TONY HILLERMAN - SELDOM DISAPPOINTED

Tony Hillerman
Seldom Disappointed - a Memoir
C 2001
Harper Colins Publishers


pages 262-263 about teaching in academia in the mid 1960's:


"The middle sixties were the ideal time to start if one was fated to spend almost twenty years teaching journalism at an university. Student lethargy still ruled as late as 1963, providing a taste of lecturing to a disinterested audience. But even then the long, loud, and lusty revolution was moving in. Before I could conclude that a professor's life tended to be boring, the late sixties were upon us and students were showing up full of fire, demanding to be taught something relevant, protesting war; the establishment, parking tickets, poorly prepared lectures, prejudices against pot smoking, unisex rest rooms, police brutality, and so forth.'

"Odd as this may sound, it was a wonderful time to be teaching. Students were interested, grade mania and the resulting grade inflation had barely emerged, the curse of political correctness had not yet paralyzed deans and department chairmen and corrupted the faculty. Teaching a roomful of bright young folks who yearned to learn and were willing to argue forced you to defend your position. Sometimes you couldn't. You were learning as much as they were, and it was fun. it wasn't until the early eighties that lethargy restored itself. The numbing dogma of PC hung over the campus, tolerating no opinions but anointed ones. With free speech and free thought ruled out by inquisitors running Women's Studies and the various minorities studies, the joy of learning had seeped out of students. With it went joy of teaching. Time to quit.'

JUDY GRUEN - HILARIUS!

Judy Gruen writes a column for a give-away magazine called Jewish Life. In the February 2009 issue she wrote an article called YOUR RESULTS MAY VARY.


Judy Gruen's latest book is "The Women's Daily Irony Supplement." Clever title!

to quote the article...
"Most of us have been severely chastened by bad economic news, along with an epidemic of business chicanery. Now we are left to wonder: How can we protect ourselves from bunco artists, flimflammers, bamboozlers, rouges and the otherwise slippery, shifty, and shameless? ... One relatively easy way to protect ourselves is to pay closer attention to advertisements, because darned if those ads are not always cleverly sneaking in critical information about their products and services right under our noses.... I became suspicious, however, when it finally dawned on me that the woman pictured in the ad looked young enough to be far more likely candidate for acne cream rather than wrinkle filler. Sure enough, when I whipped out my handy Hubble telescope, I was just able to make out the words: "Model pictured is not an actual customer. In fact, she's not even old enough to buy liqueur legally in most states."

CONVERSATION by Elizabeth Bishop

CONVERSATION

by poet Elizabeth Bishop (deceased)


The tumult in the heart
keeps asking questions.
And then it stops and undertakes the answer
in the same tone of voice.

No one could tell the difference.


Uninnoccent, these conversations start,
and then engage the senses
only half meaning to.


And then there is no choice,
and then there is no sense;
until a name
and all its connotations are the same.

CHRISTINE TRZYNA QUICK BOOK REVIEW OF JUST DO IT BY DOUGLAS BROWN

JUST DO IT
How One Couple Turned Off The TV and Turned on their Sex Lives for 101 Days
(No Excuses)
C Douglas Brown
Crown Publishing New York

Douglas Brown looooves his wife, Annie, and (of course) she loves him. Fourteen years into married life, they have two children who are doted upon and (of course) like to interrupt their parent's sex life whenever possible. The kids got on my nerves with their demands for attention but hey, that's the reality of having children in a household. Annie also got on my nerves. She's entirely too cute. But that's not her fault, it's her husband's perception...And it occurs to me that if she had written the book, from her perspective, I don't think she could get away with being as descriptive of Douglas...

Don't read this book if you're hoping to read for graphic erotica. There are some details but most is left to the imagination. There's a focus on the changes that Douglas and Annie go through as a married couple in their search for permanent "home" which turns out to be - well - WHERE THE HEART IS! Yeesh! But, yes, it's true.

page 267

(CHAPTER: MAKING LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON)
"Love happens. Yes, it takes nurturing, heat, and light. It demands commitment. it requires certain chemistry. Bur for lucky people, for whatever combination of factors, love blossoms. It's unconscious: a force, a fire, a spirit. Romance, by contrast, is alert. It's intentional. It has an intelligence. It's a dance, of sorts. Both people in a relationship must consider what please their partner; but surprise - something new - claims an important piece of the romance puzzle. So delivering romance is much more complicated than simply referring to a list of likes, picking one, and going for it. In sum, it's magicians' work.


Page 217. I learned something new: asshole bleaching is the latest craze - big thing on both coasts - pornography gone mainstream... No. I don't think I personally want a lighter shade of pink!

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY !

COMMENTARY ON HARRY CHAPIN TAXI

"Se was going to be an actress and I was going to learn to fly...now she's acting happy and I'm flying in my taxi..." A bitter sweet love song, and lyrics that tell an entire story...

RUMI LOVE POETRY

The intellectual runs away.
afraid of drowning;
the whole business of love
is to drown in the sea.
-Rumi.