One of the questions I constantly ask myself, as a parent, is “How can I make my job harder?”
One of the least appealing traits of babies is their perpetual incontinence. Yes, they are very cute and cuddly but there’s no getting around the fact that they pee and poop everywhere without consideration. They all do it, even the perfect-looking ones. Baby excrement is a problem that affects everyone. Continue reading
How do used-and-rare booksellers make a living these days? The advent of eBay and Amazon has decimated prices in used-and-rare, as everyone and their dog has hauled books down out of the attic and put them on sale online, for a little extra cash. Books that would have gone for $5 in a bricks-and-mortar store are now available in their hundreds online for $1 + $3 shipping.
One technique real booksellers use to make a buckle here and there is to put together sets of books aimed at completists, book-collectors who like to have, say, every book ever written by a certain author. Continue reading
Hey gang, hope you are having a great day. Just another reminder that we now have a Tips Page. Use it. Love it. Continue reading
Even though we are heading into the holiday season, let’s not get overwhelmed by good will. Some people deserve to be on Santa’s “naughty” list. In this case it’s Chick fil-A who’s going after Bo Muller-Moore, a Montpelier, VT tee-shirt maker for his website selling tee-shirts and bumper stickers with the slogan “Eat More Kale.” Chick fil-A insists Muller-Moore’s website eatmorekale.com conflicts with their website and slogan, eatmorchikin.com. Continue reading
American Airlines parent AMR corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Tuesday. This filing leaves Jet Blue and Southwest Airlines as the only two major U.S. airlines that have not filed for bankruptcy reorganization. Continue reading
It turns out that in 2007 the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND – the German intelligence agency) shredded the files of 250 BND employees who had been members of either the National Socialist German Workers Party, better known as the Nazis, or the Gestapo. Continue reading
Having hosted two German foreign exchange students (and being of mostly-German descent), I am completely and totally in love with Germany. Joke about Germany all you want, but they know how to do Christmas-time. First of all, you have beginning in late November, the Weihnachtsmarkts, which are these glorious open-air Christmas markets where you can wander around, buy lots of cool stuff AND get snockered on Gluhwein (a mulled wine). Continue reading
In a fall schedule filled with over-stuffed television bloated with plot devices we’ve seen before, laugh tracks we thought were a thing of the past, and NBC, who can’t keep a stable of good shows on the air if you paid them directly for the luxury — many viewers have been turning to non-network TV to accomplish what random sitcoms and exhaustive procedural dramas haven’t been able to create — real entertainment.
Has Starz hit paydirt? Continue reading
“The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.” ~George F. Will, The Leveling Wind
“A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties.” ~Harry Truman
I wrote about gratitude before Thanksgiving and it started me thinking about how differently each person can view the same situation. I am a half-full gal but I married a half-empty kind of guy. My lovable husband has moments of being just like Glum in Gulliver’s Travels, “Flirtatia, we’ll never make it!” Continue reading
The Pedobear meme will never go away. Never.