Free Books

Recently, I've started ordering free books online:

Free Constitution

Free Quran

Free Book of Revelations that looks like a D&D book?

Free Ayn Rand (but only ebooks :()

All but the D&D book might show up on the blog.

And, as always, remember:

Standard Ebooks

Project Gutenberg

Archive.org

Have fun!

Chewing Bubblegum and Kicking Ass: Eight O'clock In The Morning by Ray Nelson

For some reason, they didn't include a 6 minute fight scene in a six page story.

Stumbled across this at random on the internet today and gave it a read. No sun glasses, instead George "wakes up" when he goes to a hypnotist show and they tell him to wake up. George puppeting the dead alien at the end is funny. Kind of surprised Carpenter didn't keep it, seems like his style. Fun little read on my lunch break.

GWTTGB Intro

 I was all excited for this. I read the first section, and it was some good ol' Adler, "Reading to improve yourself." And then I skimmed a little (like he says to do!) and I saw some subject specific bits, how to mark a book, etc. Great! 400 pages books condensed down to 100ish. Just what I wanted HtRaB to be. Except, not really. Instead of a condensed version of the "How to read..." individual subjects, it's a real broad overview of the subject with quotes sprinkled through. Interesting, but not sure it was super illustrative. Not really well organized either. Could really use some numbered lists and/or bulleting.

As before, I really think Adler probably has a solid 100 pages of content, it's just a matter of putting it together right. Not sure where I'm going next, but see you all tomorrow! 

HtRaB: Final Thoughts

 I thought I had another section, but all that's left at the end are indexes, reading tests, etc. I thought the tests might be worth doing, but lost interest pretty quickly (in large part because of the awkward format of the answers).

So, final thoughts on How to Read a Book: In short, skip it. As I said several times, I agree with a lot of what Adler has to say, but it's highly repetitive, and when it's not repeating it's off on a lot of weird tangents. I'm going back to look at it, but I think there's a condensed version (~100 pages vs ~400) in the intro the Gateway. I'm betting that would be a much more efficient way of getting the same info, since I think you probably could cut a little over half without any issue.

Hopefully wrapping up with Adler towards the end of the week, then not sure what I'll be on next.

HtRaB Chapter 21: Reading and the Growth of the Mind

 I feel like Adler is starting to get a little punch drunk in these later chapters. After rambling about how he invented this cool new Synoptical Reading thing, he says in this chapter that we're probably least familiar with Analytical Reading. I think most people have at least a passing familiarity with close reading. I also want to push back (in a narrow case) on his assertion that fun/shallow books can't be developmental. They can be if, as an active reader (like he wants you to be) you critique them, think about how they can be improved etc. Obviously, the number of people who feel the need to or can gain much from critiquing trash sci-fi novels, but it's not nothing. He goes into a standard rant about how 99% of books are trash, fair. He then says there's probably a few thousand books worth reading once. I think this is a vast underestimating the number of books published per year (can't find a number for when this was published, but millions are published per year these days. Even if you knock it down to a hundred thousand a year, and one book in one thousand being worth reading, that's still a hundred a year. He goes on to say that a mere hundred in all of history are worth rereading. This is comically low. Even if we only go as far back as 1AD, that would mean something like 1 rereadable book came out every 20 years. He does specify that this is specific to each person, so I suppose an entire decade could pass where no book you were interested in rereading came out, but that seems like quite a stretch. 

Finally, read books that challenge you, exercise your brain, etc. All pretty standard.

HtRaB Chapter 20: THE FOURTH LEVEL OF READING! Synoptical Reading

 This section is more of a return to the beginning of the book with goals, questions, etc.  Before getting to the steps in Synoptical Reading, Adler needs to, again, ramble on for a couple pages about how THE SAME WORD CAN HAVE MULTPLE MEANINGS!

As far as the steps go, they're very similar to the ones in the other sections, slightly adjusted or reordred:

1. Find Relevant Passages (NOT RELEVANT BOOKS!)

2. Bring author to terms (WORDS MEAN DIFFERENT THINGS!)

3. Get questions clear

4. Define issues

5. Analyze the discussion

Some discussion of bias, a sales pitch for the Synopticon (it's not a terrible idea, but it's the kind of thing that'd need to be updated regularly, like an encyclopedia, and it only made it through 2 editions in 40 years).

Then, back to WORDS MEAN DIFFERENT THINGS. Again... 

I know I took a month off, but after the super specific sections previously, this really feels like he should've put it with earlier, it seems to fit more there. 

HtRaB Chapter 19: How To Read Social Science

 Adler says that social science is a relatively new field. This is iffy when the first edition was published in 1940, and well out the door by the second in 1972.

He then wastes 10 pages with what can be summarized as: Social Science is amorphous and indefinable.

Phone posting, because he sure phones in this chapter.

HtRaB Chapter 18: Philosophy

 While he's better remembered for his education works today, Philosophy is arguably his primary subject. As a result, Philosophy gets the largest section out of all the genres, by a large margin. It's not worth it. Like many of the sections, there's a lot of repetition from the initial "principles of reading" sections here. And, like all bad philosophy texts, he needs to spend a considerable amount of time on why philosophy is impossible and totally different from those other, lesser, forms of writing. History doesn't do X, manuals can't do Y, no one could ever figure out an answer to questions about existence, etc. I'll limit my whining and pull out two points that I found interesting, both about children:

1. Children as "better" questions than adults, because they ask "why?" (Philosophers are the adults who keep asking why. Don't think about all the scientists asking why stuff happens, they don't count.

2. Children are obsessed with right and wrong because, "their behinds are likely to suffer if they make mistakes about it." That's a clever turn of phrase.

Clues Corporealizing Constantly: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allan Poe

 Thanks, Gutenberg!

Summary: A locked room mystery with decapitations, people stuffed up chimmies, and unintelligible accents.

Bonus: 

Kinda accurate to the story.

Summary: Tonight's silent book club theme was mysteries. "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" is widely credited as the first detective story, and I was happy for an excuse to read more Poe.

Two women are murdered (in a locked room, because of course). One is shoved up a chimney, the other is decapitated (seemingly by the straight razor at the scene of the crime). The most important clue is that there were two voices heard, one French and one variously described as one of a half dozen unintelligible foreign languages, each by a person who speaks a different languages (eg an Italian says its Russian, a Russian says its Spanish, etc.).

Poe's anonymous (very self-inserty) narrator and Dupin establish the Watson-Holmes pairing very quickly, down to being vaguely gay. 

In the end, it's a fun story, but somewhat weakened by the fact that several of the clues don't show up until too late. After a rambling introduction (using as examples) of calculation vs analysis, Poe gives the details of the murder via newspaper clippings. I've summarized the key points above. Poe and Dupin investigate the scene of the crime for about a paragraph, then return to their gothic mansion. Dupin has it solved! Thanks to a tuft of hair and a ribbon he pulls out of his ass. An orangutan stole its owner ( a sailor)'s razor and escaped. It comes to the rooms of the two women, murders one and tries to hide the body from the sailor. It lops off the other's head and throws her into the street. Also, the room isn't locked, due to a precisely damaged nail that looks like it's holding the window shut.

3/5 on the classics scale. Interesting and significant despite its faults.

Classic Comics Collection: Sailor Moon

 Read this for silent book club at the winery back in April, but didn't blog it since it didn't fit in with A to Z. I talked on the other blog about how I'm reading stuff from my childhood, and this matched the book to movie/tv theme they were doing.

Sailor Moon is a lot of firsts for me. I'm pretty sure it's the first show I watched "actively" in that I tried to catch it every day, followed the plot, so on and so forth. I could just sneak it in before I had to leave for school in the mornings (I think it was in the 8AM slot). I still have a soft spot for that dub. It's cheesy, but I don't think it's as awful as people make it out to be, and most of the actresses are pretty good.

It's the first anime that I watched that I was conscious of a difference in style compared to "regular" cartoons. I think I'd probably seen some before then (If I had to guess, I think Noozles on Nickolodeon/my grandma's VHS was probably the first) but Sailor Moon is very 90s anime, with sweat drops, stock footage, and all that good stuff.

It's the first thing I watched that made me want to track down the source material (the dub credits a "original KODANSHA Comic Book") though that'd take years.

Definitely a lifelong love of cheesy shojo anime/manga. The tackier the better.

The manga's not great (it's also 30 years old, so maybe a little slack). I think the Sailor V manga is actually stronger. Sailor Moon runs really fast, and can be kind of shallow because of it. New characters pop up very quickly, but with minimal characterization. By the end of this volume you have: Sailors Moon, Mercury, Mars, and Jupiter, Luna, the rest of the Tsukino Family, Mamoru/Tuxedo Kamen (very out as Kamen, wears a tuxedo in public, not as Endymion), Queen Beryl, Jadeite, Nephrite, Naru, Umino, Haruna-Sensei, Motoki, and a couple other even more minor characters. It's 5 chapters. Jadeite is already dead by the end. It's like 200 pages.

 I read an interesting article (that I can't find now) about how different the production process was for older anime, why filler was so necessary, etc., mostly due to pacing. Napkin math: Sailor Moon (manga) premieres December 28th 1991. The anime premiers less than three months later on March 7th 1992. Episode 25 (roughly coinciding with the end of this volume) hits in September. Chapter 5 drops in April, and corresponds with episode 25 of the show. They had to stretch 5 chapters/months of manga into 6 months and 25 episodes of TV. No wonder there's so many character filler episodes. The end of the first arc would be chapters 13 and 14, which would drop about a month before the TV episodes for them.

Beyond that, I'll be the 9001th person to mention that the manga is considerably more graphic than even the least censored show (the live action?) People get sliced in half and decapitated. Mamoru has a lot less to do in this volume than the equivalent anime, Usagi handles the first several monsters without his help.

I'm reading out of the "Eternal" edition that Kodansha ran in the late 2010s. It's very well produced. Nice paper, strong colors. They keep the kanji for sound effects, which is always a plus. Even little things like the newspapers appear to be fully translated. They kept cute little stuff like the star and moon in Sailor (* Moon (It looks much better, I'm lazy). I was interested to note that they kept the art for the little "creator note" side panels, but didn't bother to translate them. I think the only line I can remember keeping them was the old Viz Shojo Beat imprint and I can't remember the last time I saw a scanlation with them.

All in all, this was fun. It's not a "good" series, but when Takeuchi lets the characters breathe for more than half a panel, they're just as interesting as ever. I might go through the rest eventually (summer project?)

Phone Posting

 Left main computer at work today, so trying a phone post for the first time. Someone was complaining about people misusing participles, "I seen," should be "I saw," that kind of thing. I'll skip the dialect debate, because I don't like phone posting. I told him it could also be, "I've seen," as in, "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attacks ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion." Told you it's the one most likely to be useful in casual conversation. Still working on the next sentence. I always forget that the C-beams glitter specifically in the dark.

Phone post, away!

Knot again! Teaching other people

 Had a friend come over tonight, and he asked me to help him with a couple knots to help him tie down loads. I was a little disappointed in myself that I never bothered to learn the trucker's hitch, which is probably the ideal, but I did show him 4 or 5 of the knots from that knot challenge a couple months ago that should help.

I teach people knots pretty regularly. Usually one of my students when they finish something early and get bored. The point of this is less about knots in general, and more that everyone should have a skill that you can teach people in five minutes or so. It's fun for them (hopefully you too), impressive, and if you do it enough someone, someday will actually use it. You don't have to give them a lot, just one or two basic points that can get them started. They can always look up or come for more. That's your goal this week, non-existent blog audience. Go teach someone how to tie a knot or polish their silverware or hyper-efficiently clean a litter box, or whatever it is your know how to do.

HtRaB Chapter 17: How to Read Science and Mathematics

 Back on this, at least for tonight. I've talked before about how readable I found most of the science in 15MAD and the math selections in TGWttGB were pretty good as well. According to Adler, this is because, up until sometime in the early 20th century, most science pieces were written with the intent it would be understandable for a layman. An intelligent/educated one, but a layman none-the-less. I never really thought about that, but it makes sense. I have a friend who is a scientist who often talks about improving scientific communication for people. Also, math is a language. The math part was definitely less interesting than the science one.

DICKFEST 2025! "The Little Black Box" by Phillip K. Dick

 Was I supposed to finish Adler stuff? Yes. Am I going to read a Phillip K. Dick short story instead? You bet!

The Little Black Box

Summary: It's all the parts that didn't make it into Bladerunner!

Bonus: This is a little black box:

Commentary: I should add the Litany Against Fear to the list.

No particular thoughts on proto-Mercer story. It's good weird Phillip K Dickishness. Got home late because it was my wife's graduation. I'm tired.

Tears In The Rain: Vague Imagery

 One of the things that I think makes Tears In The Rain work so well is the combination of concrete imagery, and the lack of explanation of what's going in.

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off (the) shoulder of Orion. 

What are attack ships? Why are they at Orion? (Leave out the fact that the shoulder of Orion doesn't really make sense in the context of the constellation). It's easy to imagine ships on fire (I like to think of the end of Starcraft Campaign 1), but we get the mystery of where/why exactly they are).

I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. 

Glitter is doing some heavy lifting here, and is a great verb. Why are more lasers not glittery? What is a C-beam? A non-laser beam at or near the speed of light? What is the Tannhäuser Gate. Bonus points for opera reference. I've talked about this before, but even before I started doing this blog I've always loved references to classic writing, mythology, etc. in sci-fi and fantasy. I like to think it's a big FTL gate. Do they have FTL in blade runner? Presumably, if they can get attack ships to Betelgeuse. 

All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

Tears in the rain is perhaps the least mysterious imagery in the speech, but (even without Batty literally sitting in the rain) it speaks to his character. Can't have a KILL DROID showing tears, but of course a human would cry.

Maybe I'll just make this a Blade Runner blog for a while. I haven't reread Androids in years...

Memorization #2: Tears In The Rain

"This Is Just To Say..." went pretty well, so I'll go for it again. Tears In The Rain is like 50% longer, but I think I can handle it.

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off (the) shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

I think I've posted this video as an extra before:

Like I said earlier, this one strikes me as the best "party trick" choice. It's also fun to have something sci-fi. There's not a ton of good sci-fi monologues (I guess I could grab something from Wrath of Khan), but that just makes it more important to grab the ones there are.

Voice Reveal!

 Got in late tonight. The blog is definitely more manageable when I'm on a concrete goal like 15MAD was. I know what I read, I can prep it, etc. I was thinking of doing this the other night, but didn't get a chance. I'll probably replace it with a better one later.

View on Vocaroo >>

Oh yeah, that sucks.

MRE Menu 20 Is Weird!

 Welcome to a very off topic blog post. Sometimes, I go to the surplus store up the road and buy MREs. Most of them are actually pretty decent, at least for an occasional something different. They're definitely better than a frozen dinner or fast food. I occasionally take them camping, but mostly just eat them when my wife's out. I do most of the cooking, but I don't really like to cook for just myself. Left on my own, if there's no left overs, I'll resort to a can of soup if I really don't want to cook, or (if I sort of do) eggs, toast, maybe some sausage or bacon if its around, a piece of fruit if I'm feeling healthy. With the MRE, you usually get something resembling a three or four course meal, which is a lot more interesting than whatever bachelor-chow I'd relive. 

The usual MRE menu is:

1. Snack: Trail mix, combo-pretzels, etc. I usually have these as an "appetizer" while I make the rest.

2. Bread and Spread: Usually crackers, occasionally tortillas, and cheeze-whiz. Sometimes jelly, peanut butter, etc. Since I'm not in a foxhole or whatever, I usually put the cheese on the cracker/tortilla, pop it in the toaster oven, and make a pseudo-grilled cheese.

3. Entrée: The current official MRE menu has two options. Between the ones I've tried and looking over the menu, I'd say about a half are good, a third are passable, and the rest I try not to get. There's a lot of "Southwest/Mexican Beef/Chicken" all of which are solid. Nothing super exotic, although I think an MRE was the first place I had goulash.

4. Desert: Lots of pound cake and sugar cookies, but you get more interesting stuff like an apple dumpling from time to time.

And then there's usually a little goodie bag with powdered drink mix, candy, freeze dried coffee, etc. My favorites are the ones that come with a bag of "fruit puree." Truly, the American military's greatest invention is squeeze bags of adult baby food. I'm not kidding, I would eat like five a day if I could.

Occasionally, I'll use the snack/cracker/spread in the main course. Any of the tex-mex ones benefit from some cheese spread squeezed in, and some of the thinner stews are improved by cracker/corn nut chunks to thicken them up.

Anyway, tonight I sat down and opened up a 2022 Vintage Menu 20: Italian Sausage with Peppers and Onions in Marinara Sauce. Out comes:

1. Smoked Almonds. Okay, that's a fair snack to munch on while I make the rest.

2. Crackers. Normal.

3. Cheese Spread. Will go on crackers to make grilled cheese. Might mix a little in the sausage.

4. Recovery Trail Mix w/ beef jerky. Kind of weird, with the almonds, but okay.

5. Hot beverage bag (this usually means coffee, but every once in awhile you get luck with hot chocolate).

6. Powdered Lemonade

7. Dried Cranberries. Oh boy, more trail mix!

8. Goodie bag w/ coffee, gum, etc.

So, I dumped the almonds, trail mix, and cranberries together to have some trailmix with my trailmix so I could trailmix while I trailmixed.

Does this meme count as a classic yet?

I went online and confirmed that Menu 20 is, in fact, the trailmix menu.

Weird, reasonably tasty, filling. 3/5 on the MRE scale, which is slightly worse than a 3/5 on the classics scale.

Come back tomorrow when I'll get back to classics. Or maybe I'll be reviewing the best scratch and sniff pens. Who knows!?

Memorization: This Is Just To Say

 Decided to start with something a little smaller than "The Man in the Arena" for my memorization. "This Is Just to Say" by William Carlos Williams is one of my favorite poems, and it's only 33 words, which makes it pretty manageable. I'll continue to work on the larger pieces, but fun to work on a small one first.

This Is Just To Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

The hardest part is remember where the that and which are. At first, I thought there was a that in the first line.

So, there we go. It'll probably never be anything more than a party trick, but always fun to accomplish anything, even something little like this. I'm still in catch up mode for the blog at the moment. Finishing up the Adlerama series I started before April, and doing posts for a couple smaller/one shot readings I did in the couple months. Not sure where I'm going after that. Part of me wants to circle back to the Norton Anthology stuff I was looking at earlier in the year. The other part wants to dig in and do a whole book.

Star Wars Week 2025

 Happy May the Fourth. I'll be posting over on Star Wars Classics instead this week.

Memorization Part 2

I'm tired, but I'm KEEPING THE STREAK! so here's a kind of half assed entry about the stuff I'm considering memorizing this month.

I didn't have a super specific criteria for choosing these. I had to like them, obviously. I chose to avoid most of the "It's better to die X than live Y!" type poems/speeches, since I'm not planning to charge off to a glorious death anytime soon, and I feel like you should more or less try to live the poem/speech you're memorizing. On the whole, I was mostly looking for something I could say in my head when things are rough, or maybe snap off as an "off the cuff" monologue, people like stuff like that.

"Citizenship in a Republic" AKA "The Man In The Arena" by Teddy Roosevelt: There's two paragraphs in here that are popularly memorized, which I already copied in the previous memorization post. Besides the general "pick yourself off, you're gonna make mistakes, get back in there" message, which is always a good one, I also like the critique of pointless cynicism and criticism, which are just as popular now as they were in Teddy's time.

"This Is Just To Say" by William Carlos Williams: This is my favorite poem. It's not too long. I especially like the last stanza, which makes them sound like they were the plums he ate after dragging himself out of hell or something.

"St. Crispin's Day" by William Shakespeare: My favorite Shakespeare speech. I want to go through the sonnets again. I might consider "My Mistresses Eyes Are Nothing Like The Sun." This is the closest to a "glorious death" speech I was willing to consider, but it's not quite in favor of outright suicide. More of a "push your luck FOR GLORY!"

"Hate me, but do it honestly." by There's like half a dozen writers credited?: We all have a tacky/hammy monologue we loved as a kid. This one is mine. If you're gonna hate someone, you might as well do it for the right reason. Also, I have managed to land a coin on the edge.

"Tears in the rain" by (mostly) Rutger Hauer: This one just seems like the most fun to whip out at a party or whatever. If people know Blade Runner they're recognize it. If not, it still sounds cool.

Goodnight, Internet.

A to Z 2025 Reflection

 Top line: It was nice to do one of these reading lists again. I started the blog with one, and I should probably just keep doing them. Every time I stop, I miss them. Every time I restart, I have a great time. I do have that Norton Anthology sitting on my desk...

The average was a little lower here than on the 15MAD list, which surprised me. It's newer, I got to pick, I didn't have to read any awkward excerpts in the middle of the piece. 15MAD finished with a 2.47, TGWttGB came in at 2.23. Not a huge difference, and still "passing", but surprising never the less.

Speed round of all the ones with really high or low scores:

5:

"Contentment": Do stuff you enjoy, make your life better!  

4s:

"Of Refinement in The Arts"? Or maybe "The Study of Mathematics"?: My notes don't make sense. 

"The Running Down of the Universe": Entropy is when everything is maximumly (that does not look right) random.

0:

"Definition of a Number": Numbers are numbers.

I learned some stuff, I read some cool stuff, all around a good time. Even though the average is a bit lower, The Gateway... is probably a more practical introduction to classics than 15MAD. Copies are cheaper, easier to find, larger print, and only take like 2 or 3 feet of shelf instead of 5. 

Memorization (I lied!)

 I said tonight was going to be a reflection post for TGWttGB, but then I mowed the lawn, took a bath, and went to a crit circle, and I don't feel like trying to grind out a "good" post before bed. Plus, this post has a little urgency, so good to get it out sooner.

HR sent out their (usually bullshit) "Employee Assistance" newsletter for the month. I skim them, I usually don't take much away, whatever.

But today it had a mental health challenge calendar, and obviously I'm a sucker for that kind of thing. The day one challenge is to set three self care goals for the month. My first two are boringly standard, getting more exercise and going to bed on time. But number three ties back into the blog. As I read through most of the education themed classics, along with the introductions to the collection, something they talk about a lot is the "joy of keeping quotes in your soul" or some such. So, self care goal number 3 for the month: Memorize at least one poem, speech, etc. Current front runner is Roosevelt's "Man In The Arena" from "Citizenship in a Republic."

Let the man of learning, the man of lettered leisure, beware of that queer and cheap temptation to pose to himself and to others as a cynic, as the man who has outgrown emotions and beliefs, the man to whom good and evil are as one. The poorest way to face life is to face it with a sneer. There are many men who feel a kind of twisted pride in cynicism; there are many who confine themselves to criticism of the way others do what they themselves dare not even attempt. There is no more unhealthy being, no man less worthy of respect, than he who either really holds, or feigns to hold, an attitude of sneering disbelief toward all that is great and lofty, whether in achievement or in that noble effort which, even if it fails, comes second to achievement. A cynical habit of thought and speech, a readiness to criticize work which the critic himself never tries to perform, an intellectual aloofness which will not accept contact with life’s realities—all these are marks, not as the possessor would fain to think, of superiority, but of weakness. They mark the men unfit to bear their part painfully in the stern strife of living, who seek, in the affectation of contempt for the achievement of others, to hide from others and from themselves their own weakness. The role is easy; there is none easier, save only the role of the man who sneers alike at both criticism and performance.

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. Shame on the man of cultivated taste who permits refinement to develop into fastidiousness that unfits him for doing the rough work of a workaday world. Among the free peoples who govern themselves there is but a small field of usefulness open for the men of cloistered life who shrink from contact with their fellows. Still less room is there for those who deride or slight what is done by those who actually bear the brunt of the day; nor yet for those others who always profess that they would like to take action, if only the conditions of life were not exactly what they actually are. The man who does nothing cuts the same sordid figure in the pages of history, whether he be cynic, or fop, or voluptuary. There is little use for the being whose tepid soul knows nothing of the great and generous emotion, of the high pride, the stern belief, the lofty enthusiasm, of the men who quell the storm and ride the thunder. Well for these men if they succeed; well also, though not so well, if they fail, given only that they have nobly ventured, and have put forth all their heart and strength. It is war-worn Hotspur, spent with hard fighting, he of the many errors and the valiant end, over whose memory we love to linger, not over the memory of the young lord who “but for the vile guns would have been a valiant soldier.”

If you've got any suggestions, I'd love to hear them. Otherwise, I'll try to have something locked in by early next week. Be cool if I get two or three, but one is fine. Not sure how hard it'll be.