With all the nonsense and hooey out there, it’s nice to have some real perspective. What was it Zhou Enlai said when asked about the French Revolution? “It’s too soon to say.” http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

The new book is different.  It is not a sequel.  It has a different tone.  It is historical fiction, it happens later than the last book, but still 19th Century.  There are themes that perhaps carry from one book to the other, as writers have their obsessions, conscious and unconscious.  Others will pick out their own themes as they ‘read’ them.  I see a few when I step back, but I do not include them intentionally.  These are the types of characters and stories to which I am drawn. 

And it will be different.

Came out raring to work, put down the big damn glass, and over it went.  Grateful that I do my 3 by 5 cards in pencil.  Books were spared but for two, and they were not borrowed books.  Nor were they expensive or irreplaceable.  So far the keyboard seems finca0oiaunjfa;noieda’er. 

Eh, Mr. Gibbon?  We are tickling keys with our eye on the Opulent Interiors of the Gilded Age, as well as Old New York in Early Photographs.  Then there are the two books on carriages, and the Historical Atlas of New York City and the catalogues from stores and the manners books and more than that, just so damned much information that I have to be sure not to overwrite all this research.  Somebody better reign this all in.  Oh.  I guess that would be me. 

We’ve got thunder and lightning.  We’ve got a fire in the fireplace, a huge Bugs Bunny mug (that says ‘looks, brains, charm — all that and I’m humble, too’) with lemon ginger tea, we’ve got a cashmere sweater to keep our proverbial butt warm (or at least our chest, neck and arms), and a little research to do, with Howard Zinn and A People’s History of the United States (the robber baron section) on the coffee table.  You want anything else?  It’s raining outside and I’m dry.  And Deborah liked the pages.  Not bad for a Tuesday.

Is the beer as poor as the grammar?  Beer commercial.  ”Me and Buster are hanging off a cliff and you can only save one of us,” says the girl.  C’mon, you’ve seen it.  Does it annoy you yet?

Me and Buster?  Hey, here’s a simple test, advertising executive in charge of writing the script for your commercial:  Drop the second name and see if it works:  Me are hanging off a cliff…  Hmm.  Seems a little more obvious now.  I am hanging off a cliff.  Oh, right.  ”Buster and I are hanging off a cliff and you can only save one of us.”

The answer is, I save Buster because the Bulldog isn’t mangling the English language.

Knuckleheads.

Resilience is an excellent word. An elegant word. It has punch. I read in newspapers and magazines the word ‘resiliency’ when resilience is what they mean. Drives me nuts.

Yesterday, I read an article by Joe Cowley in the Chicago Sun Times about the Chicago White Sox.  I like his stuff, and find him to be a solid, professional writer.  In the second paragraph, Mr. Cowley wrote “between he and closer Bobby Jenks.”  I couldn’t help myself.  I posted:

Joe: Really?  Between he and closer Bobby Jenks?  Prepositional phrase.  Between Bobby Jenks and him. 

Today, I looked up the article, and the sentence had been changed so that the phrase now read:  Between him and closer Bobby Jenks. 

I have made one small difference in this indifferent world.  Thank you, Joe, for noticing and fixing that. 

I am quickly becoming a crackpot, but at least this time it was for grammar. 

For any of you interested in a terrific perspective on our known universe, today’s Astronomy Picture of the Day gives you a small trip to the outer edges of our knowledge.  Go visit. 

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

If you’re doing this on a day OTHER than January 20, 2010, you might have to go back in the archive, which is easily done at the bottom of the page. 

I have been trying to write a post concerning the continuous batting rule in little league.  I can’t seem to write it without getting pissed off.  So I am abandoning it for the night, and saying, even though we won on the issue, I feel lousy about it. 

My sons love to play.  That’s all there is.  And they get to play with our regular league, which makes me happy.  The rest of it is a waste of time and a lot of nonsense.