(W. C. Fields as sideshow barker Gabby Gilfoil in the 1927 film Two Flaming Youths- Corbis-Bettmann Archives.) “You need perfume? We got perfume, how ’bout an engagement ring? Something for the little lady, something for the little lady, Something for the little lady, hmm Three for a dollar We got a year-end clearance, we got […]

“Step right up, step right up, step right up, Everyone’s a winner, bargains galore That’s right, you too can be the proud owner Of the quality goes in before the name goes on One-tenth of a dollar, one-tenth of a dollar, we got service after sales…” What a song! It rolls, it laughs, it reaches […]

(Japanese Emperor Hirohito Calls on General of the Army Doug MacArthur, Tokyo, 1945)   They are at it again, bow-wowing over the greeting of the President of the United States to some overseas monarch. The one to the King of Saudi Arabia still has the Right agog, the bow to a reigning Islamic Potentate, guardian […]

(Brandy Station Review, June 1863 – painting and copyright by artist Don Troiani)   Yesterday was busy, since it started out with a mild case of disorientation, as you may have heard, and then I had to get down and back to the farm at Brandy Station- cat issues, of course, and some seasonal issues […]

(Oh, my God.)   I am surprised my head is still on straight this morning. The story started to write itself last night. I woke up just after two; that was a simple function of being so groggy by nine that there was no point in trying to stay up any longer.   I knew […]

  The hurricane- the remnants of it, anyway- has passed. I am hoping for “dry” this afternoon, or at least only damp, since we are off for the blacktop around the stadium at College Park in about an hour.   Dreams have long died this season, though of course my real allegiance is to a […]

(Dismounted troops. Battery B, 3rd Battalion, 320th Field Artillery Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. US Army photo.)   I got a note from Kabul this morning. I cherish those communications, which strike me with awe at the miracles of technology that permit instantaneous communication across the time zones.   There was a time, not long ago, […]

(The Little Giant, Speaker Carl Albert)   Speaker of the House Carl Albert (D-OK-3), the most famous former resident of Big Pink, would probably have sent in his proxie for the Board to vote his unit at the annual meeting.   I say that only because he was a busy man with national responsibilities.   […]

  It would already have turned to 11 November on the Continent when the event occurred. The commemorations of the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the 18th year of a new century would begin shortly, and head in this direction across the still-dark sea.   We have turned the holiday into an event […]

(The Ludendorf Rail Bridge, 1945)   The anniversary of the Fall was yesterday, or so they tell me.   I wrap my life around that long ribbon of concrete. It went up in 1961, when I was ten and the notion that our little suburban town was in imminent danger of being incinerated by Soviet […]