"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
It’s the week when, in folklore, nothing happens; the quiet peaceful interlude between Christmas and the new year. In actuality, the world keeps on turning: we’ve merely turned our attention inward, away from genocide, starvation, war, terrorism, slavery, mass shootings, corruption. We pretend it’s a season of tolerance and love, and maybe it is … […]
This is an older post, originally posted in March 2008, updated to correct some details I got wrong the first time around. —Paul A friend sent me a link to this History Channel video, which has been circulating on the internet for several years: He wanted to know if the video was for real … […]
Last night Donna asked me if I couldn’t see my way clear to working up a little Christmas spirit. Sigh. Millions are affected by holiday season depression. I always thought they were weak, but now I’m ready to admit I have a touch of it myself. It certainly helps explain my seasonal grumpiness, which rarely lifts […]
You may have noticed a trend here toward fewer topical posts. More and more, I write about life, books, and aviation. Two windows are always open on my desktop monitor: one is this blog, the other the draft of the memoir I plug away at. The personal rides shotgun these days; politics and current events ride […]
From an article titled State of Terror, written by Keith Gessen and published by The New Yorker on November 6, 2017: Stalin soon began to receive warnings of an imminent German invasion. Despite the ravages of the Terror, his anti-Nazi spy network was still the best in the world. Hitler issued a top-secret order for […]
Ode to Mr. Moto! Six Mitsubishis — with bombs all set to slide — The sailor gave his guns a squirt — and there were only five. Five Jap bombers thirsting still for gore, Our N.A. blipped another burst, and now — there’s only four. Four grim and deadley Nipponese droned o’er the Eastern Sea, […]
This is collection of reviews previously posted on Paul’s Thing: these are the books, old and new, that I most enjoyed reading this year. I’m about to embark on Philip Pullman’s “The Book of Dust,” a potential contender, but doubt I’ll finish it before the end of the year (also, I’m sometimes disappointed with long-delayed […]
I’m enormously gratified to see Doug Jones win over the odious Roy Moore in yesterday’s Alabama special election. Values beat tribalism, but it was a squeaker. It shouldn’t have been as close as it was; if all Alabamians had turned out, Jones would have won by ten or more percentage points and there’d be no talk of recounts.