To most of us, the name “Tiny Tim” recalls the late Herbert Khaury, he of the uke and falsetto.  We may also think of the plaintive tot in Dickens, or — if smitten with old comic strips — Stanley Link’s miniscule hero of the ’30s.
But there was another, now forgotten, yet once a familiar New […]

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People lie for different reasons: cowardice (the truth can hurt), cupidity (falsehood can be more profitable), arrogance (the truth can be improved), or ignorance (the truth is unknown).
I don’t know what motivated Jeanne des Armoises.  True, she got attention and cash, but she must have known it couldn’t last.  In fact, I don’t know how […]

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The Star Lodge, or Summer Palace, outside Prague, is another of those curious buildings that dot the Czech Republic.  The Letohradek Hvezda was designed and built in 1555 by Archduke Ferdinand of Tyrol; it was supposedly a hunting lodge, but the fact that it’s shaped like a six-pointed star, with four stories, each keyed to a […]

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I made this sketch of that curious old building, the Faust House, on a trip to Prague a few years ago.  I post it here for whatever pleasure it may trigger.
The Faust House, for those unfamiliar with it, sits on Charles Square; it houses the Faculty of Medicine of Charles University, and is not open to […]

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[The flurry of activity that went into our event, “Medi-Vaudeville,” delayed the last installment of this talk on Darwinism.  Please do read the earlier parts; it’s all connected.]
If “BC” could introduce the Bible into the caveman cartoon, then, obviously, the next step is to introduce the caveman cartoon into the Bible.
So, busy theologians have been […]

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November 16 marked the beginning of National Geography Awareness Week. Whether “national” indicates an emphasis on native geographical awareness, or is meant to suggest that we as a nation need to brush up on world geography, is unclear. Without getting too theoretical, I’d like to point out that geography is a social construct. Unlike […]

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The computer is a useful tool.  We all use it regularly.  The fact that I post here should make it clear to the impartial that I have no beef with these gizmos.
But this is a puritanical culture; and many of our fellow citizens view the non-digital with the same dogmatic intolerance with which the Pilgrims eyed […]

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An article in this Sunday’s New York Times celebrates an organization  dedicated to the historical documentation of local ullage (in this case, “local” meaning the 1/3 of the nation comprising the West).
ByJESSE McKINLEY
TWAIN HARTE, Calif. — Strange where a road trip can begin: a dorm room, a bar stool or Page 283 of the W.P.A. […]

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Yes, it’s an election year; and no, I won’t add to the glut of punditry.  It’s not that I have nothing to say on the subject – I too can yakety yak till twilight falls — but this site is devoted to the other part, and that’s what I’ll stick to.
I would like to mention, however, […]

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There is a wonderful variety of short literary forms: limericks, quatrains, haiku, couplets, epigrams, anecdotes, jokes, riddles, parables, fables, proverbs, maxims, blackouts, slogans, and on and on. Some are simply passing thoughts; others pack as much meaning as possible into the smallest space.
Here, we’ll trot out the one-word poem — to be specific, the one-word […]

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