No donuts for YOU, Big Angry Beaver!

Big Angry Beaver is dead. Details are still coming in, but I have confirmed that Big Angry Beaver is now in that mountain meadow in the sky.

The day began like any other. Hrothgar, King of the Homeowner's Association, sent this note to the 436 subjects of the realm.

Hello Folks,

We have had a few requests wanting to know the date for our annual garage sale. Traditionally we have had our sale on the first Saturday after Mother's Day. This would be Saturday May 19, 2007 unless there is some kind a conflict with this date. My darling wife has volunteered to coordinate the event again this year. Her royal highness will be sending out details for the sale in a few weeks.

Please spread the word with your neighbors & encourage anyone not on our email list to get with the times. (longspeak for "I brought the Kool-Aid. Do I have to bring the cups too?)

Hugs & Kisses,

Hrothgar

Pretty standard fare really. The next Homeowner's Association "One over the World" message carried the dread news . . .

Hrothgar,

You may already know this, but this afternoon we were at the north end of the lake and saw a large dead beaver by the side of the water. I don't know who takes care of removing this type of thing -- but it's pretty big.
Thanks!

A. Vassal

The renegade Beaver was dead. Not gone out like Johnny Dillinger, not like Jesse James, but like . . . Donald Rumsfeld. T.S. Eliot was right . . .

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

Big Angry Beaver's was floating in the north end of the pond like a meat flavored lilly pad, a feast for the gulls. There was no last Hoorah, only silent bobbing at the shore. Big Angry Beaver had enemies that wasted no time confirming the facts, and worse . . . as the next message reports.

A. Vassal,

I also saw the beaver and raked it into the lake. Mother Nature (turtles) will take care of the carcass usually in short order. Nothing will go to waste.

Thanks for asking,

Hrothgar Triumphant
(f.y.i. from now on - Hrothgar the Victorious - will do nicely. Thank you very much.)

Like Antigone's King Creon, Hrothgar the Victorious' de facto decree that Big Angry Beaver is to be rendered into meat for the creatures of the pond and not to be buried: "touching this Beaver, it has been proclaimed to our people that none shall grace him with sepulture or lament, but leave him unburied, a corpse for turtles and dogs to eat, a ghastly sight of shame."

Good Ladies and Gentlemen, I ask you - who is our Antigone? Who is our dear sister of Justice and Mercy? Who dares defy the order of Hrothgar the Arrogant? What did the next to last message of the day contain?

Hrothgar,

I think a dog or another critter may have pulled . . . (the bloated, stinking corpse of the Big Angry Beaver) . . . back out of the lake. I will go over this evening and bury him.

On another note I am preparing an informational flyer that we can email and print up to advertise the Trash-Off day on Saturday, April 14. I was wondering if there is any money in the Homeowner's Association budget to purchase a few dozen donuts and water for those who are wanting to help?

Thanks,

Amanda Huggenkiss

The nearly instanneous reply was ...

Ms. Huggenkiss,

You know what? NO DONUTS FOR YOU!

Hrothgar

My home town is in "A Place Called Baca"

"A Place Called Baca" is a self-published tribute to a windswept and dusty county in the southeastern corner of Colorado. Most people would call that place pretty much the middle of nowhere and they'd be right, but the 1,268 families (according to the 2000 census) that live there call the place where Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, and Oklahoma touch -- "home". What Baca County, Colorado, does have is a Past, and Ike Osteen tells that story in a way that makes it personal, involving, and fun.

"A Place Called Baca" is also a tribute to its author, a man whose story telling sensibility was cut from the same cloth as Mark Twain and Will Rogers. Ike Osteen called Baca County, Colorado, "home" most of his long life. "A Place Called Baca" contains the laughs, joys and sorrows from that long life which unfortunately ended in February, 2007. He was a farmer, civil servant, writer, historian and friend to many.

The best parts of "A Place Called Baca" deal with growing up on the prairie in an earth-and-plank dugout with his widowed mother and eight brothers and sisters; surviving the Dust Bowl; and telling the stories of those who came and went along the way. The stories are fully developed vignettes with interesting maps of homesteads and windmills.

Ike Osteen's knowledge of Baca County is so rich and accessible that he was often sought out for interviews and talks. Ike was 90 when Timothy Egan called for interviews when Mr. Egan was writing "The Worst Hard Time", a brilliant work on the Dust Bowl era. Ike was contacted by the Pueblo Chieftain newspaper for local information about a serious border dispute between Colorado and New Mexico. The case eventually led to a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1925.

"A Place Called Baca" is a hardcover book that was published without a jacket. Ike told the Plainsman Herald newspaper of Springfield, Colorado, that he wrote the book to document the history and hard work the citizens poured into the county. He did that extremely well. He did something else with "A Place Called Baca" that both surprises and impresses. He leaves a person with the realization that this land is neither barren nor empty. It has a bright Future in front of it because it is full of life and people that you want to get to know because they are hard working, interesting and dynamic. By the end of the story, you may even want to count some of them as friends.

"Rogue Angel: Forbidden City" by Alex Archer

"Rogue Angel: Forbidden City" is a brisk, no-nonsense adventure and mystery double play. It's got everything you expect from the Rogue Angel franchise and whole lot more.

The action in the first sixty pages is some of the best in the Rogue Angel series. It starts with a bump in ancient China and sweeps on to forested goldfields of California. There is a host of bad guys, dazzling chase sequences, and the flashing sword of Saint Joan of Arc, and that is just for starters. The rest of the story is a compelling turn toward adventure and mystery. With a strange heirloom belt plaque as a guide, Annja unravels a mystery that leads her beyond the Silk Road in search of a lost treasure city that was built by assassins and thieves ages ago.

"Forbidden City" explores a theme of possibility and the likelihood of change. China, with its thousands of years of tradition and current headlong plunge into modernity, is the perfect canvas for the story. When the clues don't make sense, the pitch of battle sharpens to a razors edge, and events turn their darkest, Annja is forced to grow as a character. This isn't a teaser, this is meaty and substantial. Then Annja allies with Kelly Swan, a trained assassin on a mission to even the score with those who murdered her father. Kelly is so richly drawn that she's a perfect counterweight to Annja. Kelly is a character fully deserving of a spin-off novel of her own.

For the first time since the beginning of the Rogue Angel franchise, we really dig into the inner workings of Roux and Garin Braden. The theme rings true even in the smallest details when Garin partners with the villain. While bowing only once to its own mythology, this story very cleverly does more than has ever been done before to deepen and broaden its principal characters. Alex Archer's commitment to plain prose drives this point home and makes this story a fast, fun read.

The greatest strength of this story is in its telling. The pacing is spot on. The author's expert use of action and language makes this a fun read for all readers. Highly recommended!

I have only one tiny, tiny thing to say about the book that is not absolutely, positively 100% "thumbs up". Yes, it is very, very tiny, but it is one of those things I feel compelled to say. The only question I have is this -- what were the Chinese characters on the cover of this book intended to mean? It doesn't translate into much beyond gibberish; the words become "English Life" to the best that I can make out. I know this doesn't mean much in the greater scheme of things, but seriously folks, this is one of those things for me. Have you ever seen those baseball caps with Chinese characters printed on them? I saw a young person at the mall recently with one of those caps on his head. He was very proud of the cap, but apparently had no idea that the character translated to "foot". How hard can it be to find an appropriate word or words to say in Chinese? Really now, one third of the world we live on can speak that language fairly well!

Beer-belly Beowulf

Something awful happened this weekend.

Big Angry Beaver swam all the way here from the River and bit down the biggest tree on the banks of the pond. He chewed and chewed on the tired, old Cypress until it splintered and fell into a heap, sprawled across the poo-slickened footpath. Then Big Angry Beaver decorated the carcass of the ancient tree with gnawings.

Why? I understand biting off the tender young saplings, but why the old Cyprus tree? Why? Did the Big Angry Beaver have some terrorist purpose in his violence? Was there some hidden message in those chew marks, that gnawed graffiti? Was the Homeowner's Association President right? Is the Big Angry Beaver a dread danger our good civilization can not endure?

Big Angry Beaver is powerful and sinister. He walks upright on his two hind legs like a man when he chooses. He has two tiny forelimbs. He slays with his mouth or jaws - a "muthbona" in old English or just plain "mutha" in most modern English. He hunts by night, alone. He stalks the marshy places of the property.

The Cyprus tree symbolizes survival in the after-life. Did Big Angry Beaver choose to murder the ancient Cyprus because of that? Was Big Angry Beaver sending a message? What did it all mean?

I had to know, so I went to modern day Oracle, typed the all information into Google and pressed the "I'm feeling lucky" button. The answer was so obvious - Big Angry Beaver is really the murdeing monster, Grendel, from the old Beowulf tale. It makes perfect sense to me now! Grendel's lair was a large swampy lake where other strange creatures lived. My pond has many strange creatures in it. Not all have feathers or fur. There are creatures like armadillos (too stupid to live, to hard to kick very far when you catch them digging up the yard), mean snapping turtles, frogs (wicked little screamers), and snakes (I caught one once while fishing, he still has my hook and a length of line - no, I don't want them back. yes, it was the very last time I went fishing in my 1/436th of the pond.).

The Beowulf legend also has an old King had always enjoyed success and prosperity. His kingdom was envied. He built a great mead-hall, called Heorot, where his warriors would gather to drink, receive gifts from their lord, and listen to stories sung by the scops, or bards. The jubilant noise from Heorot rang out across the countryside and angered the Grendel, the horrible demon who lived in the swamplands of Hrothgar’s kingdom. The great King, Hrothgar, never knew defeat ... until the Grendel came up from the marsh. From that moment on Hrothgar never tasted victory.

What sin of the Homeowner's Association President (Hrothgar) summoned the Big Angry Beaver (Grendel)? Our King Hrothgar went door to door in the Homeowner's Association asking people to sign voting proxies. All those who signed over the power of proxy forever gave Hrothgar their vote in Homeowner's Association meetings. Without reading the evil document, about a third of the Homeowner's Association signed, giving the prideful Hrothgar a golden Hammer. Hrothgar used the great Hammer to drive any measure he wished through the Homeowner's Association. Hrothgar's great Hammer also crushed all who opposed him (and now write blogs about things).

I sent the picture of the murdered Cyprus to the Homeowner's Association President, King Hrothgar. This was his reply:

"Thanks, we had some previous reports. I've called our beaver catcher to take care of the situation."

So, just as in the Beowulf legend, Hrothgar has sent out word for warriors to rally to the kingdom to fight the terrible Grendel.

And ... (once again, the toothless Hillbilly) Beowulf got ready, donned his war-gear, indifferent to death (pulls his sagging pants up over his neon white butt crack and loads a chaw of tobacco into his black stained mouth); his mighty, hand-forged, fine-webbed ... (galvanized metal traps) ... would soon meet with the menace underwater.

The tale nears its completion. Beer-belly Beowulf only has to get lucky once with one of his many body-gripping traps to snuff the life out of the Grendel. I'm afraid Time and Luck have run out for Big Angry Beaver.

A mystery meat lasagna

"Resurrection Mary: A Ghost Story" by Kenan Heise is an honest-to-goodness, no-lie, biblio-cafeteria special - Mystery Meat Lasagna.

I picked up this book first because of the title. I love the Resurrection Mary story. I love Chicago. This book is all about both. The second reason I picked up this book is , the author, Kenan Heise. He is a Chicago landmark in his own right. His stories of Chicagoland gangsters are excellent. His travelogues are mandatory companions for first time visitors. He honed his writing skills over thirty years in the newspaper trade covering Chicago - a great deal of that time he spent as the Tribune's chief obituary writer.

The parts of this book that really work are rooted in the author's knowledge of his city and in his writing style. There are layers of brilliant travelogue in this book that turn Chicago and its suburbs into living, breathing characters. There is a secret "To understand Chicago" that Heise explains on page 83 that is an absolute truth, and certainly worth a sneak peek when you find this book on the shelf. The book's tight journalistic prose makes for a fast read.

What doesn't work in this story is the same thing that doesn't work in mystery meat lasagna. The story is strangely structured, at times disconnected, and a little soupy. It's got a full measure of cheese in every helping by wandering away the facts of the title character's story and the strengths of the genre.

Resurrection Mary is Chicago's most famous ghost. The countless retellings of her story have turned her into a legend. The strange thing about legends of any genre is that while the details may vary through their retelling, there are certain parts of the story that are sacred. Those essentials make the myth what it is. They can't be violated - under any circumstances - or the story is simply ruined. How important are these "sacred essentials" to mythic stories? Let's see ... It would have been a forgotten statistic in a baseball game if not for Babe Ruth pointing to the outfield and calling his home run shot in the fifth inning of Game 3 of the 1932 World Series. It would have been just another stupid question and answer session in yet another White House press conference if not for Richard Nixon's jowl-waggling exhortation "… people have got to know whether or not their President's a crook. Well, I am not a crook." What would the story of the Alamo be without William Travis drawing "a line in the sand" with his sword? Could you leave out Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, or the eventual death of all the defenders of the Alamo?

The real Mary of the Resurrection Mary legend comes from the early 1930s. She was a pretty, blonde, blue-eyed innocent. She dressed up to go out. She enjoyed dancing. After a bad experience with a date one evening, she walked away from Willowbrook (O Henry) Ballroom. While walking along Archer Avenue, she was struck by a car and killed. She was buried in her dress and dancing shoes at Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, Illinois, a few miles west of Chicago. Since then, people sometimes report picking up a young female hitchhiker matching Mary's description who asks for a ride to the dance hall or home from it. She disappears (harmlessly) mysteriously when she is near Resurrection Cemetery.

It was a very, very sad surprise to find in Kenan Heise's fictionalized retelling of Mary's story that she was awkward and did not know how to dance (page 131), died from ingesting rat poison at age 15 (page 132), and then became a bloodthirsty, sex-charged specter (page 147).

So, the next time a hankering for mystery meat hits, go with an old standby instead ... meatloaf.

Big Angry Beaver

All the recent rain and melted snow raised the water level in my pond. The ducks love it, the geese love it, and so does our arch enemy - the Big Angry Beaver. Now he's back ... and angrier than ever.

Originally my pond was built to for flood control. A series of ditches and canals lead through the neighborhood to the pond, and then out to the South Canadian River. Big Angry Beaver lives by the river - a river he can't dam. That makes Big Angry Beaver very ANGRY. Why? This is Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain ... because there aren't enough trees to stop it. That was, of course, until we created this suburban wetland with its strange combination of natural and aesthetic diversity, wide open spaces, cookie cutter houses*, ultra-green lawns, and acres of fruitless Bradford pear trees, cottonwoods, oaks, and maples. Suddenly, even magically, there is enough wood to (almost) dam the mighty river, but the big angry Beaver has to swim up the canal to my beautiful pond, bite down a tree, then carry it all the way back to his dam on the river - all the time swimming AGAINST the current and the wind that comes sweepin' down the plain and that *REALLY* pisses him off.

Mr. Big Angry Beaver came last Spring and converted our freshly planted oaks and maples into toothpick shaped monuments to futility. We took it gracefully and replanted. Mr. Big Angry Beaver and bit down the picnic benches. We grinned and rebuilt them. Mr. Big Angry Beaver crossed the fence into my neighbor's yard and chewed down his Chinese Elm (actually Golden Lacebark Elm). The tree was big. It was beautiful even in the harshest drought. It was the center piece of his landscape, and its golden yellow leaves drew the eye up to my neighbors' house. In Winter, it's multicolored “jigsaw puzzle piece” bark was something to see. It was just a little too big to get through the cast iron rail fence, so the beaver left it there - sideways, stuck halfway through the fence. Since my neighbor is on the Homeowner's Association Board of Directors, we took action!

We are inside the City Limits, so our first call was to our local animal control person. He laughed and hung up. Someone in the Homeowner's Association found a toothless Bubba in the phone book, and set a contract with him to come and "control" the Big Angry Beaver. I voiced my concerns in a note to the President of the Homeowner's Association. I wanted to know what "control" really meant. After all, Oklahoma allows beavers (and other furbearing animals) to be "controlled" in only two ways: catching in a body gripping trap of a specified jaw-spread width, or "night shooting" the nuisance beaver by using shotgun only with BB-size shot or smaller.

The thought of someone blasting away at the Big Angry Beaver in the middle of the night terrified me. This isn't Dodge City, Kansas, for crying out loud! On the other hand, what would a body gripping trap do to Big Angry Beaver? Would it pinch off a leg? Would it break his bones? Would it kill him? Would it merely detain him so the toothless hillbilly trapper could relocate him to another town (preferably in Texas)?

I had to do some research on this before we chunked down the money. For a state that historically had almost no beaver, Oklahoma would appear to be a very beaver friendly state. We have a county named Beaver. It's small, in the Panhandle, and its largest town is named ... Beaver. In 1952, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation (ODWC) relocated 29 beavers from 5 western counties to Department lands in 4 eastern counties. Now beaver is plentiful. Half the state is considered home to the beaver. One may hunt beaver in Oklahoma all year long. The season never closes. Given the birthrates, it seems that beaver is on everyone's mind. The population is so large that beaver pelts now may be purchased on the street for only $10. Because of that low amount, skuny smell and the apparently revolting flavor of beaver, we were going to have to pay a toothless hillbilly trapper to come and "control" our four legged miscreant.

In the meantime, the Homeowner's Association President (obviously an understudy of George.W. Bush) began to practice the politics of Fear. He sent around a note saying that the beaver problem is about out of control. He said "The beavers have lost their fear of Man and it is showing." Notice how he transformed the Big Angry Beaver into satanic multiples. All animals must fear the capitalized Man! He went on to say that "the beavers were going across the street and attacking the big cottonwood trees that provide shade to the playground equipment." Oh, I give up, why did the Big Angry Beaver cross the road? Could it be that there were no trees left for Big Angry Beaver to eat where he came from - the pond side of the road? The President encouraged all 436 members to "start throwing sticks and stones at these critters whenever they are close to us." Apparently people were merely stepping off the goose poo slickened sidewalks and giving the right of way to the Big Angry Beaver with his snapping big orange teeth. Dogs did. God knows I did. I mean if he could bite down an oak, I was pretty sure he could bite off my feet without too much trouble. But for the Homeowner's Association President to think that sticks and stones would "force ... (the beavers) ... back to their normal habitat away from us and our trees", well, he was just full of it!

So, $350 (US) later, we terminated the Big Angry Beaver control contract - because we had no more trees left for him to bite down.

Now we do, Big Angry Beaver is back, and I weep for the trees.

- - -

* That is, naturally, every house but mine ;-)

A generously intimate scrapbook

"The Winds of Change on Croton Creek" is the warmest, most personal sort of recollection. It's a cherished memory more than nostalgia. It's generously intimate scrapbook, and a quilt work of personalities that tell the true life story of a girl born in 1917 in Roger Mills County, Oklahoma. These Oklahoma winds sweep up her family and carry them through some of the most interesting times in American history.

The story is so well written that it is almost impossible NOT to read the entire book in one setting. There is so much information in this story that there's something to rediscover in every reading. Clara King Davis' lush voice and journalistic narrative binds the vignettes of family life from the beginning on board the Mayflower to the present day.

It's easy to feel the warmth of a craftsman's gentle hand in these stories. It's all here - Oklahoma's rough and rowdy cowboy past, farm living, two world wars, politics, the Great Depression, the red scare, bumper crops, tornadoes, and the hardest of times, the Dust Bowl. This story is fresh because there is so much more than that here. This is the story of a family that joins together, survives and then overcomes even the harshest adversity.

That family continues to flourish in Oklahoma. In the forward, page xv, is a picture of two little girls on horseback. My grandmother is on the gray horse. Her cousin, and author of this book, Clara King Davis, is on the dark thoroughbred. The story of their adventures on horseback continues on page 124. This book is a lot of fun to read. It is rare, but it is worth picking up a copy. You'll be glad you did.

Root canal "therapy"

Today my dentist told me that teeth are hard calcified objects, but their inner aspects are not completely solid. Inside every tooth there is a hollow space which entraps a tiny tooth demon. When the demon senses even the tiniest whiff of oxygen, it becomes ... excited. The demon stabs the tooth's meaty nerve pulp with its pitchfork. It drinks. It sings old Warren Zevon songs purposely off key. The randy tooth demon pines for its eventual union with the Tooth Fairy. The painful throbbing I felt, the dentist said, was really the tooth demon stomping in time to "Werewolves of London".

Once when I was a child, one of the demons drilled his way out of a bicuspid. I thought there was nothing that can be done. The dentist pulled the tooth. Soon enough, a shiny new tooth grew in its spot. I vowed to brush and floss that shiny new tooth so I could keep it forever. But one day, many years later a bad thing happened and that shiny tooth cracked. The demon inside was trying to get loose. I went to the dentist hoping to save the tooth. He drilled and drilled, then stepped back in defeat. The buxom dental assistant dabbed the beads of sweat on Mr. Dentist's forehead. He went back in and bravely put a temporary filling over the chasm in my tooth.

Now I'm going to get some root canal "therapy". It's going to be a long two weeks until my appointment with Mr. Dentist. I've practically memorized the lyrics already of the 1987 classic "Sentimental Hygiene". What's next, "Life'll Kill Ya"? Yeah, it figures.

A fantastic action-thriller

"Hunters of the Dark Sea" (2003) is a fantastic action-thriller. The War of 1812 rages on land and sea. The dark seas of the world are full of hunters of every sort. Some of them hunt whales, some of them hunt merchant ships, some of them hunt scientific truth, but one of them, a great infected whale, hunts human flesh. First Mate Ethan Swain's hunt becomes a quest that leads the whaling ship Reliant halfway around the world to a forsaken point in the deep Pacific Ocean. There he discovers that the difference between the hunter and the hunted is razor thin.

This story isn't "Moby Dick". Here the seas are real and the seamanship authentic. Rather than a chapter on the symbolic nature of the color white, "Hunters of the Dark Sea" has pitching wooden decks, the smoke of broadside cannons fired in volleys, white capped waves and wind-filled canvas sails. Metaphor, madness and allegory are traded for a fast read of action, adventure and discovery. "Hunters of the Dark Sea" is more akin to the 1924 Newbery Medal winner "The Dark Frigate" by Charles Boardman Hawes. "Hunters of the Dark Sea" might have been a competitor for that very award if not for the graphic depiction of naval combat, medical gore, and the seventy nine years separating them.

The only shortcoming of this fine story is that it has no mythic theme, no symbolic restatement of a fundamental truth - might does not make right. The point it does make is powerful, but stated so subtly that it almost passes without notice. That is, might makes monstrous rather than right. The scale up of violence from simple fishing to whale killing, to killing a person, to killing a ship full of people is so natural that its logical progression merely depends upon the order of arrival of the hunters of the dark seas. Maybe that's too similar to a story being told in the evening news to be commercial. Then again, maybe not.

The greatest strength of this story is in its telling. It's a very good read, fantastically entertaining, and so filled with wet salt air that you'll need a towel before the final page. Plot a course with "Hunters of the Dark Sea" and log the journey. Find the (hidden secret?) latitude and longitude waypoints along the way. You'll be glad you did.

An old fashioned highball

"Rogue Angel: The Spider Stone" is an old fashioned highball. It's a big shot of action in an ice cold world, lightning fast pacing to fill and garnished with a sacred stone from the heart of Africa. It's intoxicating and fun.

The action in this story is positively breathtaking. An experienced hand wrote this book and it shows. That hand has been in the dojo, doubled into a fist and smashed through some bricks. That hand recognizes the feel of steel, has cradled a blade and known a sword as weapon and a friend. That brings an edgy reality to the action sequences that pop right off the page.

Annja Creed is a heroine with a mission from the highest power. She's definitely not one of Alcott's little women "taught by weal and woe to love and labor ..." She's on the other end of the pendulum's arc with Laura Croft and Electra. She is a hero in the ultramodern sense, and that is the story's only flaw. She is unshackled by uncertainty, romantic interest, or existential introspection. I missed the depth that would have brought to her character. But this isn't a tea and crumpets romance, it is an unapologetic action thriller, and it earns its chops.

"Rogue Angel: The Spider Stone" stays true to its theme rooted deep in a constant opposition of light and shadow. Alex Archer's commitment to plain prose makes this story read fast and sure.
Annja Creed has the avenging sword and social compass of Saint Joan of Arc. And that's just for starters. This story takes Annja Creed across the world on a quest to protect a sacred stone. Yes, the trail is bumpy, dangerous and littered with plenty of bad guys. I'm glad I went Annja on this adventure. You will be glad too. Highly recommended.

Brilliant! Milk coming out of your nose funny.

"The Pop-up Book of Sex" is kinetic brilliance! It's so funny, milk coming out of your nose kind of funny, that it's got to be illegal somewhere.

What pops up in this book is naughty, but nice. It's missionary when the mood is right. It yodels in the canyon. It spanks with a feather duster. It even does it a mile high.

The illustrations by Balvis Rubess are wonderful, but the real magic of this book are the pop-ups by Kees Moerbeek. The feather duster spanking pop up really spanks! It was so loud that shoppers in the bookstore came over for a look. The next thing you know, there was a crowd laughing right out loud to a doggy-style pop up popping like a pan of Jiffy Pop on the surface of the Sun.* This is going to be the best twelve page coffee table book ever!

This pop-up book is not for kids. It includes content, images and themes of an adult, sexual, or controversial nature.

* P's o'plenty, if you please, and I do, thank you very much.

Six Weird Things About Me

"The Naked News" anchor Victoria Sinclair makes me happy.

My sideburns are so ridiculously curly that they have the Latin scientific name - sideburnicus pubicus.

John Lennon is my hero.

I enjoy embarrassing people who don't wash their hands after using the restroom. It's gross and I don't care if mum taught you to go without getting your hands wet! And for the love of God, don't use your cell phone in a bathroom stall.

I love Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs. I'm not sure if it's the twisty shapes, that wonderfully fuzzy light they make, or that flickering glow when they go out. I've changed out all the lights I possibly can at home.

I drink Diet Coke by the gallon. It's the greatest soft drink ever. Diet Coke makes the world go round. Damn the man who let Pepsi have the vending machine contract where I work. Damn the man who holds us down. Damn we need a Union!

A Three Chambered Heart

"Relative Danger" is a mystery with a three chambered heart. First is Doug Pearce's hunt for answers about a long lost uncle who came to a bad end in a hotel room in 1948 Singapore. Doug is about the least likely sleuth one might ever encounter in the genre. He is an "innocent abroad" with a nice earthen hue. His only credentials are a blood relationship to the victim and (thanks to being laid off from a brewery job) enough free time to look into the case. His dependency on "the kindness of strangers" begins in chapter one with a mysterious benefactor financing his journey overseas. It continues person-to-person to the very end of the story with a timely arrival of Singapore authorities and media. This person-to-person connection makes the figures we meet along the way real, even recognizable.

All points in between Morocco and Singapore are connected in the second beating lobe of this story's heart by a hunt for a blood red diamond that chases through some of the most exotic and interesting places on Earth. The taste, smell and feel of each waypoint is so richly told that a it's hard to resist the urge to check the passport between chapters for freshly inked visa stamps.

The most delicious pulse of this story's heart comes from its third lobe, Aisha Al-Kady, a woman as exotic and sensual as the environment she fills. In Arabic, Aisha means life. In "Relative Danger", Aisha means life AND to have it more abundantly. She's so strongly drawn that dents in her halo are real, the beauty bone-deep, the sex exuberant, and the bullets deadly.

This isn't the kind of story intended to be heady or profound. No, what earns "Relative Danger" its chops is the way it's told. This is a story with compelling prose, a gut-feel reality, an unexpected twist ending, and a delightfully Southern pace. It is an Edgar Allan Poe Awards® 2005 Nominee for Best First Novel By An American Author. It is an impressive first outing for Charles Benoit. I look forward to more.

How I lost the Great Goose War

This is a Canada Goose. Ages ago evolution stripped the pitchfork, horns and pointed tail off this devil and left behind this grass-chomping poo machine. This demon is swimming happily in my pond. We were at war.

I live comfortably in the city limits of the third largest city in the state. I share my pond with others. We formed a Homeowners Association and are a close community. Everyone enjoys the pond. While only 1/436 of the pond is legally mine, I feel perfectly comfortable walking the trail around the whole of it and communing with its abundant wildlife.

We have a nice assortment of white farm ducks that live on the pond. I'm not sure where these domestic ducks came from, but more seem to show up after Thanksgiving for some reason. Everyone in the Homeowners Association brings the ducks cracked corn and healthy grains to eat. We try not to feed them bread - even though they love it. Children love to feed the ducks and play on the playground equipment we've assembled in the park that we built beside the pond. The Homeowners Association buys cracked corn to feed the ducks to make sure that they get enough to eat every day and to keep them happy and healthy. Wild ducks often stop by and glide through the calm waters of the pond.

One day the devil birds, the Canada Geese, showed up. They are big birds. A full-grown Canada goose can grow up to 40 inches long, with a wingspan of up to 70 inches and can weigh between 7 and 14 pounds. A single bird can produce as much as a pound of feces per day according to the biologists. I think that estimate is conservative. They are aggressive at feeding time, and show no remorse when savaging their smaller cousins, our beautiful ducks.

One day I was feeding the ducks. They like it when I broadcast the grain by hand. I was raised on a farm, so I am familiar with the technique and am happy to oblige. A fat Canada Geese stomped up to me and stood on my right shoe. I ignored it and continued feeding the ducks. Then it started honking. I ignored it and continued feeding the ducks. It covered my shoe with poo. I lifted the stupid bird off my shoe and tossed it aside. I continued feeding the ducks. It came back. The Canadian eyed the sack of grain and then my clean left shoe. It flapped its great wings and honked. I caved. I offered it a handful of cracked corn, and the awful beast ate it all from the palm of my hand. Then it stomped off crowing its victory. My hand was wet with goose slobber and my shoe stunk.

I got on the telephone and called the State Wildlife man and complained. He said that there wasn't much that really works to get rid of the Canadian devils - other than hunting. I haven't hunted anything at all since the war, but it was personal now. This goose had violated me. Maybe if I did teach one of the birds as lesson, the others would fear me and respect my pond. I could go to the pond with sweet cracked corn in one hand and a meat cleaver in the other. One quick stroke and I'd be back on top of the food chain. What would I need to make this … legal?

The state wildlife man said the first thing I needed was a state waterfowl hunting license with a Migratory Bird Hunting and Conservation Stamp. I was certain that I wouldn't need anything like that since the migratory extent of these beasts was from one side of town to the other. I'm sure they don't even know where Canada is anymore. The state wildlife man said "yes, it was stupid, but it was a federal thing with penalties that include fines and/or prison sentences." Given who's running the federal government right now, I could see the logic in just paying for the ridiculous stamp.

The state wildlife man said that the state legislature didn't approve of using a meat cleaver to hunt geese. He suggested a shotgun. I imagine myself dressed up in camouflage, sneaking between trees to the duck pond. There would be a renegade goose gorging on our homeowner's association lawn grass, slickening the footpath with poo, and laughing at our pain. I would lift the gun, breathe steadily, and then hold the last one, relax, lower an aim onto the bird, and squeeze the trigger. The gun would roar and all 436 homeowners in the association would simultaneously call the police. Nope, there had to be a better way.

The state wildlife man said that a bow and arrow were the only other legal method for "taking" a goose. I confess the idea has some appeal. Although I'm no match for Legolas Greenleaf the Elf, I did hit the archery target at summer camp with all three of the arrows they gave me. Of course, I was 12 then and hadn't practiced a bit since. But that target was still and the Canada Goose would be moving, intentionally making his profile as small as possible. What would happen if I merely wounded the bird instead of killing it? It would start screaming, flapping its wings, and then all 436 homeowners in the association would simultaneously call the SPCA.

I needed something manly, mean and silent. Something that would the geese would respect. I had to go Rambo on their feathered butts.

"Do you have to *shoot* the arrow with the bow?" I asked.
"What do you mean?" the state wildlife man stepped through the words like broken glass.
The telephone line crackled. The state wildlife man hadn't a clue.
"What if I just take the arrow and stab the goose?"

** click **
buzz …

This morning I again feed the ducks by hand. This is the Canada Goose that crapped on my shoe. He is still very much alive. The war between us is over. I lost, and as you can see, the only animal harmed in the making of this story was me.

Action, adventure, attitude ... fun

Meredith Fletcher's elemental thriller "Storm Force" is a hurricane that just made landfall at the intersection of action, adventure, and attitude.

Every year wilderness guide Kate Garrett gets to spend the month of July with her children who live with their custodial father. It's a date she wouldn't miss come hell, high water or both. So life gets really interesting when both of those meet belligerent customers, a Cat 5 hurricane, escaped convicts, a fortune in hidden cash, organized crime, and Shane Warren - a strength for strength match for this incredibly complex and interesting heroine. He's handsome, rugged and tough enough, but stands on the wrong side of the line - a line Kate may have to cross to save herself and her children from a storm named Genevieve.

Kate keeps her wits and battles through everything that is thrown at her - which includes the kitchen sink AND the house it belongs to! When it comes to her kids and ensuring their safety, it's personal. Kate's strength, skills, maternal instinct and steadfast determination make her more than a match for her adversaries - it makes her story a compelling and entertaining read.

The connection that forms between Kate and Shane is natural and fulfilling. It grows through language, communication, need and reason. What follows clinches the story and delivers to the very last page.

"Storm Force" is very hard to put down. Count on reading it cover to cover in one satisfying session. You'll be glad you picked up this thriller.

A lipstick smeared sledgehammer

Invisible Sister by Jeffrey Ethan Lee

"Invisible Sister" is a sunburst of pain and pleasure in stained glass world. I used to believe that a poem was "but a thought complete." Then I met Jeffrey Ethan Lee's "Invisible Sister." I feel like I've just discovered that the world is round, blue and beautiful.

In the Prologues, "Invisible Sister" is delicate and elegant as much for what is on the page as isn't. It's paced neatly by clean white spaces between tasty chunks of text. It's propelled by the senses, exploring race, sex, coming of age, violence, loneliness (and its opposite), and enough pain to be noir - a real, dark, and gritty experience of insufficiency.

The second portion of book, the title poem, is the elephant in the room. Iris is a soul that at the same time everyone knows, wants to know and never will know. She's the invisible sister, an icon and the victim of fragmented postmodern life and insanity. The very incompleteness of these fragments is a kind of gravity drawing in the mind, making the story tighter, and sharpening its hooks. There is nothing subtle about this descent into darkness; after all, "girls had exclamation marks instead of dicks" (p.24). If the Iris in your life pushed a little too far away from the sunlit center of reality, you already know how the story ends. If you don't know or you just like watching the dominos fall, then you must read this book. The next time the phone rings at 4 a.m. (p.37), you'll think of this poem as your hand touches the receiver.

Some of the work is presented as a pair of voices, each with its own story, and together making a strange harmony. This dialogic lyric makes for excellent punctuation in the greater storyline {especially in "4 a.m. phone call from my sister" (p.37)}, but difficult when used too much in "Iris returning after five mostly wasted years" (p.57).

Here the sensory content, depth, lush voice and quality of the poetry by itself is all that is necessary and sufficient to define a world of immeasurable beauty, fragility and elegance with the punch of a lipstick smeared sledgehammer.

So, yes, this makes you the poet, and me - the audience. A very good read.

A really, really good read

An excellent anthology of time travel stories. All of the stories are classics. This mix of authors and stories seems to be perfectly chosen because they are still contemporary and speak to today's more selective readers. A reader of any age will enjoy this compilation. Younger readers will find this broad range of stories especially tasty. The best one in my opinion is the "Love Letter" by Jack Finney. This story captured my imagination when I was in grade school and its sense of adventure, magic and romance never left me. That was something I have been able to pass along to my child because of this very nice anthology.

Johnny's missing minutes

THE unanswered question in "The Night of the Living Dead" is what happened to Johnny between the time his head was smashed on the headstone and when he pulled Barbra out of the house. The events of these infamous minutes are left as an exercise for the student in Steven E. Wedel's class "Writing Character Driven Horror Fiction" being taught at the Moore-Norman Vo-Tech.

Here is my homework for class. Let me know if this is how you think the "missing minutes" passed.

* * * *

Dear Sweet Barbra

The stinking man-thing was stronger than God had ever intended. It used the weight of its own body like a third clawing arm to trip me. Falling. I remember falling and the stink of dirt and mold, and that sound. It was like the crack of an eggshell, and then a wet pulse of its contents in one thick warm squirt. Then a yellow flash wrapped its arms around me. I could shut down, rest a moment here and everything would be alright. I heard her voice so clearly. Dear sweet Barbra. Are you singing or is that screaming. Is there a difference? Let me rest here a minute. I'll catch up with you later. It will be alright, you know.

Flickering spirits clung to the light like celestial moths tangled in the hair of God. It was a warm, safe, filling place. I felt content, complete and whole as never before. They should have told me about this in church before. Was it a secret for only a privileged few?

Something came to take me away from there. It was a hard pull I could not resist. Though I fought the invisible hand, I struggled in vain. My eyes once filled with light, dimmed but did not let loose of the sight of that far shore and there my stolen destiny. I landed with a crash into my wrecked body back in the graveyard. My skull smashed against a low gray headstone. An electric thrumming warmed the insides of my head. It hurt. I know it should have hurt more, but it didn't. When I dared to open my eyes, what sights I saw! The night rolled back before me. I saw the lilting paw of trees in the breeze, the rough covering of bark on their limbs, the yawning mouths of leaves sighing their last exhale of sunlight into the chilled suck of Fall, and the radiant spectra of roosting birds. What power had I obtained? Raw energy throbbed in my chest. I was new, even better than new. I was powerful.

That steady crackle of energy in my head warmed my spine and limbs. All the years of coming to this forsaken place to lay a wreath on Father's grave had been life draining ordeals. I only did it to appease mother, and it helped Barbra somehow. Dear sweet Barbra. She was shattered glass, lost and unfit for this world anymore. She was there when Father died, beside him, his bloody hand in hers. An icy country road, a sharp turn hidden by snow laden trees, and a hot apple pie wrapped in foil in the backseat. Barbra and Father spent the last hours of the feast holiday pinned in the crumpled husk of the car, beneath the broken jagged trailer of a semi-truck. Most of her ordered, sunlit world died before they found her there. Those scars never healed. Change was something she never did again.

Change was something I could do and had. I sat up and dusted myself off. I saw a lost shoe on the hump of a distant grave. I recognized it as hers. How could she have lost it? She loved her shoes. I remembered that awful man-thing monster. Oh no. What had become of her? She needed me. Dear sweet Barbra. When was this world going to stop being so cruel to you? It occurred to me then that I could stop all the cruelty, pain, and suffering. I had the power. I laughed, I had to - the truth of it was so clear now. I knew what all of this meant.

I pushed myself up onto my unruly feet. Steps helped loosen the stiffness there. I walked to her shoe and picked it up. It was cold to touch. My new eyes saw the afterglow of her presence in that shoe. The soft leather didn't give up its secrets through some sorcery, reveal her location or help me in the least. All it told me was the curve of her arch and instep, the hard roundness of her heel, and her fading scent. She was out there somewhere, alone and scared. She needed me.

I saw the others, locked in a slow trudging march toward a house a quarter of a mile away. Light peeked out of windows that were cross-hatched with boards. The light stung my hypersensitive eyes. I tossed the shoe aside and joined the crowd marching to the house.

That familiar electric drone in my head was stronger in their company. Some of them were fresh up from the grave, many others had moldered in peace for far too long, still others were wet with injuries that should have been fatal, and yet on they marched. We were many and we were strong. We were united in an aching emptiness, a strange hunger I couldn't explain. It was a feeling, like the one before a sneeze. It gripped me and pulled me along, bobbing in the current with these others.

The others surrounded the little house. They banged their fists on the doors. Each new arrival swelled the crowd. I could feel their frustration. Anger heaped upon white hot anger. The heat of it spilled out of them and burned the ground under their feet. They surged in waves against the barred windows and doors of the house. One group of them banged sticks on sticks, adding a rhythmic crack to the shrill screams of people inside the house. The low hungry wails of those outside it hung heavy the air.

Through a barred window, I saw Barbra inside screaming. One of the others had a handful of her golden hair. The people inside the house did not lift a finger to help her. One inside the house brandished a rifle. A shot rang out. Another clutched his side and dropped out of sight. The breakdown of the order of their world was complete.

I pushed through the crowd, my gloved fists battering the others in my way. I had to reach her. An arm smashed across my face. A single thought crowded the rest at the front of my mind -- I had to help Barbra. Dear sweet Barbra.

The truth of my own words tormented me. "They're coming to get you, Barbara." I wished I could take all of this back, restart the sunlit world Barbra and I left a few hours ago. The others gushed forward behind me, knocking me down. I struggled up but feet kept stomping me back down. I heard Barbra scream again. Red, hot fury fueled my body as I clawed my way up one their bodies until I was on my own feet again. I swung my elbows to clear the path to Barbra. My fingers balled into a fist of iron and I swung it at the spine of the one who had a clenched a handful of Barbra's hair. His death grip was pulling her neck backwards. My fist landed hard where I had aimed it. There was sound. The crunching noise of bone breaking bone, of desiccated corpse-flesh crinkling and tearing, freeing the gooey insides. It was an enemy who buckled and dropped underfoot. Her enemy.

Now that Barbra was free of his grip, she wheeled around and I saw her face. I saw the terror in her eyes. I could make her safe. She merely had to trust me one last time. She called my name. The sound came out feeble and overwhelmed. It was sweet to my ears nonetheless. I clamped my hand onto her and pulled her hard to the window. She struggled, too much in fear of these wretches around me. I wrapped my arms around her in a loving embrace and pulled her through the window. She pressed her head against me and hot tears fell onto my neck. I turned and pushed through the crowd with her as my prize, safely away from the others. She struggled in my arms to be free. These awful creatures around me frightened her too badly to reason through the situation. Now I could give her the gift of protection. I pressed my mouth to her neck. How she struggled in my arms for this gift. It thrilled me to give it to her. Her liquid scent filled my nose, and pulsed into my mouth and down my chest. She was so soft and warm. Finally, she relaxed in my grip. Her unmoving eyes consented, accepting to the offer I'd made. Dear sweet Barbra hurried to the safe place inside my stomach.

THE END

Satisfying, quick and fun

"A Matter of Honor" by Sally Malcolm is a catchy story about SG-1's visit to P4X-481, a planet that has some interesting security technology and even more interesting gravitational machinery. Ordinarily that would be enough for two episodes worth of adventure, or equivalently one trade paperback from Fandemonium Books. Because the adventure has a well wrapped Baal tie-in, a Senator Kinsey hook, and all the pull of the planet-chomping black hole from the season 2 episode, "A Matter of Time" -- it rates a royal treatment -- a double book presentation. "A Matter of Honor" is the first part of the story, and "The Cost of Honor" is its conclusion. The plot of "A Matter of Honor" is very well done. It reads as fast as it is fun.

The hardest thing in the SG-1 universe for an author to do is to get the characterizations right. Sally Malcolm did an admirable job bringing our favorite Jaffa, Teal'c, to life in the pages of this book. The mannerisms were spot on. His subtle humor was natural and effectively presented. I liked her presentation of General Hammond very much.

In three places in "A Matter of Honor" the author missed the characterization mark. These EXTREMELY jarring gaffs happened in the characterization of Samantha Carter and Jack O'Neill. The first happens very, very early in the story when Samantha Carter thinks about when she will HAVE to relieve Colonel O'Neill of his command. There is an unfortunate and out of place discussion of military service being equivalent to legalized murder. The last and most appalling is when Colonel O'Neill shoots Teal'c in the ear because he mistook Teal'c for an enemy. Daniel Jackson, Teal'c, Samantha Carter and Jack O'Neill are heroic characters. The SG-1 canon has never wavered on that point. Taking liberties with the heroic nature of these four characters is -- CHEATING. Don't do it! These three miscues are the only weakness that mattered to me in the story because the storyline is so strong and (otherwise) well done.

This book is definitely worth a read, even if you have to hold your nose to cross three bad paragraphs. All the rest of the 236 pages of "A Matter of Honor" are a pleasure to read.

Mile 147

It's one of those days when everything feels a little out of whack. They had a fire alarm today. Everyone went outside, across the street, into an oversized gazebo, and out of the rain. A fireman climbed onto one of the picnic tables and announced that "as a part of fire safety week everyone should check the batteries in their fire extinguishers and make sure the pressure in their smoke detectors was still good". At first I thought it was just me, then the network server sympathetically failed when they announced who the "Employee of the Month" was. On a related note, they renewed the Son of Santa's network support contract today. A bald guy and a pregnant woman in a huge Chrysler challenged me to race to a southside taco stand. I didn't have enough gas for it. An abnormally tall man asked me why they put a buffalo on the back of the Kansas quarter because "everyone knew" that the last buffalo had already left and was swimming to the Phillipines. Is it still "dog paddling" if a buffalo does it?

Mile 147 is an ordinary mile marker on Interstate 40 in the Texas Panhandle east of Amarillo. Mile 147 is 1.4 miles from mile marker 146. This wouldn't matter if not for the fact that Mile 147 marks the secret entrance to the Isle of Misfit Toys. Stop by and say "Hi!" sometime. Rudolph and I work nights there with a small and charming Fish (who's our hero and union steward).