Haunting Books and Movies: FROM HERE TO ETERNITY and BRIDESHEAD REVISITED
During October, I’ve traditionally posted about “haunting books” I’ve read in the past year. This year, I haven’t read many books I can honestly say were haunting. So I’ll post instead about the Movie Group I’m in. I joined this group about the time I retired after it had been underway for several years. A friend […]
The Fun Part of Writing: Meeting Readers . . . So Come Say Hello
One issue every writer must address is how much time to spend marketing as opposed to writing. At first, of course, it is most important to produce a high-quality book and get it published. Once a writer has published a book, however, marketing begins to take more time. Some of the time I spend marketing […]
Researching Historical Fiction: Making a Living in 1850s Oregon
Making a living was important to pioneers on the frontier, just as it has been at all periods of American history. I wrote last month about farming in the 1850s. Land was free for white males in Oregon to claim, so if a man was willing to clear the land and work it, he could […]
Random Photo: An Old IBM-XT . . . Or Maybe It’s a Clone
This random photo was taken in December 1986, when our family visited my parents for Christmas. I found an envelope of pictures taken during that trip, and, since many of the pictures had Christmas motifs, I will save them for December posts. But this picture is of an early IBM personal computer—the IBM-XT, or a […]
A Visit to the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam
I’ve written before about the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City. It is a wonderful museum, but it is nothing compared to the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. I’ve visited other museums as well (see here and here), but they also are shadows of the Rijksmuseum. About the only museums I’ve spent much time in that compare to […]
Things I Learned About My Sister During Our Summer Vacation
I’ve written several posts about the cruise (see here, here, and here) we took this summer with my sister and her husband. I really enjoyed the opportunity to spend some concentrated time with her, something she and I have not had many chances to do during our adult lives. I left home for college about […]
On Writing and Editing and Procrastination
I talked to a friend the other day and found her in the process of making tomato sauce. “I haven’t made tomato sauce in years,” I said. “Not since someone gave me an excess of tomatoes one summer.” “Well, it was either this or edit the book I’m working on,” she said. She preferred making […]
Visit to the Strategic Air Command Museum
Late last month, my husband, another couple, and I went to the Strategic Air Command Museum in Ashland, Nebraska, outside of Omaha. The four of us stayed at Lied Lodge in Nebraska City, where my husband and I have stayed before. Lied Lodge and Conference Center is an oasis of peace in the middle of corn […]
Battle of the Sexes, circa 1963
I first became aware of gender differences when I was about six or seven. I had a brother just seventeen months younger than me (he turns 61 in just a few days), so I knew about the physical differences between boys and girls. But in terms of sexism and role-playing, it didn’t really strike me […]
The Fiasco That Began Third Grade
On Tuesday, September 3, 1963, fifty-five years ago today, I started third grade. The first days of school years are often memorable for one reason or another, and the morning of that day sticks in my mind. It was a day in which an ordinary event made a difference in my life . . . […]