Todd Depastino's  Bill Mauldin: A life Upfront  is an excellent biography of cartoonists/author/ illustrator, best known for his war cartoons featuring the "dog face" GI's Willie and  Joe. Depastino's book  fleshes out Mauldin's life, his quick rise to fame ( his Up Front cartoons were done at the age of 21!) and subsequent fights  for respect and ( Read more... )

"You will be required to do wrong no matter where you go.  It is the basic condition of life, to be required to violate your own indentity. At some time, every creature which lives must do so. It is the ultimate shadow, the defeat of creation; this is the curse at work, the curse that feeds on all life. Everywhere in the universe."

Do Androids Dream ( Read more... )

 Rush vocalist makes donation to Negro Leagues Museum

By WARD TRIPLETT

The Kansas City Star


( Read more... )

Harlan Ellison was on Public Radio's Studio 360 this week
go to http://www.studio360.org to  listen to either the cleaned up 12 minute aired segment or even better the hour long warts n all interview. If you love Harlan like I do, warts n all is the way to go.

 
The Rangers will have approximately 19 Million in Cap Room if they don't resign Jagr, Shanny, Rozival and straka.

if they spend wisely the rangers could look like this

Lw                  C           Rw

Hossa          Gomez      Huselius

Avery         Dubinsky    Dawes

Prucha/Korpiskoski Drury  Callahan

Sjostrom      Betts         Mietennen (Holweg)

( Read more... )

 
I just  finished John Birmingham's Weapons of Choice  bk 1 of the Axis of Time trilogy. It is fantastic and loads of fun .

the basic premise: A Multi-national  Fleet of Navy ships f rom the year 2021 have been thrown back in time to just before the battle of midway 1942.

this is very similar, in general concept, to the movie
Final Countdown
where the ( Read more... )

Just had to do this one -lol


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"Humor is tolerant,tender...its ridicule caresses. Wit stabs, begs pardon- and turns the weapon in the wound."

Ambrose Bierce

This Summer, I have the distinct pleasure of seeing two bands that were among the first bands I ever got seriously into:

Jethro Tull and Rush.

Rush I have seen regularly over the years, but for various and sundry misbegotten and forgotten reasons I haven't seen Tull since 89-90!!!

So in Lieu of Tull's 40 anniverasy tour and my seeing them for the ( Read more... )

or more things to make existence worth living through...

Luc Sante's Kill All Your Darlings:Pieces 1990-2005

A fantastic  collection of his pieces in various publications, all with his hard boiled style of writing ala Low Life. The ones that strike me are his New York Pieces, but he also has excellent essays on Tintin,Bob Dylan, The Blues, Victor ( Read more... )