Slowly

Perfection is attained by slow degrees;
it requires the hand of time.

~ Voltaire ~





Illustration courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Abracadabra!

Words to me were magic. You could say a word and it could conjure up all kinds of images or feelings or a chilly sensation or whatever. It was amazing to me that words had this power.

~ Amy Tan ~

The Life of the Party!

The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you.

~ Frederick Buechner ~

Illustration courtesy openclipart.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Every life should have nine cats.

~ Author unknown ~
Illustration by Louis Wain courtesy Library of Congress.

Laws and Freedom

Laws do not constrain freedom; they enable it. Look at civil rights. Without laws none of us are free.

~ Margot Livesey ~

Poetry Friday

The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.

~ Walt Whitman ~

Merry Christmas!

Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;

~ Sara Teasdale from "Barter" ~

"Christmas Morning" by Henry Mosler, courtesy The Athenaeum.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Walking on water? Ninja magnificence!

We Are the Frayers

If we think we have ours and don't owe any time or money or effort to help those left behind, then we are a part of the problem rather than the solution to the fraying social fabric that threatens all Americans.

~ Marian Wright Edelman ~

Poetry Friday

Oh who can tell the range of joy
Or set the bounds of beauty?

~ Sara Teasdale from "A Winter Bluejay" ~

Photo by Joseph Baranowski.

One and the Same

In the Hebrew, Chanukah is pronounced with the letter chet. The chet’s "ch" sound is not enunciated like the "ch" in child; rather it’s a guttural, throaty sound—like the "ch" in Johann Bach—which does not have an English equivalent. The letter "H" is the closest, but it’s not really it. So while some people spell and pronounce it "Chanukah" and others settle for "Hanukkah," they really are one and the same.

~ Chabad.org ~
Photo of dreidels courtesy Wikimedia.

A Book

A book should serve as the ax for the frozen sea within us.

~ Franz Kafka ~

A Mouse!

I only hope that we don't lose sight of one thing--that it was all started by a mouse.

~ Walt Disney ~
Image courtesy Wikipedia.

Building Block

Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe.

~ Frank Zappa ~

Illustration courtesy NASA.

The Theatre

The theatre is traditionally where people go to hear the truth.

~ David Mamet ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Infographic by Gemma Busquets.

There's No Getting Around the Work

Every artist was first an amateur.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

Poetry Friday

Sometimes the best poems come after bad starts.

~ Douglas Florian ~
Illustration courtesy openclipart.

Ugly Sweaters

"Hello, Lobster!"

The boy in the crimson sweater raised a pair of blue eyes to the speaker's face and a little frown crept into the sun-burned forehead; but there was no answer.

~ Ralph Henry Barbour from The Crimson Sweater. ~

I'm Glad Someone Likes It

Winter is good--his Hoar Delights

~ Emily Dickinson ~









Photo by quas.

And It's Sometimes Quite Scrumptious!

Life is like an ice-cream cone, you have to lick it one day at a time.

~ Charles M. Schulz ~
Photo by LabyrinthX.

Books!

Books are funny little portable pieces of thought.

~ Susan Sontag ~




Illustration courtesy openclipart.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

I'm sorry, but I don't know who created this; I found it unattributed on Facebook.

How Lovely...

If I had a flower for every time I thought of you, I would walk in my garden forever.

~ Alfred Lord Tennyson ~
"In the Flower Garden" by Robert Lewis Reid, courtesy The Athenaeum.

Poetry Friday

And yet, in a culture like ours, which is given to material comforts, and addicted to forms of entertainment that offer immediate gratification, it is surprising that so much poetry is written.

~ Mark Strand ~

War

War remains the decisive human failure.

~ John Kenneth Galbraith ~

Agreed!

Books! I dunno if I ever told you this, but books are the greatest gift one person can give another.

~ Bono ~

Bears

Bears are very nice, as long as you are nice to them.

~ Karl Lagerfeld ~

Farming

The more exposure people have to the realities of factory farming, the more we will see people rejecting it. It's already happening.

~ Jonathan Safran Foer ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

When I am feeling
low
all I have to do is
watch my cats
and my
courage
returns.

~ Charles Bukowski ~
Photo by Appaloosa.

OMG!

I missed yesterday's kwote and I almost missed today's! What is wrong with me? --KK

A book is a garden, an orchard, a storehouse, a party, a company by the way, a counselor, a multitude of counselors.

~ Charles Baudelaire ~
"Portait de Baudelaire" by Gustave Courbet courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Postcard courtesy Dave.

If Only All Movies Were Good Movies!

No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough.

~ Roger Ebert ~

In Light of Last Night's News

R.I.P. Mike Nichols

Directing is mystifying. It's a long, long, skid on an icy road, and you do the best you can trying to stay on the road...If you're still here when you come out of the spin, it's a relief. But you've got to have the terror if you're going to do anything worthwhile.

~ Mike Nichols ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Little cat, are you as glad to have me to lie upon
As I am to feel your fur under my hand?

~ Amy Lowell from "After an Illness" ~

Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Reading!

We used to have contests at the elementary school--who could read the most books in a week or a month. I’d power through 30, 50 books. I was unstoppable. Just loved the feel and the smell of the pages. Loved immersing my brain into uncharted territories. Loved turning that last page and closing the book, a changed man. Still do.

~ Neil Patrick Harris ~


Photo by mikefats.

Poetry Friday

There is no "must" in art, because art is free.

~ Wassily Kandinsky ~
Kandinsky painting, 1911, courtesy Wikipedia.

Sweet Comfort

There's no denying that candy is comfort food and it's affordable.

~ Dylan Lauren ~

Morehouse's Comet

In Morehouse's comet of 1908 tails were repeatedly formed and discarded to drift bodily out into space and float away.

~ From "The Vagaries of a Comet's Tail," Indianapolis Star, May 20, 1910 ~
Stereocard courtesy Museum of Photographic Arts.

Comet!

Like a blazing comet, I've traversed infinite nights, interstellar spaces of the imagination, voluptuousness and fear.

~ Antonio Tabucchi ~
Illustration courtesy The Public Domain Review.

Wars

I hate those men who would send into war youth to fight and die for them; the pride and cowardice of those old men, making their wars that boys must die.

~ Mary Roberts Rinehart ~
Photo by Phil Guest.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Last week I posted a really creepy animated cat video about Schrödinger's Cat. This one is a reasoned explanation of the Schrödinger's Cat "thought experiment," and much more palatable!

Whatever...

Whatever you are, be a good one.

~ Abraham Lincoln ~





Matthew Brady photograph courtesy Wikimedia.

Poetry Friday

The poet enjoys the incomparable privilege of being able to be himself and others, as he wishes.

~ Charles Baudelaire ~
Illustration courtesy openclipart.

Kindness

There are two ways to think about kindness. You can think about it as a fixed trait: either you have it or you don’t. Or you could think of kindness as a muscle. In some people, that muscle is naturally stronger than in others, but it can grow stronger in everyone with exercise.

~ Emily Esfahani Smith ~

A Perfect Gift

If I were given the opportunity to present a gift to the next generation, it would be the ability for each individual to learn to laugh at himself.

~ Charles M. Schulz ~

Veterans Day Thought

All wars are civil wars, because all men are brothers.

~ Francois Fenelon ~

Light As a Medium

To be a painter, one must work with rays of light.

~ Edvard Munch ~
Photo from Munch Museum (Oslo) website.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Sorry, no quote, just an animated cat VIDEO! (And a pretty creepy one at that!)

No Excuses Accepted

There is no excuse for a culture of hate.

~ Neil Gaiman ~

Poetry Friday

Usually a poem takes shape acoustically--a line or a pair of lines will repeat itself in my ear.

~ Thomas Lynch ~

He's Got It!

I don't remember deciding to become a writer. You decide to become a dentist or a postman. For me, writing is like being gay. You finally admit that this is who you are, you come out and hope that no one runs away.

~ Mark Haddon ~

I Believe He's Right!

A man paints with his brains and not with his hands.

~ Michelangelo ~
"The Conversion of Saul" courtesy The Athenaeum. Click on the image to enlarge. (Look at the man below the horse at the bottom of the picture--doesn't it look like he's carrying some kindergartener's backpack? Michelangelo was 500 years ahead of his time! --KK)

Marvel-ous!

Fantasy, abandoned by reason, produces impossible monsters; united with it, she is the mother of the arts and the origin of marvels.

~ Francisco Goya ~




Goya self-portrait (1795) courtesy Wikiart.

The Only One!

[This should be tacked up in every home! --KK]

Vote Tomorrow!

A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to its true principles.

~ Thomas Jefferson ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Then the cat-shadow darted at her,
through her legs, and slipped outside.
It mingled with the shadows of bare branches,
and leapt at the shadow of a bird.

~ John Philip Johnson from "Bones and Shadows" ~

Photo by Gordon.

Halloween's Over--Vote Smart on Tuesday!

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

~ H. L. Mencken ~

Poetry Friday

But at last in the thousand elegies
The dead rise in our hearts,
On the brink of our happiness we stop
Like someone on a drunk starting to weep.

~ Galway Kinnell from "Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock" ~

Print courtesy NYPL Digital Gallery.

Almost Gone...

There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant an effect on the feelings, as now in October.

~ Nathaniel Hawthorne ~
Photo by sachman75.

How Odd

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

~ Oscar Wilde ~

Hauntings

What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.

~ Mary Shelley ~







Portrait by Reginald Easton, courtesy Wikipedia.

The Rule Regarding Hot Beverages

Sunday's Kat Kwote

"A dainty look..." If you practice, you should be all set by Friday! --KK

Cold Calculation

It seems that those spreading panic about Ebola, ISIS and the southern border hope that their new rhetoric will reinvigorate an old tactic: racial dog whistling. It has never been bigotry amid politicians that drives this, so much as the cold calculation that stimulating racial panic can win votes.

~ Ian Haney López ~
[This should be horrifying to all voters, especially here in NH where we have a candidate for Senator who is only running by way of cold calculation. (Can't win in MA, so I'll run in that hick state to the north.) He is now using the old dog whistle, "...we have a border that’s so porous that anyone can walk across it. I think it’s naive to think that people aren’t going to be walking through here who have those types of diseases and/or other types of intent, criminal or terrorist." Save us from the cold, calculating, maniacs who run for office to satisfy their greed and need for power! --KK]

Poetry Friday

We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.

~ Ernest Hemingway ~








Photo courtesy Ernest Hemingway Photographs Collection. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston.