Happy Halloween!

From ghoulies and ghosties
And long-leggedy beasties
And things that go bump in the night,
Good Lord, deliver us!

~ Traditional Scottish prayer ~

Isn't It Better to Learn to Work Together?

Men think they think upon the great political questions, and they do; but they think with their party, not independently; they read its literature, but not that of the other side.

~ Mark Twain ~

Oooh...Scary

We go by the major vote, and if the majority are insane, the sane must go to the hospital.

~ Horace Mann ~

I Think Writers All Agree

Talking is a hydrant in the yard and writing is a faucet upstairs in the house. Opening the first takes the pressure off the second.

~ Robert Frost ~

You Still Can Make Egg Salad Out of a 20-Minute Egg

Photo by fille_de_photo
I have met a lot of hardboiled eggs in my time, but you're twenty minutes.

~ Oscar Wilde ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

With the qualities of cleanliness, affection, patience, dignity, and courage that cats have, how many of us, I ask you, would be capable of becoming cats?

~ Fernand Mery ~

Not Just Weakness, But Laziness

To swallow and follow, whether old doctrine or new propaganda, is a weakness still dominating the human mind.

~ Charlotte Perkins Gilman ~

Poetry Friday

If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry.

~ Emily Dickinson ~

Poor Dollies

Do dolls invite abuse, with their dent-able heads,
those tight little painted-on or stitched-in grins?
Hurt me, big botched being, they whine in a dialect
only puritans and the frequently punished can hear.

~ Amy Gerstler from "Touring the Doll Hospital" ~

Read the complete poem here.

I Think I Disagree...

A movie is not a book. If the source material is a book, you cannot be too respectful of the book. All you owe to the book is the spirit.

~ Graham Greene ~

Oooh...Sounds Dangerous

Hungry man, reach for the book: it is a weapon.

~ Bertolt Brecht ~

Well-Dressed

I have heard with admiring submission the experience of the lady who declared that the sense of being perfectly well-dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquility which religion is powerless to bestow.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

When you're special to a cat, you're special indeed...she brings to you the gift of her preference of you, the sight of you, the sound of your voice, the touch of your hand.

~ Lester B. Pearson ~

Change Is Gonna Come

There've been times that I've thought I couldn't last for long,
But, now I think I'm able to carry on.
It's been a long time coming.
But, I know, a change is gonna come.

~ Sam Cooke ~

I Never Knew...

My mother used to have little words of wisdom for each and every situation. I just assumed they were all folk sayings or momisms. I heard many times, "Tell the truth and shame the devil." Until today, I never knew it came from Shakespeare!

O! while you live, tell the truth,
And shame the devil!

Sadly True

American youth attributes much more importance to arriving at driver's license age than at voting age.

~ Marshall McLuhan ~

No Longer Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs?

More often than not, I've found, a rut is a consequence of sticking to tried and tested methods that don't take into account how you or the world has changed. It's like your mother serving you the same breakfast you loved as a child. You push the meal away half-eaten and she says, "But you always loved Cocoa Puffs and pork sausage." That was then, this is now.

Age

The old believe everything; the middle aged suspect everything; the young know everything.

~ Oscar Wilde ~

Columbus Day

I also hate those holidays that fall on a Monday where you don't get mail, those fake holidays like Columbus Day. What did Christopher Columbus do, discover America? If he hadn't, somebody else would have and we'd still be here. Big deal.

~ John Waters ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Photo by Tara Severns

Come I will teach you to dance as naturally
as falling asleep and waking and stretching long, long.

~ Marge Piercy from "The Cat's Song" ~

Human Kindness

I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in the kindness of human beings. I am so absorbed in the wonder of earth and the life upon it that I cannot think of heaven and angels.

~ Pearl S. Buck ~

Poetry Friday

One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture and, if possible, speak a few reasonable words.

~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ~

Yes!

Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future.

~ Ray Bradbury ~

On the Eve of Destruction?

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

~ Abraham Lincoln ~

Look Outside Today

Nature gives to every time and season some beauties of its own; and from morning to night, as from the cradle to the grave, it is but a succession of changes so gentle and easy that we can scarcely mark their progress.

~ Charles Dickens ~

Have You Taken a Child to a Museum Lately?

The Smithsonian long ago.

Most convicted felons are just people who were not taken to museums or Broadway musicals as children.

~ Libby Gelman-Waxner ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

In memory of Bitz.

Big droplet tears are shed for yesterday, but are dried in time for tomorrow, until all that remain are foggy, broken memories of a happy yesteryear.

~ Daniela Gallo ~

Keep Smiling

In the time of your life, live--so that in that wondrous time you shall not add to the misery and sorrow of the world, but shall smile to the infinite variety and mystery of it.

~ William Saroyan ~

Poetry Friday

People wish to be poets more than they wish to write poetry, and that's a mistake. One should wish to celebrate more than one wishes to be celebrated.

~ Lucille Clifton ~

October is Archaeology Month

Archaeology is the peeping Tom of the sciences. It is the sandbox of men who care not where they are going; they merely want to know where everyone else has been.

~ Jim Bishop ~

The Elephant

Nature's great masterpiece, an elephant--the only harmless great thing.

~ John Donne ~

A True Visionary

Waste is worse than loss. The time is coming when every person who lays claim to ability will keep the question of waste before him constantly. The scope of thrift is limitless.

~ Thomas A. Edison ~

What's Not to Like About Beans?

Photo by DawnsRecipes

Better beans and bacon in peace
than cakes and ale in fear.
~ Aesop ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Just as the would-be debutante will fret and fuss over every detail till all is perfect, so will the fastidious feline patiently toil until every whiskertip is in place.

~ Lynne Caiafa ~

Books

Some books leave us free and some books make us free.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

Debate Tonight!

Politics calls for robust debate and criticism, but this should never descend to personal and demeaning slurs.

~ Kim Beazley ~

What Does He Call the Time Between?

You only live twice. Once when you are born and once when you look death in the face.

~ Ian Fleming ~

Time

Time! Joyless emblem of the greed of millions, robber of the best which earth can give.

~ Amy Lowell ~

Oh, New Hampshire

She has a touch of gold. New Hampshire gold—
You may have heard of it. I had a farm
Offered me not long since up Berlin way
With a mine on it that was worked for gold;
But not gold in commercial quantities,
Just enough gold to make the engagement rings
And marriage rings of those who owned the farm.
What gold more innocent could one have asked for?

~ Robert Frost from the poem "New Hampshire" ~

Happy Birthday!

Birthdays are nature's way of telling us to eat more cake.

~ Anonymous ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance--a sharp, vindictive glance.

~ James Thurber ~

2008 Election Season

There are two sides to every issue, and a politician usually takes both.

~ Anonymous ~

Poetry Friday

Perhaps no person can be a poet, or can even enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind.

~ Thomas Macaulay ~

Funny How That Works...

We climb to heaven most often on the ruins of our cherished plans, finding our failures were successes.

~ Amos Bronson Alcott ~

Photographs

It is one thing to photograph people. It is another to make others care about them by revealing the core of their humanness.

~ Paul Strand ~

Obviously Venus Improved With a Little Color!

Adding sound to movies would be like putting lipstick on the Venus de Milo.

~ Mary Pickford ~

Ignorance

Ignorance is the night of the mind, a night without moon or star.

~ Confucius ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Women are just like cats--they always land on their feet.
~ Iranian proverb ~

A Nation of Inventors

We are called the nation of inventors. And we are. We could still claim that title and wear its loftiest honors if we had stopped with the first thing we invented, which was human liberty.

~ Mark Twain ~

Poetry Friday--Oh, So True

There's no money in poetry, but then there's no poetry in money, either.

~ Robert Graves ~

Never Be Without a Home

Reading makes immigrants of us all. It takes us away from home, but more important, it finds homes for us everywhere.

~ Jean Rhys ~

Book Titles

Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.

~ Andre Maurois ~

Talk about International Cooperation!

In Northern Lapland, four towns share a mobile library bus, which also carries children's books. What makes this bus special is that the service is shared by communities in three countries: Finland, Sweden, and Norway.

~ Margriet Ruurs from My Librarian is a Camel: How Books are Brought to Children Around the World ~

Here's a Norwegian mobile library bus that is shared by several communities:

In Norwegian, a mobile library bus is called a Bibliotekbussen.

I Suppose...

You know honestly I think there's a Dracula, a Wolf Man, and a Frankenstein's Monster in all of us. They are sides of our own character so that's why I think we can relate to them in terms of a "I know how that feels" kind of thing.

~ Richard Roxburgh ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

In the eyes of the mouse the cat is a lion.

~ Albanian proverb ~

Exactly!

The Web's only as good as our ability to ask questions of it. The ability to access information means nothing if you don't have an educated framework of knowledge to fit it into.

~ Susan Jacoby ~

Poetry Friday

Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.

~ Aristotle ~

My Sentiments, Exactly!

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.

~ Jimi Hendrix ~

Do McCain and Obama Dance?

All the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill the history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill at dancing.

~ Moliere ~

Let's Not Forget

Our liberty cannot be guarded but by the freedom of the press.

~ Thomas Jefferson ~

Remember the Laborers

A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.

~ Albert Einstein ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

It's not the fleas of the dog that make the cat meow.

~ Chinese proverb ~


It's that the dog steals the cat's food!

Why?

Simply put, people don't always vote for the candidate or the policy that serves their own best interests. That concept should be no more surprising in politics than in other parts of people's lives. If individuals always did what was best for them, they would consistently choose broccoli over cake; they would enter into relationships with the good guy (or gal) instead of the charming jerk who never calls; they would stick to purchasing necessities and use credit cards as a last resort -- only when there's not enough money at the end of the month to pay for groceries or utility bills.

~ Heather Gehlert ~

What Does It Mean?

Words will not pollute the soup.

~ Brazilian proverb ~

How Sad is This?

This quote is from "Populism in the Age of Celebrity," an article that appeared in The Atlantic in June 1990. That was 18 years ago. Sadly, I don't think much has changed!

Raised on Sesame Street and now MTV--a celebration of commercials between rock videos that are themselves merely commercials for celebrities--we demand production values, not social values, in our politics.

~ Kirk Scharfenberg ~

Good Advice--Are You Listening Candidates?

Make sure you have finished speaking before your audience has finished listening.

~ Dorothy Sarnoff ~

Troubles

Troubles are like babies--they only grow by nursing.

~ Douglas Jerrold ~

Ya Gotta Love This Title

Sunday's Kat Kwote

By associating with the cat one only risks becoming richer.

~ Sidonie Gabrielle ~

Self Sufficiency

I believe in neither God nor the devil and I am not afraid.

~ Marilla M. Ricker ~

Poetry Friday

Poetry moves heaven and earth.
~ Japanese proverb ~

Fuzzy Math?

95% of this game is half mental.

~ Yogi Berra ~


Did you know there's a Yogi Berra Museum?

I'll Bet He Could See into the Future...

to today, 8/20/08, when BMX makes its debut as an Olympic event.

Get a bicycle. You will not regret it. If you live.

~ Mark Twain ~

Blessed Relief

There is no feeling, except the extremes of fear and grief, that does not find relief in music.

~ T.S. Eliot ~

And the People at the Food Network are Eternally Grateful

Man falls upon everything that comes in his way; not the smallest fruit or excrescence of the earth, scarce a berry or a mushroom can escape him.
~ Joseph Addison ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Flatterers, like cats, lick and then scratch.
~ German proverb ~

Have Courage!

Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

~ Andre Gide ~