cicero (@cicero) at December 01, 2019 10:44 AM (XVuno)

167 I was into Game Designers Workshop - Frank Chadwick
was a genius, IMO.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:39 AM (ZbwAu)

---
Over Christmas Break in 1990, my friends linked the Central Front and Southern Front maps from the Third World War series and did an epic mega game over several days.

It is still spoken of in awe and reverence.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:45 AM (cfSRQ)

168 I started War and Peace. I like it. A lot. I'm not setting any goals for its conclusion. I intend to finish it before I die. No hurry I hope.

Posted by: Cannibal Bob at December 01, 2019 10:45 AM (VqhL9)

169 I think he set out to novelize a wargaming session and then realized that oh yeah, I need to give these people names besides SACEUR and CINCLANT.
Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (cfSRQ)


Wasn't it literally a game of Harpoon that Larry Bond and Clancy just wrapped a story around?

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 10:45 AM (t+qrx)

170 164 Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons" got flung about 1.5 chapters in. Or should I say, "cast down".
Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:44 AM (Dc2NZ)

-------------------

Having read Dan Brown's first book, name escapes me, my impression is that he writes like he's running down a road, sees a turn takes it, runs like mad a bit further, ducks down an ally, jogs for a bit to catch his breath, maybe enters a local pub, then, out the door for more aimless running in the streets.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:46 AM (WEBkv)

171 I can always tell a BTH post because I feel like a protohominid dancing around an obelisk when I (try to) read it.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:46 AM (Dc2NZ)

172 140 ... "Does reading the Book Thread count as reading?"

Good morning Weasel,

Damn right it counts. Between OM's wonderful posts and all the comments, reviews and suggestions, each book thread is an education. It also does a number on my book budget.

Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 10:47 AM (bmdz3)

173 Someone got the Thomas Becket-style "suggestion", probably.
Posted by: Cicero (@cicero) at December 01, 2019 10:44 AM (XVuno)
------------------

Yep.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:47 AM (WEBkv)

174 Wasn't it literally a game of Harpoon that Larry Bond and Clancy just wrapped a story around?

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 10:45 AM (t+qrx)

---
Those were the action sequences for The Hunt for Red October. I don't recall which system they used for central Germany.

I should clarify that I only got into minis in the 1990s when all my friends were into it. Board gaming was in steep decline and I always liked army men, so it wasn't that hard of a sale.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 10:48 AM (cfSRQ)

175 lol - Eris, concur, sir.

Posted by: goatexchange at December 01, 2019 10:48 AM (UCGHn)

176 Well, time to wander.

Church beckons.

Stay reading, all.

Catch everyone on the gun thread!

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing
at December 01, 2019 10:48 AM (WEBkv)

177 171
I can always tell a BTH post because I feel like a protohominid dancing around an obelisk when I (try to) read it.


You have obelisks? Luxury! My band of protohominids has to make do with an old turtle shell.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:48 AM (T6t7i)

178 130- a good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat she'll give me the hairy eyeball if I use TWO plastic straws.

She just bought a new car yesterday.
An SUV.

Posted by: vivi at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (11H2y)

179 Good morning Weasel,

Damn right it counts. Between OM's wonderful posts and all the comments, reviews and suggestions, each book thread is an education. It also does a number on my book budget.
Posted by: JTB at December 01, 2019 10:47 AM (bmdz3)
-----
Howdy JTB!

Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (MVjcR)

180 Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:40 AM (T6t7i)

I was surely one of the people recommending it. Your complaints are all legit; I just like him and so do a lot of friends with wildly varying tastes online and real world. I'm sure I have friends that feel very much like you do; they probably don't say anything as we rave about him.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (y7DUB)

181 The only Clancy I've read is the first, Hunt for Red October. But I do recall we went to one of the movies, in which is starts with a pan shot of Jack Ryan's office. My wife started giggling "I trip over all those books."

Really, it was true.

My own reading this week was supposed to be Scruton's Frauds Fools and Firebrands, plus an old mystery Passenger from Scotland Yard. But when I stared feeling bad, I went with my usual go-tos for that: Bill James Abstracts and Conway's Fighting Ships. When my brain is on SLOW, I'm like a hobbit, and read stuff I already know. (Also reread A Horse and His Boy - Lewis always works for me.)

I'm thinking of making another long dive into Wodehouse, but I'm not sure, do I want Bertie or Blandings? Either way, I know I'll be reading that for months.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:51 AM (ZbwAu)

182 Welp, reckon I should go throw something together for the gun thread tonight. Y'all be cool.

Posted by: Weasel at December 01, 2019 10:51 AM (MVjcR)

183 Chuck Todd out on a limb with Sen Kennedy,

Wait until the reveal that Obama interfered in the 2016 election

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 10:52 AM (C5DlE)

184 How lovely. Around 1740 hrs yesterday, there was a drive-by shooting less than a mile from our house on our road. Apparently at an uninhabited house. Not sure which, but there's a couple down the road from me that are for sale.

Posted by: Iron Mike Golf at December 01, 2019 10:53 AM (di1hb)

185 180
Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:40 AM (T6t7i)



I was surely one of the people recommending it. Your complaints are
all legit; I just like him and so do a lot of friends with wildly
varying tastes online and real world. I'm sure I have friends that feel
very much like you do; they probably don't say anything as we rave
about him.

Posted by: Captain Hate


Different strokes. I get the same reaction when I tell people that Moby Dick is my favorite book.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:55 AM (T6t7i)

186 178
130- a good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat
she'll give me the hairy eyeball if I use TWO plastic straws.



She just bought a new car yesterday.

An SUV.

Posted by: vivi at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (11H2y)

_______


Back in my college days, I could have gotten a dozen buddies together and we would have pulled an all-nighter and glued thousands of plastic straws to its exterior.

Posted by: ShainS at December 01, 2019 10:55 AM (WqPYg)

187 There's another series, Daniel Suarez's "Daemon" (two books), that I read in spite of the headaches from teeth-grinding. They're about a distributed intelligence that a visionary-yet-utterly-insane software developer comes up with, and unleashes as his dead man's switch. In short, it gives individuals a way out of the commoditization of their online presence and a way to opt out of the illusory empowerment of social media (though there's much more to it). The first of two was published in 2006 (for reference, Facebook was still .edu-only until that year, and the first iPhone wouldn't be released for another three years; it still has relevance now).

So it's a pretty prescient narrative, with plausible technologies and conflicts. But the writing is just awful. Just awful. So that one, I don't re-read, but use the audiobook, because it's slightly easier to take in as a story as told by a nerd who isn't very good with language, rather than trying to read it as literature.

Posted by: hogmartin at December 01, 2019 10:56 AM (t+qrx)

188 MP4
Have many fond memories of reading the two volume Annotated Sherlock Holmes by WS Baring Gould as a teenager when I was in my "read everything to do with Sherlock Holmes stage".

Posted by: Charlotte at December 01, 2019 10:56 AM (Aj6Tl)

189 178 130- a good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat she'll give me the hairy eyeball if I use TWO plastic straws.

She just bought a new car yesterday.
An SUV.
Posted by: vivi at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (11H2y)
______

Since I was feeling bad, and couldn't eat much, my wonderful bride made me a milkshake. WITH a plastic straw. We may be sinking fast, but Virginia isn't California, yet.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:57 AM (ZbwAu)

190 "Nixon/Kissinger did not get played. They made a wise strategic move. China in 1972 was not the China of 2002. ....The fact that none of those chances were taken doesn't mean the initial impulse was flawed". Posted by Lloyd

An initial good intent does not mean they did not get played. I don't have a broad background on the subject, but this recent conversation on Epoch Times might interest you and others, on this particular subject of China's real nature (they were never going to reform, and playing them against Russia was not so clear cut)

Dr. Arthur Aldron ... he says Kissnger's approach was one of the great failures ... I cued it toward the end, but I think earlier he speaks directly to Kissinger/Nixon. (I listen at 1.5x speed on some of these deliberate speakers)

https://tinyurl.com/unvlbdl

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 10:57 AM (Cus5s)

191 Does reading the Book Thread count as reading?


Yes. Also as cardio if you move your lips while you read.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 10:58 AM (gd9RK)

192 Later, book fags. I shall return anon.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:58 AM (Dc2NZ)

193 Read "Johnson's Life of London: The People Who Made The City That Made The World" by Boris Johnson.
Spent days reading through this- not that the book was boring- Johnson is a good writer, but I would read a bit and then spend hours going and doing research on areas of London and bits of history I was not as familiar with as I wanted to be. Then read some more. Repeat until done. Highly recommend.

Posted by: Charlotte at December 01, 2019 10:59 AM (Aj6Tl)

194 Ludlum.....

Posted by: goatexchange at December 01, 2019 10:34 AM (UCGHn)


I was reading one of his books on the beach years ago when one too many highly unrealistic but convenient sequence of events happened and I thought "I can't do this anymore" put it down and never went back. I know some people like him but I just maxed out.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:59 AM (y7DUB)

195 185
Different strokes. I get the same reaction when I tell people that Moby Dick is my favorite book.
Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:55 AM (T6t7i)
______

A great one; my father's favorite, too. And you know who else loves it? Remember Jim Gilmore, VA governor (and failed presidential candidate). I knew him in college, he reads it every year.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 10:59 AM (ZbwAu)

196 I recently bought The Carpetbaggers; just so I could re-read the chapter on Nevada Smith.

Posted by: JT at December 01, 2019 10:59 AM (arJlL)

197 162 Explain the appeal of Grass. I hated The Tin Drum and liked The Flounder ok. Not that it matters but he's a thoroughly unlikeable person and I got a big kick when some of his lefty fans found out about his past.
Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 10:42 AM (y7DUB)

The Flounder is one of the few books I completely gave up on. I tried and tried, and just could not read it. Also The Sound and the Fury.

Posted by: m at December 01, 2019 11:01 AM (UZ8BZ)

198 Speaking of Nazis and mysteries, I'm enjoying the private detective Bernhard Gunther mystery series. The first two are set pre-war and Bernie hobnobs with Goering, Himmler, Heydrich etc. The next two (which is as far as I've gotten) are set in post-war Germany and Austria and deal with German guilt/responsibility.

SPOILER ALERT!!!

Don't hire Bernie. In the first book, a rich industrialist hires Bernie to find out who murdered his daughter and to recover some blackmail material. Turns out daughter is not dead but Bernie gets her killed and the Nazis get the blackmail material and keep the industrialist under their thumb. In the next, a mother hires Bernie to prevent her son from being exposed as a homo. Bernie gets him killed. In the third, one of Bernie's old comrades hires him to keep from being executed. He gets executed for a crime he didn't commit.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 11:01 AM (+y/Ru)

199 @194. The reveals about things like the Pee Pee Dossier and the antics of Brennan and Comey are like bad Ludlum, no?

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:02 AM (C5DlE)

200 Wait. Did you guys have a MiMoMe and go to a used bookstore?

That is so Moron.

It's a pity Powell's is in the steaming, rancid heart of Portland because that would be a perfect MoMe location. They even have food on site so we wouldn't have to leave!

Posted by: Sabrina Chase at December 01, 2019 11:02 AM (XK6Vj)

201 If a book insults me a few pages in, I will throw it against a wall.

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency,
fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 10:41 AM (Dc2NZ)

_______
Same. Started an audiobook (downloaded from my local library) entitled "Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom" by David W. Blight.


Within the first 10 minutes of the Introduction, he contradicts himself twice (paraphrasing):

1. "Douglass was NOT a self-made man;" soon afterward: "Douglass was a self-made hero."

2. "Conservative and Republican deplorables have adopted Douglass as an icon but we academicians (he's a Yale professor) and Lefty's know better -- he was no Republican;" soon afterward: "Douglass was a Republican."


Way to give half your audience the middle finger as you dazzle us with your congnitive dissonance disease. * immediately checked the book back in and spat, not necessarily in that order *

Posted by: ShainS at December 01, 2019 11:03 AM (WqPYg)

202 "A desperate Kremlin takes advantage of a military crisis in Asia to simultaneously strike into Western Europe and invade east Africa in a bid to occupy three Rare Earth mineral mines that will give Russia unprecedented control for generations over the world's hi-tech sector.

Pitted against the Russians are a president who promises Putin to be more flexible after he fools the voters one last time, a Secretary of State who is selling them America's uranium, her husband who is giving half-million dollar speeches at Putin Savings and Loan in downtown Moscow, an attorney general who is personally giving Russians parole visas and sending them to Trump Tower and a hybrid FBICIA agent who is sending surveilled Russians into Republican campaigns as a way to spy on them and rig the elections."

Should be a good read.

Posted by: The Gipper Lives at December 01, 2019 11:04 AM (Ndje9)

203 The reveals about things like the Pee Pee Dossier and the antics of Brennan and Comey are like bad Ludlum, no?
Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:02 AM (C5DlE)


Correct!

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 11:04 AM (y7DUB)

204 booken morgen horden

10,000 snowflakes were decimated by the pic of MP4's shelves!

Posted by: vmom's in the kitchen at December 01, 2019 11:04 AM (G546f)

205 good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat

-
Dude, new correct terminology is "climate emergency". Learn it, love it, live it.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 11:05 AM (+y/Ru)

206
An initial good intent does not mean they did
not get played. I don't have a broad background on the subject, but this
recent conversation on Epoch Times might interest you and others, on
this particular subject of China's real nature (they were never going to
reform, and playing them against Russia was not so clear cut)

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 10:57 AM (Cus5s)

---
It is simply not credible to blame Nixon for decisions made by Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama.

The paramount threat in 1972 was the Soviet Union. Opening up China made strategic sense, just as NATO made strategic sense in 1949.

The issue is that our foreign policy establishment is feckless and calcified, and seems intent on preserving policies that have long passed their expiration date.

BTW, I'm a fan of Kissinger and have a copy of his Diplomacy on my bookshelf. Very good overview of power politics.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 11:05 AM (cfSRQ)

207 @98 Eeyore
You may like Margaret Frazer's Sister Frevisse series.

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 11:05 AM (AwPyG)

208 I'm one who doesn't like to waste time reading books I'm not enjoying.
What I do with a lot of books is read it slowly. I read a few chapters and then put it away for a few days.
I'm doing that with Cryptonimicon by Neal Stephenson.
I like well enough but it hasn't set my imagination on fire yet.

Posted by: Northernlurker at December 01, 2019 11:06 AM (eq+5M)

209 199
@194. The reveals about things like the Pee Pee Dossier and the antics of Brennan and Comey are like bad Ludlum, no?

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:02 AM (C5DlE)

______


"My fiction has been called a lot of things, but never bad Ludlum sir!" -- Fusion Glenn Simpson

Posted by: ShainS at December 01, 2019 11:06 AM (WqPYg)

210 Well, in that case the only book I've read/listened to that seems relevant is Patrick Leigh Fermor's _A Time of Gifts_, concerning a walk the author took through 1930's Germany.


Oh, I started reading that and misplaced it but found it again.


I had a bad case of class envy reading it, and also envy of a lost world.

Our guy is basically roughing it, walking from town to town with scraps to eat, except he shows up often enough at a castle where he has letters of introduction so he gets to feast for a few days and then keep walking.

It's delightful but if you reading thinking I'd like to do that you can't.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 11:08 AM (gd9RK)

211 Just started Kurt Schlicter's latest "Collapse"

Kurt S. is hilarious.

Paraphrase: Alyssa Milano leaves the US for the PR, gets disgusted, returns, learns to admire Ayn Rand and "joined 84-year old Tony Danza to reboot their old TV series as an Objectivist sitcom called 'You're Your Own Boss' "

I LOLed.

Posted by: TANSTAAFL at December 01, 2019 11:08 AM (T09ml)

212 205
good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat



-

Dude, new correct terminology is "climate emergency". Learn it, love it, live it.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 11:05 AM (+y/Ru)

_______


One of these days the loonies will have accidentally lurched into the truth in their rebranding efforts when they start calling it "climate hysteria."

Posted by: ShainS at December 01, 2019 11:09 AM (WqPYg)

213 The paramount threat in 1972 was the Soviet Union. Opening up China made strategic sense, just as NATO made strategic sense in 1949.

Nixon was a huge mixed bag as far as being an economic retard and humongous expander of the derp state, but he was right on China and Alger Hiss.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 11:10 AM (y7DUB)

214 I tried a Lee Childs' Jack Reacher story. No denying the skills but so over-written. 300 pages in and I was exhausted. Wrap it up, for God's sakes.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 11:10 AM (H8QX8)

215 President Nixon was trying to play China against Russia for America.

President Trump was trying to play Russia against China for America--but Hillary's need to blame Russia instead of Seth Rich interfered.

Posted by: The Gipper Lives at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (Ndje9)

216 You have obelisks? Luxury! My band of protohominids has to make do with an old turtle shell.
Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 10:48 AM (T6t7i)


You had it good. My "band" was only me and by brother Earl and all we had to dance around was an old coprolite.

But we made do, we did.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (zGtXn)

217 It's a pity Powell's is in the steaming, rancid
heart of Portland because that would be a perfect MoMe location. They
even have food on site so we wouldn't have to leave!
Posted by: Sabrina Chase at December 01, 2019 11:02 AM (XK6Vj)


there is a branch in Beaverton,

OR

There is Bob's in Lincoln City.

Posted by: Kindltot at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (1glZx)

218 Explain the appeal of Grass.


His language is amazing, recursive, playful, run-on, obscure, and fun.

I've started Tin Drum and never got through it. I love Cat and Mouse and I totally loved the memoir Peeling the Onion.

I should snob it up a little and point out that I don't know whether the playful language translates well because I've never read him in translation.

Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (gd9RK)

219 Well, time to get ready for mass 'n stuff.

Later!

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (cfSRQ)

220 On with Chuck Todd, John Kerry wants to declare war on Climate Change. A new WWII

With hindsight this will look like one of the silliest things in modern history. I can't think of anything comparable

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:12 AM (C5DlE)

221 LOL. Now, who are we going to get to help us deal with China?

Posted by: JAS at December 01, 2019 11:12 AM (DBGf/)

222 They want to declare war on the Sun? I'm no scientist but I think that's a losing proposition.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:14 AM (2DOZq)

223 220 On with Chuck Todd, John Kerry wants to declare war on Climate Change. A new WWII

Good luck with the war equivalency thing. They're desperate.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 11:15 AM (H8QX8)

224 If only the the Native Americans had declared war on climate change we wouldn't have lost such a huge percentage of our glaciers and would not have the Great Lakes and their pollution to deal with .

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:18 AM (2DOZq)

225 Sorry, Robert's Bookstore in Lincoln City. Who is up for that?

Posted by: Kindltot at December 01, 2019 11:19 AM (1glZx)

226 216 OM thanks for increasing my work power. However, please help out (those more naive lurkers) with a 'stop drinking' warning for when we google 'coprolite' .

Also, a tremendous visual. I suspect it will recur all day.

Posted by: socalcon at December 01, 2019 11:19 AM (Roy2Z)

227 I read several books on 9/11 and decided I should read about the first bombing. I'm reading Two Seconds Under the World. It's a book that will piss you off at the FBI again and manages to point out how we allowed these radicals to game our immigration system.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:20 AM (Lqy/e)

228 They want to declare war on the Sun? I'm no scientist but I think that's a losing proposition.
Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:14 AM (2DOZq)


Nah, 98.6% of climate scientists agree that the sun has no effect whatsoever on the climate. The science is settled!

Posted by: DR.WTF at December 01, 2019 11:20 AM (aS1PU)

229 Dying Star Wars Fan Gets Special Advanced Screening Of 'The Rise Of Skywalker'

-
Well, I guess that'd transform death into a relief.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 11:22 AM (+y/Ru)

230 Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:20 AM (Lqy/e)

Did Clinton ever visit the Towers after that attack? My bias memory says no.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:23 AM (2DOZq)

231 I read several books on 9/11 and decided I should read about the first bombing. I'm reading Two Seconds Under the World. It's a book that will piss you off at the FBI again and manages to point out how we allowed these radicals to game our immigration system.
Posted by: Notsothoreau

Is it worth the money for a hardback? I remember exactly where I was when that happened.

Posted by: Infidel at December 01, 2019 11:24 AM (O/X1S)

232 The FBI is just as experienced, competent and accomplished as Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden.

Posted by: JAS at December 01, 2019 11:24 AM (DBGf/)

233 efore the Anschloss or however it's spelled.

They just had a spelling reform in 1996, so it's Anschluss. It used to be Anschluß- if only we could do that in Fraktur!

Posted by: t-bird at December 01, 2019 11:24 AM (1+J19)

234 218 Explain the appeal of Grass.


His language is amazing, recursive, playful, run-on, obscure, and fun.

...
Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (gd9RK)
________

If I want language like that, I don't go with modernists. Tristram Shandy is the way to go.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:25 AM (ZbwAu)

235 208 I'm one who doesn't like to waste time reading books I'm not enjoying.
What I do with a lot of books is read it slowly. I read a few chapters and then put it away for a few days.
I'm doing that with Cryptonimicon by Neal Stephenson.
I like well enough but it hasn't set my imagination on fire yet.
Posted by: Northernlurker at December 01, 2019 11:06 AM (eq+5M)


I used to be an avid reader but then life...

The daughter gave me a copy of Cryptonomicon because she knew that cryptography was something I was kind of into.

I started the book with only the anticipation of learning the "Solitaire" code. After a couple of chapters I found that I just could not put it down.

What was going on with Bobby Shaftow? What about Dengo? Enoc Root?

For me the story lines in Europe and the Pacific during WWII were much more interesting than what was going on with Randy. But that story also got better as it went along.

I found myself disgusted to have to put the book down to go to bed. 5AM comes early. I was even more disgusted when I realized that I only had 40 pages left.

I've got 2 more books by Stephenson and I hear they are as good as this one.

Posted by: Ex-ex at December 01, 2019 11:25 AM (RU4sa)

236 At Thanksgiving, I asked a college-age relative to consider: (1) Everyone on earth could live in Alaska (2) the surface of the earth is 3/4 water and (3) The sun is 1.3 million times larger than the earth.
didn't seem to help

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 11:27 AM (AwPyG)

237 Nah, 98.6% of climate scientists agree that the sun has no effect whatsoever on the climate. The science is settled!

All weather is local. Does the Moon affect our weather? Well, the Sun is even further away! Heck, it's not even there half the time.

Posted by: t-bird at December 01, 2019 11:27 AM (cfSLd)

238 With hindsight this will look like one of the silliest things in modern history. I can't think of anything comparable
Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:12 AM (C5DlE)

Yup....War on Poverty, War on Drugs, World War Zero.

Crap in, Crap out.

What is needed is a War on Leftists.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 11:27 AM (Z+IKu)

239 Come for the pants.
Stay for the conversation.

Morning all.

Posted by: Diogenes at December 01, 2019 11:28 AM (axyOa)

240 If I want language like that, I don't go with modernists. Tristram Shandy is the way to go. Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:25 AM (ZbwAu)
=====

You must be living in my head. LOL

Posted by: mustbequantum at December 01, 2019 11:29 AM (MIKMs)

241 Greetings:

Re: World War II and Hitler

Currently reading "Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1944-1945" by Max Hastings.

I seem to be winding my way through his books after reading his "Vietnam-An Epic Tragedy". Both books are worthwhile and long reads. He seems to have both his Britishness and Progressivism under control with little more than inconsequential bits and pieces (DaveClark Five anyone ???) of troth plighting.

"ArmaGeddon" is not very kind to any side, the Allied, the Commies, or the Nazis, but it does lay out the the different approaches and their results in a very measured way.

Posted by: 11B40 at December 01, 2019 11:31 AM (evgyj)

242 220 On with Chuck Todd, John Kerry wants to declare war on Climate Change. A new WWII

With hindsight this will look like one of the silliest things in modern history. I can't think of anything comparable
Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:12 AM (C5DlE)
_______

Notice that "declaring war" on something other than a country never works. The ultimate was the "war on poverty." Poverty won.

But I'm not sure in the age of LGBTQWERTY consciousness, there's going to be a clear winner for silliness. A lot of contenders out there.

Got my latest UVa alumni magazine. As has been true for years, it's guilt, guilt, guilt. The usual Jefferson = Hitler shit.

But I think they may be running out of materiel. One article was bemoaning the fact that there was a university-shuttle stop that had become a meeting place for black students, and is no longer. Which was because of Trump, or the KKK, or something.

What's next? Falling sales for MD 20/20?

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:32 AM (ZbwAu)

243 MPToThePower:

I remember those Pogo collections in my parents' library.

Posted by: mustbequantum at December 01, 2019 11:32 AM (MIKMs)

244 His language is amazing, recursive, playful, run-on, obscure, and fun.

I've started Tin Drum and never got through it. I love Cat and Mouse and I totally loved the memoir Peeling the Onion.

I should snob it up a little and point out that I don't know whether the playful language translates well because I've never read him in translation.
Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (gd9RK)


Thanks for that response. Maybe I've read the wrong things.

Posted by: Captain Hate at December 01, 2019 11:33 AM (y7DUB)

245 Just finished a re-read of "Not So Wild a Dream" by Eric Severeid. It was as good as I remembered it from 30 yrs or so ago. Watched " Charlie Wilson's War" on DVD and noted that it was based on a book./ I went to Amazon and lo and behold, there it was, for the Kindle for the unbeatable price of nada. Fun movie, promises to be a fun read. Don't know if the price still holdsbut if your interested, give it a look. One of my favorite flicks, BTW, with Tom Hanks, Phillip Seymour Hoffmam and a miscast Julia Roberts

Posted by: Semilitterate at December 01, 2019 11:33 AM (5rGQg)

246 We had to read Grass in my German Poetry class (just so we could say we had). I don't know whether my prof intentionally picked two of his most graphic poems or if they're all like that, but I do know that they made me physically ill, and I'm never touching any of his other work with a ten-foot pole.

Ditto Thomas Mann, really, although at least Death in Venice was just creepy and didn't feature detailed descriptions of crime scenes.

Posted by: Elisabeth G. Wolfe at December 01, 2019 11:33 AM (aFZYk)

247 224 If only the the Native Americans had declared war on climate change we wouldn't have lost such a huge percentage of our glaciers and would not have the Great Lakes and their pollution to deal with .
Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:18 AM (2DOZq)
______

I resent that. I grew up on Long Island, which is simply where the glaciers stopped and took a dump.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:33 AM (ZbwAu)

248 Biden is Dead Candidate Walking

Hekawi Liz has dropped from 27% to 16% in national polls

Bernie is a joke.

Black pundits have knives out for the audacity of Mayor Pete comparing his gay experience to that of being black (he was on the down low until he got married). He may win Iowa, but will get killed in SC

And now Bloomberg will blitz key states with non-stop ads

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:35 AM (C5DlE)

249 They don't mention Clinton showing up but the book jumps around a bit. They go into the connection with the assassination of Rabbi Kahane.

It's a worthwhile read but I wish it was written better. There are four authors listed and the group effort doesn't always work smoothly.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:36 AM (Lqy/e)

250 "The paramount threat in 1972 was the Soviet Union. Opening up China made
strategic sense, just as NATO made strategic sense in 1949." Lyoyd

mistakes were made later, but the foundation was flawed. As I said, sure, there was a strategic intent ... but the link I gave says it was never really accomplished, and China knew what was going on since they had an inside source in Taiwan ...


here is the part of that video where he discusses Kissinger directly ... saying it was a mistake to use the expert on the congress of Vienna when they had other actual China experts available. (I don't even know the ramifications of "congress of vienna", so am not trying to have an academic argument with you, but my broader view, of how we made a mistake early on with China, formed a couple decades ago on trade issues, and Trump even confronted the Wall Street and globalist sellout back in 1990)

https://tinyurl.com/wwoz642

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 11:36 AM (Cus5s)

251 The FBI is just as experienced, competent and accomplished as Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden.
Posted by: JAS at December 01, 2019 11:24 AM (DBGf/)

IIRC, just like the Boston Bombings, the Dallas draw Muhammad attack and likely many other incidents, the FBI were advised of the plans to carry out the attack on the Towers but did nothing to prevent it. They were more concerned on catching bigger players or catching them in the act than they were on preventing potential harm to innocent Americans with certainty. Ends Justify the Means is not only the Left's motto.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:37 AM (2DOZq)

252 248
Biden is Dead Candidate Walking


Ah, that explains the finger nibbling. He's a zombie who hasn't moved up the food chain to brains yet. Or perhaps Dr. Jill simply doesn't have any.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 11:37 AM (T6t7i)

253 216
You had it good. My "band" was only me and by brother Earl and all we had to dance around was an old coprolite.

But we made do, we did.
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (zGtXn)
_______

I first learnt of coprolite in the late 60s. Jean Shepherd had a great radio show in NY. Listened to him every night in my HS days. (He's the Christmas Story guy, for you outlanders.) He read the ads for coprolite jewelry.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:38 AM (ZbwAu)

254 136
Life is definitely too short to read lousy books.

What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

Depends on the author. If it's someone I like, I read through and sometimes things start working again. If it's a new (to me) author, I cut my losses , and sometimes try again.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:38 AM (U7k5w)

255
Oh, LOL.

I had no idea about the revelations about Grass volunteering for the Kriegsmarine and getting drafted into the Waffen-SS instead.

The man who called everyone to the right of the Frankfurt School Nazis.

Excellent. I love it.

And I won't forget to bring it up whenever the opportunity arises.

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at December 01, 2019 11:38 AM (e8BgH)

256 I mentioned it already on this here site, but I don't think it was the book thread...

OM, since you often recommend Kindle versions of books, I wanted to (briefly this time) mention my frustration with Kindle for NOT making available the versions of some books that I'm seeking, but instead making ONLY a version that is sometimes poorly edited and constructed.

And they do some bait and switching with it, as in you'll see the version want in print, then you click on the "Kindle Edition," and it's not only not the same version, but you don't discover that until you read the comments where buyers are furious about it.

Anyone ever mention this to Amazon? I mean anyone with a media voice, and has Amazon ever addressed the topic themselves? It strikes me as shoddy business practice.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (hku12)

257 Good News! Bloomberg just said Xi Jinping is not a dictator. Next question, "The idea that the Chinese government is responsive to a Democratic expression.."

Bloomers: "Oh, come on, of course they are."

The context is discussing coal fire power plants, and it's ok that the Chinese are building new coal power plants because they are moving them away from the city. Apparently Bloomers is unfamiliar with the concept of "Wind".

Posted by: Juan and his little mule at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (jp0Bv)

258 If we were willing follow Manilla's example, all 7.7 billion of us (?! I remember when it was 6 billion) could live like sardines in Wisconsin.

Except for me. I'd be living in the rest of the planet.

Posted by: t-bird at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (Ry8mf)

259 Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:36 AM (Lqy/e)

I recall that the guy who murdered the Rabbi was acquitted of murder. Convicted of only weapons charge. How fucked up is that.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:40 AM (2DOZq)

260
mistakes were made later, but the foundation was flawed. As I said, sure, there was a strategic intent ... but the link I gave says it was never really accomplished, and China knew what was going on since they had an inside source in Taiwan ...

------

And Taiwan knew what was going on because Zhou Enlai sent information to his old acquaintance Chiang Kia-Shek!

Posted by: G at December 01, 2019 11:41 AM (Y08Vx)

261 The amazing thing, to me, is Kunstler getting Kahane's assassin off. Having eyewitnesses to the shooting isn't enough, unless you see the bullets leave the gun.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:43 AM (Lqy/e)

262 Dr Jill Biden must have been a horrorshow step mom

Would have driven me to hookers and blow

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:43 AM (C5DlE)

263 I just found an article in Business Insider, where a writer is complaining about Kindle's practice, but then the "turn off your popup blocker" message appears, and I have no idea whether it's worth reading or not.

Because I ain't turning off my popup blocker.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:43 AM (hku12)

264 congress of Vienna was the post-Napoleonic War treaty that apportioned out Europe to the victors. It was notable that the conquered country France was allowed a large voice, and that Austrians got to take home most of the marbles.

The artificial division and power brokering carried out by Klemens von Metternich as foreign minister of Austria kept Europe under wraps, up until the revolutions of 1848

Posted by: Kindltot at December 01, 2019 11:44 AM (1glZx)

265 Nyah

Posted by: Anna Puma at December 01, 2019 11:44 AM (atCrA)

266 Good News! Bloomberg just said Xi Jinping is not a dictator. Next question, "The idea that the Chinese government is responsive to a Democratic expression.."

Bloomers: "Oh, come on, of course they are."

The context is discussing coal fire power plants, and it's ok that the Chinese are building new coal power plants because they are moving them away from the city. Apparently Bloomers is unfamiliar with the concept of "Wind".
Posted by: Juan and his little mule at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (jp0Bv)


Bloomberg is the Globallist CoC candidate.

That is all yee need to know.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:45 AM (hku12)

267 They didn't do an autopsy of the Rabbi, so Kunstler claimed they didn't know the trajectory of the bullets or which shot killed him. The assassin claimed that the gun was planted on him because he was the only Arab in the place. And the judge was Jewish so gave lots of leeway to the Defense.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:46 AM (Lqy/e)

268 Apparently Bloomers is unfamiliar with the concept of "Wind".
Posted by: Juan and his little mule at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM


Some concepts are made to be broken.

Posted by: Eric S. at December 01, 2019 11:46 AM (DMUuz)

269 Dying Star Wars Fan Gets Special Advanced Screening Of 'The Rise Of Skywalker'

Already seen it. Twenty times.

Posted by: Caliph Ibrahim al-Baghdadi at December 01, 2019 11:47 AM (ykYG2)

270 Anna! How is the madness of crowds this year?

Posted by: Kindltot at December 01, 2019 11:48 AM (1glZx)

271 Random idea

Vampire gone native in San Francisco has a nervous breakdown because he realizes that free range human usually mean GMO human.

So he starves to death

Posted by: Anna Puma at December 01, 2019 11:48 AM (atCrA)

272 Life is definitely too short to read lousy books.

What do you do when after hours of reading a book, the writing, characters and plot fall apart, halfway through?

Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

Depends on the author. If it's someone I like, I read through and sometimes things start working again. If it's a new (to me) author, I cut my losses , and sometimes try again.
Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:38 AM (U7k5w)


Since I mostly read non-fiction, and I'm a slow reader, this comes up a lot.

I have many unfinished books around here. It used to bother me, but the answer is in your opening statement: Life is too short to waste on bad books.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:48 AM (hku12)

273 Bloomberg actually has a half a point about China, but he fcuked it up in implying there was something democratic or pluralist about it. It IS true that in China, as in every big country, there are interests which even the Maximum Leader has to pay attention to. Usually the army is one of those.

The rule was best put by Ambrose Beirce, "An absolute monarch can do as he pleases, so long as he pleases the assassins."

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:49 AM (ZbwAu)

274 267 They didn't do an autopsy of the Rabbi, so Kunstler claimed they didn't know the trajectory of the bullets or which shot killed him. The assassin claimed that the gun was planted on him because he was the only Arab in the place. And the judge was Jewish so gave lots of leeway to the Defense.
Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:46 AM (Lqy/e)

Immigration trumps safety every time for my tribe. Ugh

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:50 AM (U7k5w)

275 Dying Star Wars Fan Gets Special Advanced Screening Of 'The Rise Of Skywalker'

-
Well, I guess that'd transform death into a relief.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Tyrannosaur Wrangler at December 01, 2019 11:22 AM (+y/Ru)


Yeah, that's just cruel. Couldn't somebody arrange for him to know the touch of a woman instead? You know, something that would be original and satisfying?

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:51 AM (hku12)

276 World War Zero.

Recall the Brad Pitt flick from a few years back World War Z where he battled the zombie apocalypse. Perfect fit in my opinion.

Posted by: Sock Monkey... carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero at December 01, 2019 11:51 AM (wmoAX)

277 And the collection of evidence was totally bungled.

The book was written in 1994. I do think it's a worthwhile read because we tend to forget about that first attempt. And there are interesting bits like the tower was built to sustain at hit by a fully loaded 707, which was the biggest plane made at the time. One of the 9/11 books claimed they never considered having a plane hit the towers.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:51 AM (Lqy/e)

278 Off Romancing the Stone sock

Posted by: Bilwis, Devourer of Low Glycemic Souls at December 01, 2019 11:52 AM (jp0Bv)

279 Since I mostly read non-fiction, and I'm a slow reader, this comes up a lot.

I have many unfinished books around here. It used to bother me, but the answer is in your opening statement: Life is too short to waste on bad books.
Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:48 AM (hku12)

For some non-fiction, I choose select parts anyway.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:52 AM (U7k5w)

280 Died out quicker than Beto Fever, just picking up the pieces is a bear.

Posted by: Anna Puma at December 01, 2019 11:52 AM (atCrA)

281 245 Just finished a re-read of "Not So Wild a Dream" by Eric Severeid. It was as good as I remembered it from 30 yrs or so ago. Watched " Charlie Wilson's War" on DVD and noted that it was based on a book./ I went to Amazon and lo and behold, there it was, for the Kindle for the unbeatable price of nada. Fun movie, promises to be a fun read. Don't know if the price still holds...

Posted by: Semilitterate at December 01, 2019 11:33 AM (5rGQg)


Dang it, it's now back up to $9.99.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:53 AM (zGtXn)

282 The rule was best put by Ambrose Beirce, "An absolute monarch can do as he pleases, so long as he pleases the assassins."
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:49 AM (ZbwAu)
-----
Ah, Ambrose. During the Civil War, he was a mapmaker for the Federal Army. I've got a book on ACW cartography with several of his maps reproduced therein. He was quite the dab hand at drawing a map.

Posted by: Captain Obvious at December 01, 2019 11:53 AM (3Z6pZ)

283 Good morning!

Let's smile and be happy & strike fear in the hearts of killjoy leftists everywhere.

Posted by: NaCly Dog at December 01, 2019 11:53 AM (u82oZ)

284 >>Dying Star Wars Fan Gets Special Advanced Screening Of 'The Rise Of Skywalker'

Yeah, there's already a movie about that - with the Star Wars movie being the 1st prequel.

Posted by: Lizzy at December 01, 2019 11:54 AM (bDqIh)

285 Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:51 AM (Lqy/e)

Did the book talk about the FBI knowing the plan to blow up the Tower beforehand? They had an informant who told them about it.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:54 AM (2DOZq)

286 Kunstler's partner, Ronald Kuby, had been a member of the JDL. But he convinces the Muslims that's all in the past and he'd be honored to get a fair trial for them.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:54 AM (Lqy/e)

287 262 Dr Jill Biden must have been a horrorshow step mom

Would have driven me to hookers and blow
Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 11:43 AM (C5DlE)

I thought that too. And maybe there were lots of comparison's to the older son, which might also explain the amazing decision to take up with the widow.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:54 AM (U7k5w)

288 248
Biden is Dead Candidate Walking


They're all dead candidates walking. Look at them. Do you see any joy or sense of vitality or life. They represent moribundity in every respect.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 11:55 AM (H8QX8)

289 I recall that the guy who murdered the Rabbi was acquitted of murder. Convicted of only weapons charge. How fucked up is that.
Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:40 AM


If it is any consolation, the assassin is currently serving a life sentence +15 at Marion for conspiracy.

And while not convicted of murder, he was convicted of firearms charges, assault, and the shooting of the postal inspector and got the maximum 22 years at Attica.

Posted by: Chuck C at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (r6GXX)

290 "President Nixon was trying to play China against Russia for America.
President Trump was trying to play Russia against China for
America--but Hillary's need to blame Russia instead of Seth Rich
interfered."

Posted by Gipper Lives

Russia and their KGB became a mafia, and Putin became the mob leader over time (some say he may be the richest man in the world, idk). As with Ukraine, Hillary gleefully took a half billion to her "foundation" from "Russia" as she sold our uranium interests and hypersonic tech (Skolkovo/Silicon Valley approvals) into that corrupt part of the world.


That whole "Magnitsky Act" thing is rather important, since efforts to bring "capitalism" into the failing Russia region was upended when Putin and his ilk confiscated wealth and murdered inconvenient victims (did Hillary learn from them, or vice versa?).


There is actually some hope ... but China must now fail, and they seem headed that direction. And Ukraine/Russia and the region need reform ... and the globalists must die ... just a few details to clean up ... then ... World Peace baby. heh

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (Cus5s)

291 I'll pimp for Steven Pressfield again.

Everything he's written is a page turner.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (2DOZq)

292 Since I mostly read non-fiction, and I'm a slow reader, this comes up a lot.

I have many unfinished books around here. It used to bother me, but the answer is in your opening statement: Life is too short to waste on bad books.
Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:48 AM (hku12)

For some non-fiction, I choose select parts anyway.
Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 11:52 AM (U7k5w)


I suppose that might be useful. If the subject matter is important enough to me. What I usually will do though, is find another book by someone else on the same topic.

Which helps to see and be reminded, just how thoroughly wrong one can view any subject, if one is reading the wrong author's version of it.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (hku12)

293 Yup....War on Poverty, War on Drugs, World War Zero.



Crap in, Crap out.



What is needed is a War on Leftists.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at December 01, 2019 11:27 AM (Z+IKu)


zombie Augusto Pinochet: Tanned...well pale, ready and rested

Posted by: TheQuietMan at December 01, 2019 11:57 AM (MFe3R)

294 The context is discussing coal fire power plants, and it's ok that the Chinese are building new coal power plants because they are moving them away from the city. Apparently Bloomers is unfamiliar with the concept of "Wind".
Posted by: Juan and his little mule at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (jp0Bv)


Bloomberg really reveals himself as a clueless globalist dick in that interview. And he thinks people are going to prefer a man like him to Trump? Is he *that* delusional?

He really should run as a Democrat. In that party, he'd be the sane one.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (zGtXn)

295 ...Which helps to see and be reminded, just how
thoroughly wrong one can view any subject, if one is reading the wrong
author's version of it.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (hku12)

=====
Can't argue with that.

Posted by: Howard Zinn at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (IttZ7)

296 Died out quicker than Beto Fever, just picking up the pieces is a bear.
Posted by: Anna Puma at December 01, 2019 11:52 AM


I saw *two* vehicles yesterday with *two* Beto for Senate stickers each.

Like Ebola, it has just retreated to deep in the Progressive jungle.

Waiting. Watching.

Posted by: Duncanthrax The Austere at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (DMUuz)

297 I'm getting to the part about the informant now. (I think). The first part of the book is the bombing. Then it goes back to the Kahane murder ( because the bombers were involved in that). Then it goes to the aftermath of the bombing. I guess they figured they had to lead with the bombing or no one would buy the book.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (Lqy/e)

298 -last week-32 The last couple of weeks I have read the 8 books in the "DC Smith"
books by Peter Grainger. They feature a rather rumpled, old school
British detective, a widower, somewhat adrift in a sea of
modernizations. He's a wistful, compelling character, and I was sad when
the series ended.

Posted by: grammie winger at November 24, 2019 09:15 AM (lwiT4)
----
I am not sure what OM meant in his reply above, Grammie Winger; My wife turned me on to Mr Grainger's D C Smith series several years ago, of which #1 is "An Accidental Death". I also was sad at the end of #8, and then this past summer was very pleased with #9 "Songbird", with a subtitle "A King's Lake Mystery" rather than "A DC Smith Mystery". Fear Not! About halfway through you will smile again!

Posted by: Sigfried at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (WEXo0)

299 For some reason, on this thread, I want to fuck up some Germans.

Posted by: Fritz at December 01, 2019 12:00 PM (wo3c/)

300 291 I'll pimp for Steven Pressfield again.

Everything he's written is a page turner.
Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (2DOZq)

Thanks. He looks interesting.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 12:00 PM (H8QX8)

301 As for reading, I plan on finishing up Homage to Catalonia. I am considering Down and Out in Paris and London as the next Orwell to read.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:00 PM (U7k5w)

302 The FBI had all this evidence from Kahane's murderer, which included bomb making instructions. The evidence was seized in November 1990 but wasn't translated until 1993 after the towers were bombed.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:01 PM (Lqy/e)

303 The context is discussing coal fire power plants, and it's ok that the Chinese are building new coal power plants because they are moving them away from the city. Apparently Bloomers is unfamiliar with the concept of "Wind".
Posted by: Juan and his little mule at December 01, 2019 11:39 AM (jp0Bv)

Bloomberg really reveals himself as a clueless globalist dick in that interview. And he thinks people are going to prefer a man like him to Trump? Is he *that* delusional?

He really should run as a Democrat. In that party, he'd be the sane one.
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (zGtXn)


Is he clueless or is he a tool? They're not necessarily mutually exclusive, but I tend to think many politicians just mouth the words their owners tell them to mouth.

If that's what Bloomberg is doing, then it might be more useful to ask the question: Why would they have him out there doing that?

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 12:01 PM (hku12)

304 Good News! Bloomberg just said Xi Jinping is not a dictator. Next
question, "The idea that the Chinese government is responsive to a
Democratic expression.."



Bloomers: "Oh, come on, of course they are."




Just look at Hong Kong. What an idjit

Posted by: TheQuietMan at December 01, 2019 12:02 PM (MFe3R)

305 Bloomberg really reveals himself as a clueless globalist dick in that interview. And he thinks people are going to prefer a man like him to Trump? Is he *that* delusional?

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 11:58 AM (zGtXn)

It's going to be as sweet to see the blow to his demented ego as his squandered millions.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 12:02 PM (H8QX8)

306 Posted by: Chuck C at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (r6GXX)

Yes the rest of the story , which I had forgotten, does on a technical basis render justice. Still screwed up in my opinion on a gut level.

Posted by: Easy Andy at December 01, 2019 12:02 PM (2DOZq)

307 The FBI had all this evidence from Kahane's murderer, which included bomb making instructions. The evidence was seized in November 1990 but wasn't translated until 1993 after the towers were bombed.
Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:01 PM (Lqy/e)
-----
That Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. was fulla crap, man.

Posted by: Captain Obvious at December 01, 2019 12:03 PM (3Z6pZ)

308 I thought Bloomberg WAS planning to run as a Dem. He's actually going to challenge Trump in the primary? Guy's gonna get schlonged.

Posted by: Trimegistus at December 01, 2019 12:06 PM (NTel8)

309 In UK news, apparently Jeremy Corbyn wanted to make sure he drove his numbers down to rock bottom before the election in 2 weeks. There's an interview out this morning in which he's quoted as saying he doesn't think terrorists should necessarily serve the full sentences, after conviction. And this right after the terrorist attack on the bridge yesterday. (Corbyn is far more interested in sucking up to muslims than to the voters)

BoJo may win this election with the biggest majority since Margaret Thatcher.

Posted by: Tom Servo at December 01, 2019 12:07 PM (V2Yro)

310 309: I can't imagine he's not on some ME dictator's payroll

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:09 PM (U7k5w)

311 If you moved perception a bit, Bloomie could spend all his money running against PDJT. It wouldn't be any different than giving it to the DNC, but because he's a *candidate* he can spend all of his money that he wants which could clear a path and run interference for another candidate; Biden.

Posted by: Cheribebe at December 01, 2019 12:09 PM (a4qVe)

312 308 I thought Bloomberg WAS planning to run as a Dem. He's actually going to challenge Trump in the primary? Guy's gonna get schlonged.
Posted by: Trimegistus at December 01, 2019 12:06 PM (NTel

From what I understand he will run as a democrat.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 12:09 PM (H8QX8)

313 I thought Bloomberg WAS planning to run as a Dem. He's actually going to challenge Trump in the primary? Guy's gonna get schlonged.
Posted by: Trimegistus at December 01, 2019 12:06 PM


The previous commentator was incorrect. Bloomie is running as a D.
"Michael Bloomberg Joins 2020 Democratic Field for President" - NYT

Posted by: Chuck C at December 01, 2019 12:10 PM (r6GXX)

314 "bloomberg to challenge trump in primary...?"

thanksgiving leftovers:

turkey - turkey sandwiches

mashed potatoes - hash browns

michael bloomberg - toast

Posted by: mjc at December 01, 2019 12:11 PM (Pg+x7)

315 There is actually some hope ... but China must now fail, and they seem headed that direction. And Ukraine/Russia and the region need reform ... and the globalists must die ... just a few details to clean up ... then ... World Peace baby. heh
Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 11:56 AM (Cus5s)

Actually, Russia is in a period of Robber Baron Capitalism, with Putin playing the Part of President Grant.

They have a very small population, not enough to really exploit the natural resources they already have.

Problem is that WE are encroaching on their border, to help the EU expand.

How would we feel if the Russians suddenly put troops into Mexico to, oh, I don't know, fight terrorist Drug gangs and train the Mexican Police in KGB tactics (like when we send Spec Forces troops to train Georgia's army, and send FBI into various countries).

I contend we are picking a fight, with someone who is little threat to us, for internal political reasons.

Posted by: Don Q at December 01, 2019 12:11 PM (NgKpN)

316 It's going to be as sweet to see the blow to his demented ego as his squandered millions.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice


He and Tom Steyer can console each other. Cuddling may be involved.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 12:13 PM (T6t7i)

317 Been under the weather with a upper respiratory infection, so I turned to comfort reading.

I went to Christopher Anvil's Interstellar Patrol II, The Federation of Humanity for two of my favorite short stories: "Facts to Fit the Theory"; especially relevant to today, and "The Claw and the Clock". Christopher Anvil is such an insightful and funny writer; very droll.

Then I finished The Other by Matthew Hughes, set in his appealing far future universe. Not his best, but still worthy.

Next I read an alternate history short story by Harry Turtledove,"The Road Not Taken". Such fun fluff!

Finally, I am still reading The Deathworlders. This has (IMHO) plot holes the size of Jovian planets. But as a slice of Cambellian Space Opera, I can skim through the
bad parts to get to the good stuff.

Posted by: NaCly Dog at December 01, 2019 12:13 PM (u82oZ)

318 BoJo may win this election with the biggest majority since Margaret Thatcher.

Posted by: Tom Servo


I missed something along the way. Early in the fall or late summer, it was said that there would be no election, and that BoJo had no way to force one. What changed?

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (T6t7i)

319 I thought Bloomberg WAS planning to run as a Dem.
He's actually going to challenge Trump in the primary? Guy's gonna get
schlonged.

Posted by: Trimegistus at December 01, 2019 12:06 PM



The previous commentator was incorrect. Bloomie is running as a D.

"Michael Bloomberg Joins 2020 Democratic Field for President" - NYT

Posted by: Chuck C at December 01, 2019 12:10 PM (r6GXX)


And even in that field of losers he's polling at about 3-4%. Keep wasting...errr..spending that money Mike

Posted by: TheQuietMan at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (MFe3R)

320 He served as a Republican mayor. So now his cover is blown. It's lose-lose for him. Hardcore Leftists will not accept him, conservatives despise him.

Posted by: Dan Smoot's Apprentice at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (H8QX8)

321 "Thanks to moron author Hans Schantz for putting this deal together. He also writes:All the authors in the list are like-minded indie writers who share many of the same perspectives as the crowd here."

Appreciate the list - I've often wished for something like that. But even on a list curated for the morons, it seems that about 80% of the offerings feature strong woman protagonists, even though the readership for them probably still skews male. Not that there's anything wrong with a strong female protagonist, but it seems to be almost mandatory across the political spectrum now.

Posted by: Pompano at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (ijNLr)

322 304 Good News! Bloomberg just said Xi Jinping is not a dictator. Next
question, "The idea that the Chinese government is responsive to a
Democratic expression.."



Bloomers: "Oh, come on, of course they are."




Just look at Hong Kong. What an idjit

Posted by: TheQuietMan at December 01, 2019 12:02 PM (MFe3R)

And note, Bloombergs' other big issue?

Wants to disarm the American Populace.

You know, just like Hong Kong?

Posted by: Don Q at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (NgKpN)

323 Bloomberg thinks no D in the field can beat Trump

When this meets Bloomberg's massive ego and bankroll, he thinks it's his god given duty to stop the evil of Trump.

Until 2015 Bloomberg was the biggest billionaire in NYC

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 12:15 PM (C5DlE)

324 If that's what Bloomberg is doing, then it might be more useful to ask the question: Why would they have him out there doing that?
Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 12:01 PM (hku12)


That's always an appropriate question to ask, regardless of what Bloomberg is doing, or thinks he's doing. Questions like, who is pushing him out there, and why is the corrupt media cooperating in the pushing are also relevant.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 12:15 PM (zGtXn)

325 I think the advent of the ereader has made it a lot easier to give up on a book and move to the next one. When it was a physical book, you felt obligated to finish, or at least skim.

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:16 PM (AwPyG)

326 As a lifelong Republican...

Posted by: Little Mikey Woomberg at December 01, 2019 12:16 PM (EgshT)

327 Jeremy Corbyn's down to scaring the British underclass to the polls , by claiming that Boris and the Tories are going to take away the NHS.

Given that the NHS has already threatened to institute a social-credit score to remove medical care from #brexit supporters et al., that tactic likely won't fly among the indigenous English, who will correctly conclude they have nothing to lose there.

Posted by: boulder t'hobo at December 01, 2019 12:17 PM (ykYG2)

328 Still plowing through "The Spanish Civil War," by Stanley Payne (a Cambridge 'essential history')

Academic historians are almost by definition fry reading, in my experience. Payne's superb history cries out for photos & eyewitness accounts, imo.

The jumble of names & forgotten acronyms is difficult reading indeed.

A third of the book is the political run-up to the war, which was very unfamiliar to me. More so than the wartime events themselves.

Posted by: mnw at December 01, 2019 12:17 PM (Cssks)

329 I contend we are picking a fight, with someone who is little threat to us, for internal political reasons.

Posted by: Don Q


Thousand and thousands of nukes say otherwise. Not to mention their aggression in Crimea, Ukraine, pretty much anywhere they can make trouble. Regardless, we are not their big problem. China, Islam, and depopulation are. We're just a convenient foil to help them look bigger and more important than they are.

Posted by: pep at December 01, 2019 12:17 PM (T6t7i)

330 And the judge was Jewish so gave lots of leeway to the Defense.
Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 11:46 AM (Lqy/e)

What were the odds of getting a Jewish judge on the New York County Supreme Court at that time?

Posted by: 3rf \Fleet Radioman who didn't strip the padding from a message from CINCPAC to COM3FLT at December 01, 2019 12:18 PM (qyH+l)

331 The previous commentator was incorrect. Bloomie is running as a D.
"Michael Bloomberg Joins 2020 Democratic Field for President" - NYT
Posted by: Chuck C at December 01, 2019 12:10 PM (r6GXX)


My mistake. Let's see if he gets enough % to win a spot in the next debate.

I would love to see him p?ss away millions of his own money only to see his campaign fizzle out like one of Biden's brain cells.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at December 01, 2019 12:18 PM (zGtXn)

332 @324
I think its because the left is still under the delusion that Trump's approval stems from his being a wealthy outsider, and not a politician. So in their minds, Bloomberg=Trump

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:18 PM (AwPyG)

333 New thread.

Posted by: Cosda at December 01, 2019 12:18 PM (XCa2U)

334 Tom Servo and all:

BoJo's lead is shrinking like an ice cube on a hot barbie grill.

Posted by: mnw at December 01, 2019 12:21 PM (Cssks)

335 322
And note, Bloombergs' other big issue?

Wants to disarm the American Populace.

You know, just like Hong Kong?
Posted by: Don Q at December 01, 2019 12:14 PM (NgKpN)
______

Why don't we just offer a trade, New York for Hong Kong. Hell, sweeten the pot by throwing in LA or SF.

Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 12:21 PM (ZbwAu)

336 That's always an appropriate question to ask, regardless of what Bloomberg is doing, or thinks he's doing. Questions like, who is pushing him out there, and why is the corrupt media cooperating in the pushing are also relevant.
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Austere Religious Scholar at

The media and the CoC types misread Trump's popularity. They seem to think it's all the money and fame. Bloomberg has money, but he's largely an NYC phenomenon. The man has no charisma and makes no connection with middle America. he cannot help Biden, who looks increasingly like a dementia patient, so the only reason he might be out there is to clear a path for Hilary.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:21 PM (U7k5w)

337 Given that the NHS has already threatened to institute a social-credit score to remove medical care from #brexit supporters et al., that tactic likely won't fly among the indigenous English, who will correctly conclude they have nothing to lose there.
Posted by: boulder t'hobo at December 01, 2019 12:17 PM (ykYG2)

This is what the donks want to do, pull the healthcare plug on non supporters.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:25 PM (U7k5w)

338 Wrong. Bloomberg thinks he can step into Bidens lane when Biden drops out, and then get the nod as the only sane one in the race

Posted by: Ignoramus at December 01, 2019 12:25 PM (C5DlE)

339 The media and the CoC types misread Trump's popularity. They seem to think it's all the money and fame. Bloomberg has money, but he's largely an NYC phenomenon. The man has no charisma and makes no connection with middle America. he cannot help Biden, who looks increasingly like a dementia patient, so the only reason he might be out there is to clear a path for Hilary.
Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:21 PM (U7k5w)


Hillory is Norma Desmond.

It might be her wish to step in when the time is right, but the Democrat Party has moved on. The time for her closeup is gone.

Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 12:28 PM (hku12)

340 my theory is that all the candidates were purposely looking unelectable (case in point: everyone raised their hands for free illegals health care at the first debate)
This was coordinated so that the super delegates would come to the rescue at the convention, and vote for Hillary or Michelle as a return to sanity, much to the relief of the rank and file.
However, the poll numbers for both those ladies must be horrific, so Bloomberg has been hastily asserted.

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:30 PM (AwPyG)

341 @339 two minds with the same thought!

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:31 PM (AwPyG)

342 The FBI had all this evidence from Kahane's murderer, which included bomb making instructions. The evidence was seized in November 1990 but wasn't translated until 1993 after the towers were bombed.
Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:01 PM (Lqy/e)


It took them two years to translate the ravings of what was obviously a Muslim terrorist? They didn't have anyone to hand who could quickly skim the documents in Arabic and ascertain whether they were bomb-making instructions or recipes for couscous?

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at December 01, 2019 12:31 PM (ltmZG)

343 "Actually, Russia is in a period of Robber Baron Capitalism, with Putin playing the Part of President Grant.
.... I contend we are picking a fight, with someone who is little threat to us, for internal political reasons." Posted by: Don Q

Hard to have a comprehensive view ... there are DeepState efforts on behalf of ? CIA power mad globalists? Then there are the WallStreet globalists ... there were bargains to be had when Soviet Union fell, and big money went in, the IMF funneled in billions, (confiscated by corrupt oligarchs, c'est la vie) .. then Putin imo plays hard ball and confiscated wealth from oligarch types that actually "invested". Gorbachev was maybe easier to deal with, idk.


Yeah, pushing Ukraine toward NATO and requiring the US to keep being the Free Defense Cop for Europe probably made many traders wealthy, as the US kept underwriting big gambles, and the EU expanded, but at the same time Obama gave socks to Ukraine, not weapons, even when Russia took down an airliner. But Merkel and Israel make deals with Russia (energy), and it is DeepState that makes sure Trump doesn't even talk with Putin.

Trump is changing much of balance of power, and the globalists to some degree may acquiesce as organs are harvested from political prisoners in China ... Bannon and others are working toward decoupling from China ... DeepState must Die.

Posted by: illiniwek at December 01, 2019 12:32 PM (Cus5s)

344 Explain the appeal of Grass.


His language is amazing, recursive, playful, run-on, obscure, and fun.

...
Posted by: Bandersnatch at December 01, 2019 11:11 AM (gd9RK)
________

If I want language like that, I don't go with modernists. Tristram Shandy is the way to go.
Posted by: Eeyore at December 01, 2019 11:25 AM (ZbwAu)


I've read "The Tin Drum", which I liked. "The Flounder" which I didn't. And "Cat and Mouse", which I have no memory of, so I'm assuming that I wasn't impressed.

But...it was all in translation. So, maybe the translation was a fail, I remember the prose as a bit flat. Not as Bander described.

"Tristam Shandy" is an amazing book. Give it a whirl if you like books what are playful, etc, etc.

If you want a modern version of the playful, etc picaresque novel, may I humbly recommend my novel, "Wearing the Cat".

Posted by: naturalfake at December 01, 2019 12:35 PM (kauXV)

345 Hillory is Norma Desmond.

It might be her wish to step in when the time is right, but the Democrat Party has moved on. The time for her closeup is gone.
Posted by: BurtTC at December 01, 2019 12:28 PM (hku12)

She's far craftier than Norma could have ever been, and if you see a hit on Warren in the near future, it will probably come from the Hillary camp. I suspect it was Hillary who torpedoed Biden, and pushed Hunter into the spotlight. The woman is completely devoid of any ability to stop her pursuit of this. Bloomberg wants a dem and he wants a Clinton-like dem, he knows he cannot win. Butt will get it before Bloomberg.

Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:36 PM (U7k5w)

346 my theory is that all the candidates were purposely looking unelectable (case in point: everyone raised their hands for free illegals health care at the first debate)
This was coordinated so that the super delegates would come to the rescue at the convention, and vote for Hillary or Michelle as a return to sanity, much to the relief of the rank and file.
However, the poll numbers for both those ladies must be horrific, so Bloomberg has been hastily asserted.
Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:30 PM (AwPyG)/i]

Too complicated, IMO, and hence flunks Occam's Razor. I think that the Seven Dwarfs raised their hands because they knew that if they didn't go hard left, they'd have no chance with committed Dem primary voters, who are themselves disproportionately hard left.

The wild card here is the California primary. Getting the nomination without winning that (now early) primary is going to be a tough row to hoe.

As previously indicated, my guess is that if the Dems can't rehabilitate Biden (and/or he blue screens again in public), the super delegates will plump for Hillarhoid. Fauxcahontas is already faltering; she's Hillarhoid 2.0, equally unpleasant, if possible perhaps even a bit more so, and with a thinner resume.

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at December 01, 2019 12:38 PM (ltmZG)

347 @342,

The book says they were busy working on documents from Saddam Hussein. My guess is they were told it wasn't urgent to look into it.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:38 PM (Lqy/e)

348 She's far craftier than Norma could have ever been, and if you see a hit on Warren in the near future, it will probably come from the Hillary camp. I suspect it was Hillary who torpedoed Biden, and pushed Hunter into the spotlight. The woman is completely devoid of any ability to stop her pursuit of this.
Posted by: CN at December 01, 2019 12:36 PM (U7k5w)


This. The Presidency is her White Whale. Perhaps I should say her White Male Whale.

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at December 01, 2019 12:40 PM (ltmZG)

349 The book says they were busy working on documents from Saddam Hussein. My guess is they were told it wasn't urgent to look into it.
Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:38 PM (Lqy/e)


It's a thin excuse, but that's about it, and not a very convincing one. I'd have someone skim the new documents for the word "bomb" or "attack" or some such, because d(information)/dt is potentially greater with that approach than in slogging through all of Saddam Hussein's crap. He was a known quantity; we KNEW he was a problem. Do we have another one, closer to home?

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at December 01, 2019 12:43 PM (ltmZG)

350 @348
But she has no power, has lost twice and is old and decrepit. If it was just "Hillary is obsessed," she woulnd't wield as much power as she does. The powers that be are backing her

Posted by: artemis at December 01, 2019 12:44 PM (AwPyG)

351 They had this guy under surveillance back in 1989, complete with photos of him at shooting ranges. They didn't give any of that info to the prosecutor. The FBI informant urged them to look into his supporters and connections. The FBI just transcribed the informant's conversation with the assassin in prison and filed it away.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 12:51 PM (Lqy/e)

352 >>>[237] All weather is local. Does the Moon affect our weather? Well, the Sun is even further away! Heck, it's not even there half the time. Posted by: t-bird at December 01, 2019 11:27 AM (cfSLd)

Several researchers have calculated that Earth is actually moving further away from the Sun at the rate of 13cm per year. Some also say that all the planets are moving outward. There's a 2019 article in NewScientist (by Kelly Beatty) and and an earlier one in Forbes (by Ethan Siegel).

Posted by: Kathy at December 01, 2019 12:53 PM (q7uEm)

353 Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats are going to the COP25 climate change conference in Madrid.

She plans to "reaffirm the commitment of the American people to combating the climate crisis".

Trump ought to "punk" her by having the FBI on hand when she returns to arrest her on suspicion of violating the Logan Act.

What goes around, comes around.
Posted by: MachiasPrivateer at December 01, 2019 10:16 AM (EMi53)



She will absolutely violate customs by not declaring something.

Smuggling bribes, payola, quid and pro quo. Why else would she not declare her lucher.

Posted by: Burnt Toast at December 01, 2019 12:56 PM (1g7ch)

354 Came across The Rising Sun vol 1 @ a thrift store; thought I knew a fair amount about WWII in the Pacific but this book was a revaluation; ordered the set on Amazon; will pass on to my grandson.

Posted by: Max at December 01, 2019 12:58 PM (oONvT)

355 Do you finish the book? Or cut your losses?
Posted by: Ladyl at December 01, 2019 10:04 AM (TdMsT)

I cut my losses these days

Posted by: vmom's in the kitchen at December 01, 2019 01:01 PM (G546f)

356 Posted by: Cannibal Bob at December 01, 2019 10:45 AM

Just keep going, you'll find it worth getting through

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 01:04 PM (ZCEU2)

357 Looked for Two Seconds Under the World on Amazon, either they are hiding it, have no idea it ever existed or its out of their scope.

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 01:13 PM (ZCEU2)

358 Came up on Amazon just searching on Google.

Posted by: Skip at December 01, 2019 01:18 PM (ZCEU2)

359 Started reading the DC Smith detective series by Peter Grainger, based on a recommendation here and the fact that I could get it on Kindle Unlimited. Halfway through and I'm thinking, "Why don't they make a tv series out of this guy? I would totally watch it." Very straightforward (so far) procedural. And I like the protagonist.

Then I started and finished a little throwaway Regency romance, because there has been a lot of stress 'round these parts and it doesn't seem like that is abating. When that happens, it is regency romance time - because they let you put your head on pause for just a bit and go with your heart. Yeah, not literature but a nice enough evening of will she/won't she/will he/won't he, when, of course, the answer is ALWAYS yes of course they will. This one was A Governess for the Brooding Duke by Bridget Barton. It's not a top shelf Regency, but enjoyable enough. And sometimes that's all you need.

Posted by: SummaMamaT at December 01, 2019 01:24 PM (84ClH)

360 This one was A Governess for the Brooding Duke by Bridget Barton.
---
That one was advertised on my Kindle. Good, then?

Posted by: Cardinal Eris (weapons: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, fanatical devotion to the Pope) at December 01, 2019 01:36 PM (Dc2NZ)

361 Authors are Jim Dwyer, David Kocieniewski, Deidre Murphy and Peg Tyre. I got it from Amazon, paperback.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at December 01, 2019 01:44 PM (Lqy/e)

362 130- a good friend of mine is so convinced of the global warming threat she'll give me the hairy eyeball if I use TWO plastic straws.

She just bought a new car yesterday.
An SUV.
Posted by: vivi at December 01, 2019 10:50 AM (11H2y)

Make sure to use 4 straws the next time you see her.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at December 01, 2019 02:38 PM (/sgva)

363 Another short note on DC Smith; when I first read the series there were 7 books. I enjoyed them so much that I read them again. And then I did it again.

Posted by: Sigfried at December 01, 2019 02:41 PM (WEXo0)

364 Several researchers have calculated that Earth is actually moving further away from the Sun at the rate of 13cm per year. Some also say that all the planets are moving outward. There's a 2019 article in NewScientist (by Kelly Beatty) and and an earlier one in Forbes (by Ethan Siegel).
Posted by: Kathy at December 01, 2019 12:53 PM (q7uEm)

Given that the Sun's energy comes from converting a tiny fraction of its mass into energy, it will slowly lose mass. There may be slight gains in mass from debris like asteroids and comets falling into the Sun, so the net change of mass is not really knowable as yet, but assuming the losses from fusion exceed the gains, as the Sun's mass decreases, orbits of all planets will become larger.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at December 01, 2019 03:06 PM (/sgva)

365 I bailed on three books this week:

Magic Mountain: unlimited detail doesn't make an early 20th century tuberculosis retreat more interesting (but I might give it another try)

Iron Legion: like mil scifi, but bad and written without regard to any military realities.

Pandora's Star: Probably a good door stop, 1000 pages and almost as many characters and meaningless digressions.

But then I read Fenton Wood's new novella City of Illusions, and the week was saved.

Posted by: .87c at December 01, 2019 03:17 PM (2l9hf)

366 Nice library, MPPPP!

I like the comic strip compilations. IDW, isn't it? That outfit puts out "Steve Canyon" collections. I have all of those, but I'm two volumes behind in reading them.

"Nancy." Mmmm, Fritzi Ritz was hot.

And "Pogo"! Had been more aware of current events then, I would have enjoyed that strip more thoroughly. I was in early grade school.

Wish to hell that IDW would collect "Our Boarding House." Maj. Hoople is one of my all-time favorites.

Finished a Perry Mason binge with "TCOT Waylaid Wolf." This one actually had a courtroom confession. The TV show may have influenced Gardner.

Still debating what to start next. Keep going with mysteries, or pick out a history book? Maybe dive into those Canyon volumes? Decisions, decisions.

Posted by: Weak Geek at December 01, 2019 03:40 PM (GomLh)

367 Armand de Caulaincourt was Napoleon's "Master of Horse" and aide-de-camp. Cailaincourt wrote a memoir of the Russian campaign of 1812 (which he had warned Napoleon against). After the army was decimated, Napoleon abandoned what was left of it and returned to Paris on a sledge with Caulaincourt as his companion. Caulaincourt could hardly believe it--he was alone with Napoleon for days, listening to him talk about everything. There was even a moment when they started cracking up laughing and couldn't stop. He told Napoleon all the things he was doing wrong. Napoleon pinched his ear which was his way of saying, "You're being naughty." This memoir is on archive.org : Memoirs of General de Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza (1812-1813), edited by Jean Hanoteau. Translated by Hamish Miles, 1955.

Posted by: microcosme at December 01, 2019 03:57 PM (B+xWY)

368 I heard read about people who were ether shaving o applying makeup while driving and as everyone knows you must keep both hands on the wheel

Posted by: Tamaa the Drongo Bird at December 01, 2019 04:56 PM (FLiOE)

369 Late to the party (as usual), but my bloody phone refused to post a previous comment. So...here goes again.

My Black Friday purchases were these:

1. The 2020 World Almanac and Book of Facts. This is a continuation of a tradition that began in January 1985. As a fourth grader, we got the Scholastic Book Orders (remember those?) and my parents set a strict limit of 3 for me. But...they knew that I was going to partake. I was a huge reader then as now. So my middle sister went over my book order form for some odd reason and asked "Why didn't you order the almanac?" I thought she was full of crap as usual but I looked into what one was and decided it was a must-have. At the last second I adjusted the order to get the almanac. Sure enough, some time later I was one of only two students to get the 1985 World Almanac and Book of Facts. Every year since, I have either bought one or had one gifted to me for Christmas by somebody. The only two exceptions were the two years where I bought the Information Please almanacs at school book fairs. So yes, this would mean 36 almanacs, and yes, I have kept them all. (I suspect that somewhere, my fourth grade teacher would be proud.)

2. I have been looking for it forever, and I have found it: the third volume of the Margaret Thatcher bio by Charles Moore. It's the longest of the three, IIRC. If you haven't read any of the volumes, DO IT. As a historian, I note the two biggest keys: Lady Thatcher hired Mr. Moore to write the bio under two conditions: 1) she would never read a single word of the draft and 2) it was not to see the light of day until she died. (Indeed, about a month after she died I was alerted to the bio via The Economist and I promptly ordered Volume 1. It practically went to press straightaway after she passed.) This means that many of the key players of the era were/are still alive to talk to, and they could talk freely without concern of anything getting back to her as she would not read the draft. I suspect that this will be the gold standard for biographies on Thatcher for some decades to come. Deservedly so; it is well written, exhaustively researched, and IMHO, objective.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at December 01, 2019 05:51 PM (dJGLL)

370 208 I'm one who doesn't like to waste time reading books I'm not enjoying.
What I do with a lot of books is read it slowly. I read a few chapters and then put it away for a few days.
I'm doing that with Cryptonimicon by Neal Stephenson.
I like well enough but it hasn't set my imagination on fire yet.
Posted by: Northernlurker at December 01, 2019 11:06 AM (eq+5M)

This is an infuriating read. With editing, it could have been SO much better.

Posted by: Catch Thirty-Thr33 at December 01, 2019 05:53 PM (dJGLL)

371 Several researchers have calculated that Earth is actually moving further away from the Sun at the rate of 13cm per year. Some also say that all the planets are moving outward.

Makes sense especially for the inner planets. The sun loses mass in the form of energy and also directly via the solar wind - which always blows outward, at us. And this process is intensifying. Meanwhile Jupiter, which doesn't do fusion, is not losing mass at this rate.

Posted by: boulder t'hobo at December 01, 2019 07:26 PM (ykYG2)

372 Robert's Bookstore in Lincoln City. Who is up for that?

I love Robert's although he has apparently had to sell off a lot of his beautiful original pulp art done for covers and its less of an art gallery these days

Posted by: Christopher R Taylor at December 01, 2019 07:58 PM (KZzsI)

373 I finally bought and read one of your recommendations: Vertical Run by Joseph R. Garber. It was an entertaining read but also dated, and I don't mean the culture references that no longer apply since the book was written in the 1990's. It's not the author's fault, but since I only read it now the plot isn't new. There have been variations of the story and action in movies over the years everything was familiar. When finally told why our hero was being chased it was underwhelming. I can't say what could have been the reason to make me go Oh Wow! Cool!, but it reads formulaic because it's already been done many times over by the time I read the book.

Posted by: hadsil at December 01, 2019 11:17 PM (Wdt2K)

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